(Part 2) Best products from r/college

Don't buy your books at the campus store, order them online, Amazon is a good place to do this. Also don't buy your books until at least the first class meeting, sometimes professors will tell you that some of the books listed for the class are optional. Sharing a book with somebody is an option for some people, just be sure you both will have access to it when you need it.

As others have said, fans. Box fans are nice and cheap, but depending on your room's layout, one that stands on its own might work better. If you have a window with the hinge on the bottom that pulls towards you, try putting a box fan on top of the opened window and lean it back against the unopened window.

If you're a guy, please do not stock up on axe to "pick up the ladies", it is obnoxiously terrible, and a lot of people find it immature.

Good writing utensils that you will be comfortable using for long periods of time. My favorite are these. Also, a durable, spacious and, comfortable backpack is important, preferably with something on the sides to hold bottles, be sure to keep a bottle to hold water at all times, not buying a drink when you go somewhere to get food that isn't a cafeteria can save you a good bit of money.

A flash drive is very useful, as is your own personal printer, you will probably need to print something at 2 A.M. at some point.

Decent speakers that can get relatively loud are nice to have, if only to drown out distracting noises around you while having some kind of sound. People also like to listen to music sometimes.

A first-aid kit for obvious reasons. Also keep something for headaches around, as well as cough and cold medicine.

Food that you really like can help pick you up and relax.

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Just some general advice, take part in any freshmen activities meant to help you meet people and make friends, having friends can help you emotionally and also with your work. If your dorm has a lobby, consider doing your homework there, you might meet somebody new. Don't miss classes, once you start, it can be hard to stop, and if you keep asking people what you missed and if there was any homework, they might get annoyed. Your professors are people too, whether you have a problem or not, talk to them, you might end up having a friend that can help you out more than a student or an English professor that will help with your papers down the road.

Don't be afraid to have fun and try new things. Take advantage of campus facilities, like a gym. Also don't be afraid of parties and drinking, but always be careful, spiked drinks, food, and general assholery happens more than your school would like to admit. Have fun and relax too, going weeks at a time without unwinding in some way is an easy way to end up depressed. Do look into groups and clubs, do not complain that there is not one for you unless you have tried to make one, I co-founded one, and it was a great decision.

This is going to be a pretty long-winded post because most of the sentiments you are feeling right now are phases I went through are college (I am currently a senior, and though my situation has improved since the beginning of college, I am still facing some of the lingering effects of depression).

In my belief, recovering from depression has to be practical, personal, and environmental. Practical in the sense that you need to take care of yourself and the environment around you (i.e. cleaning your room (btw, I'm no Jordan Peterson fan; cleaning my room is just an easy way for me to get the day started and feel good about myself), working out, eating healthy, practicing hygiene, meditation, etc). Though it may seem like it might not have a direct effect on you, organizing yourself and your environment does give a sense of self-control and does create a better image of yourself.

As for personal, depression does not simply come from genetics (yes, I know there are cases where this is true, but in my personal belief, depression can also be defined by your past experiences and the environment you are currently in). For me, depression really came from the conflicts I had with my parents and my unpreparedness of going to college. My mom was so desperate for me to get into a good college that she ended up doing my entire art portfolio and I had to write fake comments about what those art pieces meant. Thus, when I got to a college that is well-ranked, I felt like a total sham; I felt like the education that I was receiving was not of my own, but my mother's. I was only able to really figure this out by attending four years of therapy, and even now, I'm still going through some personal struggles. The personal aspects of your life takes time to figure out, but at the same time, is also a great source of clarity.

Finally, the final aspect of recovering from depression is environmental. Without having friends and families nearby, it can worsen the effects of depression because it makes you feel isolated and feel as if you're the only crazy individual out of seemingly-normal people. For me, it's hard to interact with my family because we just did not talk to each other that often in the first place. As for friends, I did have one friend in the beginning of college, but I have felt ambivalent about it because I felt like the activities we were doing together wasn't really improving my well-being (going to bars, playing games, etc). I do appreciate the fact that I had a friend, but looking back, I wish I also had another friend who had my academic well-being in mind as well. Also, I realized that I cannot have a single friend in which I can depend on for all my needs (academic, partying, hobbies, personal introspection, etc). I realized that I need to have some friends (not a lot) that meets my different needs, and that perspective change did open up my field of view as to which friends I can make. I have some friends in which I smoke weed with, make games with, study with, and they're all not necessarily in the same group.

But that leads to the question, what if I don't have friends and family members to lean on in the first place? And that's the catch-22 aspect depression. Without friends and families to connect to, we further isolate ourselves into our rooms, breaking down the practical and personal improvements we have built for ourself. This, in turn, makes it harder to reach out to others in the first place because we're not at our best selves and we don't want to perpetuate this negative image of being depressed and not-in-control to others. Personally, I think depression is cyclical in nature, but there is a way to stop it as well. Otherwise, we would never hear stories about how people were able to recover from depression.

