A common piece of advice that many college students get is to surround themselves with motivated, ambitious, and like-minded people.
Similarly, many people also enroll in specialized honors programs and other living-learning communities at college.
All of this is due to the idea of peer pressure.
When you surround yourself with people with similar goals and push you to excel at everything you do, you will likely see their positive influence in your life as you match their way of thinking.However, the same is true for negative peer pressure too. When people around you belittle you or make you feel inferior in any way, you will likely start believing them or try harder to change their perception of you.
This is the exact kind of peer pressure that you need to protect yourself from in college, and here is your guide to dealing with it:
Recognizing Peer Pressure
The first step to dealing with peer pressure is to recognize the signs that you are being influenced.Moving into college housing away from authority is often an invitation for many students to explore things they have never experimented with before - be it the type of friends they make or activities they do.
This can lead to being in friend groups that make you change yourself to fit in or force you to turn away from values you hold close to your heart. If you have to change against your will just because of a friend group, you are being peer-pressured.
Peer pressure can present itself in many ways, such as being pressured to drink, change your appearance, smoke, bully others, and even disrespect authority.
Dealing With Peer Pressure
One of the easiest things you can do to deal with peer pressure is to give yourself a break and rest for a day or two.Allow yourself to just exist without having to deal with any negativity. If you have any major assignments coming up, just hire Writers Per Hour to do them for you.
Additionally, you need to start trusting your gut. When you are indulging in something that goes against your principles, you are bound to have an uncomfortable feeling and general uneasiness.
Your gut tells you it is time to turn around and leave. You should pay attention to these signals as they generally prove to be right in the end.
If the pressure gets too much, it is time to rethink your friend groups. A common misconception college students have is that they cannot change their friend group because it is too hard to make new friends.
If this is a factor in your decision, don’t let it be because even being alone for a little bit is better than being with toxic friends.
Defense Mechanisms
If you do decide to continue associating yourself with the people that are pressuring you, then you should learn some defense mechanisms that can help you cope.One of the easiest defense mechanisms to use is humor, which keeps things light-hearted while making your decisions clear to everyone around you. Even sarcasm can sometimes help you get out of a situation as you can deflect attention to something else.
Another way to deal with peer pressure is by finessing the art of saying “No” without letting people know you have said it.
Say something like “I wish I could drink that much” or “I wish I was as cool as you to binge drink” as you subtly decline a drink you are pressured into.
Conclusion
Lastly, it is essential to remember that there are resources for you and that you are not alone in this battle.Many college students experience this hardship and it is imperative to remember that you can always get out of a situation that makes you uneasy.
