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Approaching my final semester at Syracuse University, the most important thing I’ve learned is that you don’t need to be changed. You need to be embraced. The past, present and future versions of yourself are all deserving of acknowledgement and appreciation.

The phrase “I’ve been changed as a person” is a fairly common one. I’ve heard it frequently with graduation creeping around the corner. As I hear people reflect on their college careers, many claim SU has changed them, that the person they were when they started college is no longer who they are as they graduate.

Full transparency: I think that’s a silly thing to say. But, to be fair, I used to see no problem with it. On the contrary, I used to look forward to the day I’d post my graduation photos and craft a caption saying a similar phrase. But now that I’m getting closer to wrapping up at SU, I don’t think that way at all anymore.

I don’t think I’m a different person than I was four years ago. In fact, I know I’m not. The scared, unsure freshman is still within me. I don’t want to forget that she existed, and I don’t want to overlook all the work she did. It wouldn’t be fair to that version of myself.

SU didn’t change me; it taught me. It taught me how to embrace the parts of myself I had previously tried to keep hidden. My path from freshman year to now wasn’t always smooth sailing and posed many moments of self-doubt. At times, I even felt like the core of my personality was under threat.

I sacrificed parts of myself to try to be someone else, hoping I would fit into places where I didn’t belong. I used to beat myself up for my past decisions.

But I don’t hold it against myself anymore. I was naive and confused, doing what I could to stay afloat. The more time I spent here, and the more people I became close with, the more I learned to stop concealing myself and be authentic.

Many of the decisions I made are worlds apart from how I would approach them today. But I’ve come to learn that without making those ridiculous choices, I never would’ve learned why they were so ridiculous. The virtues and values I hold close now have all surfaced through those past experiences.

Freshman year, I spent a decent amount of time filtering myself — what I would say around certain people, how I would act, even what I would wear. I watered down the version of myself I previously had been proud to be, fearing the people around me wouldn’t like me. I worried they’d think I was too much.

For the first few weeks of school, it seemed to work. I was hanging out with girls who seemed to like me, except it wasn’t me that they liked, it was this polished and filtered version of myself. That version of myself was really boring and had no discernable personality. She never wore her favorite colors. She never talked about her niche interests that she had extensive knowledge of. But they liked her well enough, so for a while, I saw no sense in changing.

It wasn’t until a chance encounter that I found my real group of friends — the friends that I still consider my best friends three and a half years later — that I realized there was no need to water myself down. My best friends embraced the girl whom I hid away. They loved my loud personality. They would always remember my favorite color. They sat and listened to me talking about random video game lore and the history of Point Nemo, the most remote place on earth. They didn’t change me, nor did they expect me to change.

Instead, they showed me that the girl underneath was just as deserving of friendship and love. While it hurts to know it took watering myself down to get to the real friends, I know it was worth it. Had I not questioned my authentic self, I never would’ve learned to love her even louder and prouder. I would never have understood that it’s my uniqueness that draws genuine friends to me.

Don’t discredit the past version of yourself for getting you to where you are now. Even if they made some questionable decisions, and even if you’re happy to be free of what they were going through, it’s because of the past that you are who you are today. You haven’t changed; you’ve learned. It was your past self who led you to uncover the parts of yourself you’re proud of today, so give yourself credit for that.

Gracie Lebersfeld is a senior majoring in selected studies in education and creative writing. She can be reached at gmlebers@syr.edu

Published on January 28, 2026 at 9:55 pm