So then, here are some of the steps that I found useful when recovering from depression:

1. If you're experiencing depression during the middle of the semester and see things going downhill, the best I can offer is to try your best and take as least losses as you can. The reason why is that attending to your academic needs takes a lot of energy and concentration, and trying to change for the better half-way through is immensely difficult to do (practicing habits for the first few days is hard because it forces us to be out of our comfort zone). And failing those self-improvement goals makes us feel even more shitty.
   
2. But, when the semester ends, take the time to reflect about what went wrong and what went right. You're not going to have all the answers, and you're going to realize some way through the semester that the "corrections" you made may not be enough. However, small and incremental improvements is much better than none.
   
3. As for maintaining healthy habits in school, I would start off by practicing those habits during winter/summer break. This is the time where you can whole-heartedly focus on creating healthy habits, and by the time you go to school again, it will feel like second nature and you don't even have to put a single thought into questions like: When should I exercise? What should I eat? What time should I go to sleep? (As a warning though, don't try to change your schedule and habits midway through the semester. I ended up doing this and it just really ruined the flow. Stick with the habits throughout the semester, and make adjustments once you are done).
   
4. Start the day right and easy. The way I think of it, going throughout your day is like building momentum. You don't want to tackle the most difficult task at first, as it will wear you out easily. Rather, you want to start with the itty-bitty stuff (brush your teeth, shower, get a healthy breakfast, plan your schedule, etc). And as you finish these small tasks, it does grow into your confidence of doing bigger things. Furthermore, by tackling these small tasks/rituals in the morning, you don't have to worry about the small things, and can reserve your energy for doing more important work (i.e. academics). Motivation doesn't come before our tasks, but rather, occurs while we are in the thick of it.
   
5. Know what kind of therapist you want. For me, I wanted a therapist in which I can talk about my past troubles with and gives me a lot of room to explore those past experiences. And it takes a while to find the right therapist, so don't stress about that too much as well.
   
6. Keep your goals short and simple. For me, I would often stress about what I wanted to do after graduating college, and this stress of not being able to stick to one path in life made me feel completely unmotivated. What ended up working out better for me was to say: "Look, I honestly don't know where life is going to take me, and that's fine. I just know for now, I need to do well this semester, and I can worry about the next step after I'm done."
   
7. Weed and alcohol. First of all don't use this as a crutch to get through depression as it will further your feelings of self-worthlessness the next day. However, if you are currently consuming them and do appreciate some aspects of it, I would only recommend doing so when you're at your best and you're in the company of others. I enjoy my weed and alcohol because it lets me be a bit loose and enjoy my time with friends. However, it does make me feel shitty the next day, and that shittiness can feed int your feelings of self-defeat. I'm not endorsing weed and alcohol as the solution to make friends; I'm just saying is that if that is one of your ways to make friends, then be very careful.
   
8. Leave the room. I often joke about my therapist about my "depression chair" because it's so comfortable and in front of my desktop, I end up not leaving the room and I do nothing all day. Leave the room and go to an environment where it does encourage you to engage with your academics or other activities.
   
9. Try to get a job on campus (I work as a librarian, which is ideal as I can focus on my studies and my interaction with people is at a minimal). Getting a job does enforce a sense of discipline, and hopefully, this discipline can be applied to other areas of your life.
   
10. I also didn't get an internship my sophomore year. What helped me get an internship later on was finding out what internship I wanted in the first place (and it may not be the ideal and ultimate internship, but it was good enough), searching what skillsets they needed, and working on those skillsets during break via personal projects (I am a computer science major).
    
    Here are some resources that I found helpful:
    
    
11. Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy: This book gives you a good set of guidelines in which you can improve yourself. However, this book is practical in nature, so don't expect a lot of personal guidance from it.
    
12. Daughters - You Won't Get What You Want: If the previous resource was practical, I consider this my personal resource. Normally, I don't ever listen to this kind of music because it's really not my taste. However, this album in itself feels very visceral and raw, and is the closest thing to death I can come across. As cliche as it may sound, this music does understand some of the feelings I go through. Other artists/albums that are lighter in tone I would recommend is Car Seat Headrest - Teens of Denial, The Mountain Goats, and Courtney Barnett. When there is no one to rely on, it feels nice to listen to others who are able to understand an ounce of what you are going through.

This is a bit late, but here goes nothing:

Listen man, steer clear of the iPad in college. It can only do one thing at once, making it a total travesty to a busy college student. In my case, at least, I believe I found the perfect replacement.

