To the class of 2009: The best years of your life await you. You will be surprised at the changes you will see in yourself during this new stage of your life. You have finally finished with high school and will now truly have to strive to be young independent individuals. I would like to offer a small piece of advice for those who are looking to find inner peace.

My advice is to surround yourself with people who will make you a better person — people with whom you want to share the rest of your life. These people should help guide you through life by making some of the same decisions you would make (maybe better decisions then you would make). They are the people who want to help take care of you but are not obligated to do so. Friends are the family you choose, and in college you will create a new family. This new family might be your future bridesmaids, your groomsman, your children’s godparents and much more.

I made friends quickly my freshman year, but my expectations were not satisfied in the long run. I thought I knew my group of friends at the end of my first term, but by the end of second semester the names changed and yet again a wave of change in the fall semester of sophomore year. At this point, with one exception, I no longer have a relationship with any of these “best friends.”

I have come to find in my last semester the friends I truly desire and have chosen to surround myself with are people who are comfortable with themselves and therefore make me comfortable with who I am. These people are the people I look up to because of their ability to make mature decisions, their integrity and their openness.

The question now is what does this have to do with inner peace? I have discovered that relationships become more mature in college. I personally experienced a shift in my thinking process. I thought that I had inner peace, but now I look at myself just those two short years earlier, and I know I was far from being at peace. I had a lesson to learn: You cannot depend on other people to bring you to inner peace — it comes from the inside to the out. You may think you know this, but it’s very hard to truly grasp. When you go to school you will feel alone. Your friendships will probably be based on ego.

This means that your friendships are about making you feel good about yourself. I did this; I made friends with a girl who flattered me. She would tease and put down everyone but me. All along I thought I was her best friend, but she had many friends and she talked poorly of them all; why would I be excluded from this habit? From her I learned that there is consistency in someone who gossips. I can pick out people who do this now, and know to stay clear from becoming to close and sharing too much. I know that it is more important to be kind rather than right.

I also learned that common interests are not always reasons to be friends. My sophomore roommates and I had a huge common interest; it was how we became friends and it determined what we did together. This common interest was partying. However, I learned quickly that when you surround yourself with people who only enjoy this hobby you become frustrated, bored and depressed. Every night someone in our house was drinking or smoking: if you weren’t, you were a party pooper, thought you were too good, and were definitely too committed to school. School was about having fun right? No. School is about learning; it’s not always what you learn in class but it’s definitely a learning experience. Lesson? There are common interests that shouldn’t make people friends.

Partying was a negative common interest, but running cross country was a positive common interest. The girls I ran with made the same decisions I made about drinking in the days before a meet, sometimes even a better decision — withholding alcohol completely through the entire season. They also have common interests for habits outside of school; they want to run with me, eat healthy with me, hang out without drinking with me, and have a variety of things to talk about besides being drunk all the time.

In conclusion you should be optimistically cautious of your friendships. However, with each friendship I have learned more about myself and have changed “for good”. You will meet new wonderful people, you will talk to people you never would have imagined existed in high school, you will be exposed to all kinds of people from all different walks of life, and you will find yourself challenged by some. Those are the ones who will teach you the most — they are the people you will grow to love. Always question whether it is worth sitting through the tough times. You can think of the saying, “Those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.” I wish you friendships filled with love, joy and fun.

Mallory King is a junior peace studies major at the University of Minnesota, Morris.