High school is overwhelming. With pressure from all sides to be cool and score those impressive marks, it can be difficult to choose your direction while still making the most of the time that you spend there.

The truth is that even though it might seem as though you’ve been stuck in classrooms since the dawn of time, your high school years really do fly by. Here are some tips from someone who has made it out alive. Here’s how to survive… and thrive!

Take Part

Don’t be the loner who is only too happy to sit on the sidelines. Get involved at school! Take part in extracurricular activities, go to sports days and fundraisers, get excited for school dances. That’s half of the fun, after all.

If you’re interested in building on your leadership skills and becoming an entrepreneur, why not champion a Young Entrepreneur Society?

Plan Ahead

Scrolling through Facebook all day sounds so much better than staying ahead of the curve when it comes to studying for tests and completing assignments, right? Most definitely. But it isn’t going to do you any favours a little down the line.

Do your best to fight the urge to procrastinate, and plan ahead instead. You’ll be so very glad that you did.

Be Yourself

There is so much pressure to ‘fit in’ when you’re in school and to make sure that you’re a part of the ‘it’ crowd. Instead of focusing on ‘fitting in’, put energy into making friends who have similar interests to you. You’ll realise very quickly that genuine friendships with people with whom you share a real connection are much more valuable in the long run.

All in all, try to do your best to soak up and enjoy every experience that high school presents you with, and not to focus too much on how your peers perceive you. You’ll soon realise that being a true, unique individual, as opposed to just ‘one of the crowd’, is what gets you a lot further in life as you get older.