Just last month I sold my 4th generation iPad because I found that I wasn't using it at all for my studies and it just sat there collecting dust. After some research online, I decided to get another tablet. This time I wanted one that could actually be useful in my college studies. Enter the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1

I bought it refurbished off amazon for a good price, just to test it out and see if it was any good. It didn't take long for the new tablet to just outright replace half my backpack:

• I stopped needing to take my notebooks to my classes. The S-Note application paired with the S-Pen (mind you the tablet has a built in Wacom digitizer) is a beautiful writing tool (or even typing, if you prefer so), and everything can be exported to Evernote in PDF format for organization and accessibility
  
  
  
• The multitasking is a beautiful and crucial feature: I'm able to have a tutorial YouTube video, S-Note, and a calculator open all at once on the screen. I can have literally nothing on my table but this tablet and successfully teach myself just about anything. In addition, there's this feature where you can be looking at a picture on the browser, and you decide you want that picture in your notes. You can simply drag and drop the image into your notes and there it is.
  
  
• The battery lasts me about 9 hours of screen on time with HEAVY use (notetaking, videos, multitasking, vewing large PDF's or powerpoints) which is enough to get most people through the day
  
  
• I can just download the PDFs of my instructors worksheets and mark them up directly on the tablet, and then print out the solved worksheet. It's ridiculously efficient and saves me a lot of time and effort. If I make a mistake? Big deal; erase and correct it. Simple as that
  
  Aside from that, the tablet has a very large and beautiful display, making it a very good option for watching movies or Netflix in your downtime. Gaming performance is pretty beast as well. It is without a doubt, a college students best friend, and I highly recommend you at least check it out.
  
  I did, however, end up returning the tablet. Not because I wasn't happy, rather, the opposite. I was so ridiculously pleased with it that I just scrounged up whatever I have left in my allowance account to get the Samsung Galaxy Note Pro 12.2. It's basically similar to the Note 10.1 in every way except:
  
  
• The display is significantly larger. It is about the size of a full 11x9 inch notebook, making it a lot more comfortable to write on. The display resolution is the same as the Note 10.1, but despite the extra screen real estate it is still clear as day with about 250 ppi
  
  
• It has a bigger battery, meaning it should be able to push me through the day and more
  
  
• The Note 10.1 allows multitasking by having 2 large applications open side by side, as well as a small collection of 'mini apps' that can hover on top of the applications (eg. Calculator or a YouTube video). The Note Pro 12.2 allows up to 4 large applications to run all at once plus those mini-apps.
  
  These tablets have shown me just how useless an iPad is as a college companion. Steer clear of it. Look at the Note. Best of luck in college!

I found having a mini-vacuum really helpful. It's astounding how many crumbs and hairs collect. If you're not anticipating getting a rug/ carpeted dorms, a broom and dustpan will accomplish the same thing. There's a quality of life difference in walking on a clean floor and walking on a gross one.

A self-standing laundry bin. Freshman year I had a shoulder-bag style bag for dirty clothes. After about a month, the carry strap broke and I was left carrying a fabric tube of dirty laundry up and down stairs. The next year I got one that was soft-sided but had boning so it stood upright. So much better. Easier to get things in and out of, easier to carry, and I can fold clothes when I take them out of the dryer and put them away much easier (not that I do that now in my apartment, but as a dorm dweller it worked better).

A form of air freshener. Spray ones can be good to instantly cover smells, but they tend to be overpowering and just make everyone assume you're covering up something (ie. weed). Depending on your housing system's rules, a wax melter is a nice alternative. You're not burning anything and the smell is less obtrusive than other methods of smell coating (incense, sprays, plug ins).

Shoes for various occasions. It's easy to remember that you'll need nicer clothes, but you'll also need to footwear to go with it. Warm weather, the gym, winter, formal occasions/interviews, casual everyday. There's some cross over, but you don't want to be going to a banquet and suddenly realize all you brought with you was canvas shoes and your perfectly decent black dress shoes are at home.

Non-phone alarm. I know a lot of people are die-hard with their phones, but as someone who frequently lets their phone die or doesn't notice that it's on the verge of dying before checking out for the night, a designated alarm clock is a great thing to have. I had a dinky little thing from Rite Aid that I tucked under my pillow each night. I could hear it well enough to be woken up, but my roommates claimed they never heard it go off. I was also being woken up by literally just a clock -- I didn't have to go into my phone to shut off the alarm so I could just roll out of bed without being distracted by notifications.

