VASQUEZ: Make your lives extraordinary

“Seize the day, boys. Make your lives extraordinary.”

These words have been resounding in my head lately. No matter how I look at it, I find myself steadily approaching the point of no return. The halfway point. And when John Keating tries to inspire his class of boys with these words in my favorite movie, “Dead Poets Society,” I hear him speaking to me directly, whispering about time lost and unexplored, encouraging me, reminding me that I must fully live each day.

Right now it feels as if I am standing on the precipice of the rest of my life. Two years have never gone by so quickly. In another two years’ time, I will be taking the final step out of the comfort zone of education and into the hands of the real world. I will be entering the whirlwind of first jobs and salaries, balancing the adjustment of no longer being a student, and learning to use this foundation I have been building my entire life to stand on my own two feet.

I am two decades into my life. I always imagined things differently at this point. Not better, not worse, but different. But I don’t think there is anything wrong with that. This is only halftime. It’s not over yet. I can change things around if I want. I can improve and strengthen. There is still a long journey of growing and learning ahead of me. It is time to learn from my mistakes and make new ones. It is time to stop wasting time. I want to go back out there and keep giving it my best.

It has been a year of change. It has been a year of growth. It has been a year of falling behind and getting ahead. I have learned to sacrifice consistency, to keep my mind open like a parachute, to take a punch and keep fighting. It has been a year of personal transitions and global reshaping. We have raised our voices and fought to be heard. We have made changes within ourselves to make changes within society.

Through my words, I have experienced it all. For the first time, I have kept my New Year’s resolution to write more. Whether on this column, online, or in person, I have not stayed silent. And I refuse to do so from now on. I have seen the power I can have. I have seen the potential of everyone around me. If there is one thing I have learned, it is that every single person has one power that cannot be taken away: words. We all use them in different ways and through different mediums. But whether it is in writing, through music, in speech, we have the ability to make our lives extraordinary.

It is time to stop standing casually by. We are no longer the observers. We are action. We must be the leaders. Because before we know it, there will be no one above us telling us what to do and how to do it. The ropes will lie in front of our hands, and we must take them with all the strength we can muster. Every single day is one step closer to the top. If we make the most of the rest of our days, then we have nothing to be scared of when we reach this halfway point, or when we arrive at that final precipice on the graduation stage.

As the days slip us by and we get closer to the end of another year, we can look back and reflect on everything that has happened. All the people we have met, the connections around the world, the memories both remembered and forgotten, the songs we jammed to, the lazy days and the long nights. We have an entire summer to look back and prepare ourselves for what comes next. But once September rolls around and the summer haze clears away, there is no more looking back, only ahead. Whatever you have done up to this point, take and it and learn from it. Whether this is graduation, only the beginning, or halftime for you, it is time to take my favorite character’s words to heart and make each day extraordinary.

This is the first last of many for me. My final column of the semester. Here in this spot, once a week on Tuesday mornings, my rants and musings are printed for all to see. I have taken my words and made sure they are heard. I have played hard this first half. And now it is time to sit for a moment, recuperate, and gear up for round two. The feeling of reaching a halfway point is bittersweet, but I know there are so many good things to come.

It’s been beautiful, Boston. See you in the fall.
Dany Vasquez is a sophomore in the College of Communication and a weekly columnist for The Daily Free Press. She can be reached at vasquezd@bu.edu.