Graduating any form of education is supposed to be a huge milestone. It marks new stages of life, and supposed to be a celebration of all the hard work you’ve done to get to that point. However, there are communities across the internet that talk about life after graduation and the hardships that come with it. The internet is calling it post-graduation depression.
Post about graduation (source: reddit)
Finding a job, making new friends, and being away from family are all hard tasks for people that have only known what school is like.
JC (Juan Carlos) Simpauco, is a London native who graduated from the University of Mcgill in Montreal, just over a year ago. Simpauco has been living in Montreal, job searching, and looking to discover what his goals are for the future. Overall, Simpauco found his graduation to feel “unceremonious,” because of several circumstances like a lack of pride in his school.
“To see my university be so brazen in how they hand-waived or even sent Montreal police to disperse (Palestine) protests, so knowing that my degree was in some part soaked in the blood of innocents I couldn’t really take too much pride in that,” said Simpauco. While could be seen as an extreme example, it is an instance of institutions and students not seeing eye to eye, yet another factor leading to complicated feelings around graduation.
Another common concern about post-graduation is loneliness and struggling to make friends now that you aren’t surrounded by hundreds or even thousands of students. Finding community and activities to do has been important for Simpauco to fill the time now that he doesn’t have a rigid schedule to follow.
“It really helps that I’m in a big city like Montreal, through my going out and exploring the city I’m able to attend different events and meet community organizers,” said Simpauco.
Despite graduating from school, JC decided to stay in Montreal instead of moving back in with his parents. “I think I’d be a significantly worse person if I moved back (to London), I’m blessed to have a supportive family but I’d stagnate if I didn’t have the opportunity to make mistakes,” said Simpauco.
The most important thing that JC is trying to find is his passion and reassures people that everyone has their own timeline.
“I struggled a lot with comparing myself with how my friends are doing… but I realized it’s not what they’re doing that I’m envious about but its because they found their passion in life and that is what I’m trying to do now,” said Simpauco.
So is graduating and life after school really that bad? Catch the full conversation on almost 107, where Joshua Chen speaks to JC Simpauco about life after college, the importance of making good connections, and the risks of comparing yourself to others.
