Graduation is a time of joy but also of anxiety. It’s filled with uncertainty and change. Grads need a skill set to manage the inevitable anxiety all this change and uncertainty creates! I’ve decided to offer some skills graduates really need, and that I wish for you if you are graduating.

Achievement is important. But today, ambitious young people on the path to college are raised with an intense narrative of achievement that no generation has experienced before. Pressure to find the right job, the perfect mentor, the most elite internship, build the strongest online brand, and manage to pay the bills means the calculus to stand out is more daunting and complex. And they face a less hopeful world than I did, one full of intractable problems. Students face higher debt than ever before, so they have less wiggle room to mess up. Uncertainty is the new normal. Uncomfortable change -- whether it’s managing ChatGPT4 or adapting to a post pandemic work life -- weighs heavily. Their mental health is suffering: over half of young people report feelings of anxiety and depression. 

And for many young people - it’s the season to face the future head on. Graduating from college has always been a stressful transition, but the future looks very different for those just graduating from college - or just setting out on a new job or leaving home - than it did when I graduated 25 years ago.

Here are the skills I want our college students to gain, and that I wish were taught at every university. I wish every student could have free therapy!

Build the ability to sit with uncomfortable feelings and react mindfully. 

Build in a practice where you spend 5-10 minutes a day without your phone or an outside distraction. Practice letting thoughts come into your head, even if they are anxious thoughts. When you feel them, you can say, “I feel anxious.” Practice really looking at your anxious thoughts, without taking action. Externalize the feeling by saying “I'm experiencing anxiety right now.” There's a real distinction in that wording. What's significant about that distinction? It separates the discomfort from your identity, and puts the thoughts in their rightful place. 

Cultivate the strength to feel anxious or overwhelmed-- and not react in ways that are harmful (like drinking, substances, yelling, spending money, or endless scrolling).

When we’re triggered and become anxious, we REACT because we want to feel better. A lot of us turn to our favorite coping mechanisms... and they're not always great for us. Can you imagine feeling anxious, and reacting in a way that might help? Maybe calling a friend, getting outside, or even putting the anxious energy to use and making a plan of attack.

Gain the self-awareness to know which situations make you anxious and how to build in resources, boundaries, and supports to help you manage through.

Feeling anxious doesn’t mean you avoid the situation. It means you figure how to make it through. Who do you need on your "team" of friends, family, and mentors to manage through a difficult situation? If job interviews make you extremely anxious, what prep do you need around each interview to make them more palatable? One tip: get support. You don’t need to do things alone.

The ability to accept uncertainty and only aim to control what you can.

Control is really a coping mechanism a lot of us use when we get anxious. We have the illusion that if only we behave a certain way or think certain thoughts we can keep control and bad things won’t happen. Our anxiety feels better-- temporarily. Over time, this becomes a habit. It’s not a habit that sets us up for growth, innovation and discovery. Also, it’s futile. You can’t control the global economy, the fact that your job offer got rescinded, or climate change. Control what you can and learn to live with the uncertainty of the rest. This is the work of a lifetime for many of us! I am definitely still working on it.

The good news is that developing the skills to manage difficult emotions and face fears builds resilience, empathy, and self-awareness, all vital leadership skills for the new age. Plus, you will feel better.

My Graduation Story

As I think about my own college graduation, 25 years ago, I remember the anxiety most. I remember: “Would you ask your mother to pass the butter, please?” 

That was my father, sitting across from her at my college “celebration.” It was supposed to be a fete for my graduation, but it had instead become an opportunity for me, my sister, my boyfriend, a family friend, and the exiled divorced father of one of my roommates to act as intermediaries just so my warring parents could eat a meal. That was one of the most stressful hours I can remember!

But it didn’t matter, because I already felt unworthy of being celebrated. In my years at Brown, an elite university full of high performers, I’d pretty much coasted by on the bare minimum of requirements. Now, my friends were graduating Phi Beta Kappa, Cum Laude, or with special department honors.

The only commencement address that would have helped would have been one that said, “You’re so anxious about what’s next and whether you will find your way in life. You feel like you didn’t do enough in college and you’re ashamed of that. In fact, it was hard to shower and get dressed this morning. Just try to get through today.”

While at my college graduation, I was out of sync with the day, but I hit my stride in my mid-thirties and I was invited back to keynote at Brown in 2012. I spoke to current seniors about how sad and unworthy I felt when I was in their shoes. And after, they came up to tell me it was such a relief to hear, and that no one ever told the truth to them. Through all those years of achievement, how many times does an adult pull us aside and tell us the world might not be our oyster but that we can keep trying anyway? That life is hard and full of anxious uncertainty?

But we owe that to graduates: to acknowledge the melancholy, the dispiriting, and the downright scary. And then we need to tell them, It will get better. You will learn to accept that anxiety is part of life. You will feel better.

And even though anxiety is part of life, so is joy. You can feel joyful and proud and anxious all at the same time!! I'm heading to my own 25th college reunion in 2 weeks, and I feel all the feels.

Love to all the grads and all the people who love you.

Morra

PS: My brand new LinkedIn Learning course launched yesterday! It's called Navigating Perfectionism As A Manager. I'm gonna be honest- I hate how my hair looks in the videos. I don't love my shirt. But the course ROCKS. Check it out.

PPS: You might enjoy my most recent HBR article: You Don't Have To Be The Best At Everything