A mug. Preferably one you can fit in a microwave, but also a travel mug is helpful. I bought a cheap kettle (specifically, I've had this little fucker for four years and it hasn't quit on me yet. Also good for making ramen since you can pop the top off and clean it easily in a sink) and would make tea/cocoa on a regular basis. Most dining halls I've seen will let you bring in a travel mug to fill up with coffee so you can take breakfast on the run if you didn't have time to sit down or wanted something before class. You also don't know you want a mug until you need one. It's a good thing to have laying around. It won't go unused.

You don't need to pack this ahead of time, but when you move in, make sure you've got snacks. Pop corn is great (takes up very little space and is an easy warm snack), pretzels, fruit snacks, etc. Dining halls are great (from my experience, even shitty ones are premade food that you just have to walk in and snag some food at without thinking too much), but when you're studying or just hanging out in your room snack are nice to have. Most dorms have vending machines, but a few bags of vending machine cheez-its cost as much as a full box at Walmart. It's a simple joy but a real one.

The candle warmer is just white, so I'm guessing you meant the wall/fragrance plug. There are plenty of others that don't have "Live, Laugh, Love" or phrases on them. That was just the first one I found for an example. If I knew what color or style you were looking for, I might be able to find some better ones. Here are some others that don't have sayings on them...

Remember, that since you're ordering from Amazon Smile, to select the charity you want Amazon Smile to donate to. I would recommend selecting any of these charities: National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), Mental Health America (MHA), or Doug Flutie Jr. Foundation for Autism. You can use these unbiased websites to check the rating of a charity: Charity Navigator, Charity Watch, and Guide Star.

• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Nautical
  
  
• Candle Warmers Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Bluebird
  
  
• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Medallion
  
  
• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Snowman
  
  
• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Imperial Plum
  
  
• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Imperial Meadow
  
  
• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Cayenne
  
  
• Candle Warmers Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Honeycomb Metallic
  
  
• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Honeycomb Turquoise
  
  
• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Royal Fig
  
  
• Decorative Ceramic Wall Plug-in Tart/Wax Candle Warmer (White Scroll)
  
  
• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Americana
  
  
• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Willow
  
  
• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Rust
  
  
• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Owl
  
  
• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Rainstorm
  
  
• Candle Warmers Etc. Pluggable Fragrance Warmer, Toffee Fleur De Lis

How much financial aid is the private university giving you? With a 4.0 you'll likely be able to get accepted to a decent number of well ranked schools that could be cheaper than the private school that you have been admitted to.

I would say finish up your classes at your community college. Three more classes won't be too bad; you will also save money by going to the community college. You will also have more time to research your options as well.

Advising you to go to law school may be difficult to say. The market is currently oversaturated with lawyers. To better your chances of finding a job after law school, you'll need to go to some of the top law schools. Even then, it's not a guarantee you'll find a high paying job as a lawyer.

There's more information about transferring in this book on amazon. It's free to read if you have kindle unlimited. Otherwise, I think it's helpful information even if you have to spend $3 on it.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01HW7P1RA#navbar

I love a Pilot G2 as much as anyone.

But if you haven't tried Amazon's new gel pens yet, they are a very fine alternative at a more attractive price, so I encourage you to try them.

https://www.amazon.com/AmazonBasics-Retractable-Gel-Pens-Assorted/dp/B010RLCVR6

50 pens @ $10 w/ Prime

Tool Kit, best graduation present I ever got for college. Besides that, really depends who you are. I would recommend a board game for when you need something to do with roommates. From Settlers to Catan, Boss Monster, or a deck of cards any thing that can get a group of people playing.

The 3M command hangers are great for hanging things around your room or closet. And I would recomend some led lights like these: Flexible RGB LED Light Strip Kit

My room was dark and this really brightened it up

https://www.amazon.com/Fjallraven-Kanken-Classic-Backpack-Everyday/dp/B00G4ZYFXI

These guys seem to be pretty popular among college students.

Little late here, but consider getting something like this. It's gotten my girlfriend through four years of college and it's the same as a laptop to her. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07WNVSDDB/ref=sspa_dk_detail_4?psc=1&pd_rd_i=B07WNVSDDB&pd_rd_w=CBqcU&pf_rd_p=45a72588-80f7-4414-9851-786f6c16d42b&pd_rd_wg=tXnzO&pf_rd_r=ZKSVE4BXCQ456M6ZK6Y5&pd_rd_r=478a5050-1ab8-4364-9878-51d222fdf118&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUE4NVVEVjdQNks0NUYmZW5jcnlwdGVkSWQ9QTA3MDE5NjgxMEJMS0RBN0lNUzMxJmVuY3J5cHRlZEFkSWQ9QTA3ODQ2OTYxWVVYMDJUU1RUVjJTJndpZGdldE5hbWU9c3BfZGV0YWlsJmFjdGlvbj1jbGlja1JlZGlyZWN0JmRvTm90TG9nQ2xpY2s9dHJ1ZQ==