I have a paper due today. Within the next two weeks I have another two papers due, although two weeks is far shorter than the time I’ve spent complaining about having to write them. I started writing three different columns, all on different topics before I began to write this one. All the others were about things that bothered me or things I was unhappy about. I got about halfway into each of them before I erased the entire thing and started over. I couldn’t figure out what the problem was, but I think I finally know. I don’t want to write about things that bother me. I’m sick of concentrating on what bothers me. Like so many others I am so preoccupied with my problems that I forget to appreciate all the good I am privileged to have in my life.

Sure, I have a few papers to write. That’s because I have the good fortune of being able to attend a four-year university. I am getting an education that will not only help me attain a job in today’s competitive market but that also changes the way I think about things and makes me aware of things I never knew before. Every Sunday night I watch “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition,” and I see children whose families would have otherwise not been able to send them to college receiving scholarships and crying their eyes out. Although college can sometimes feel like a burden, it is important to keep in mind, as many professors remind me regularly, it is a privilege.

This time of year is also when most of the universities have their spring break weeks. I was supposed to go to Chicago for spring break, but due to monetary issues and ultimately illness as well, the trip was cancelled. I sat at home and read away messages about how my friends were traveling internationally, going on cruises, visiting the islands, and going to Cancun. I moped around for a while thinking about all the work I had done planning the trip gone to waste and how nothing I plan ever works out. It took me the majority of the week to appreciate being woken up by my dog in the morning instead of the sound of the construction they are doing outside my window on campus. I was a little quicker to acknowledge how lucky I am to live half an hour away from the best matzoh ball soup retailer in New Jersey.

I often find myself considering what it would have been like if I had attended one of the other 10 colleges I applied to. Many of them were private schools, at which the majority of the students would most likely have had no problem funding a spring break trip, a dinner out, or some form of costly entertainment. Many of my friends at UMass are often strapped for cash, and we end up spending a lot of nights hanging out in the dorms or at someone’s house instead of going out. When I find myself getting frustrated at this I remind myself that dinner and a movie is nice, but there’s no way I’d trade it for the best friends I’ve ever had. Not to mention the fact that in the past three and a half years I have developed a strong appreciation for all the fun that can be had for free. Furthermore, when you only go out every so often it makes the occasion all the more special.

This time of year when spring holidays are beginning to occur I am also reminded of another of my complaints: having the tiniest family in the universe. I have always had a small family, but over the past 5 years or so it has gotten much smaller. Seeing everyone celebrate holidays with their large families I find myself getting terribly jealous. Well, my family may be small, but they are incredibly supportive of everything I do and are always there for me when I need them. Family is also not only the people you are related to by blood. I have a family here at school whom I celebrate Thanksgiving with every year. I have a family back in New Jersey that took care of me throughout my early childhood and will be here to watch me graduate college. My family is actually quite large, when you include all those related simply by love.

So in short, at this very stressful time in many of our lives, no matter what the reason for the stress, take a minute and think of everything you are blessed to have. This world is not the awful place so many are beginning to think it is. There is so much good all around us that we end up forgetting about when there are too many things worrying us. Don’t stop worrying, because sometimes you certainly need to worry, but sometimes you also need to smile. Sometimes you need to take a deep breath, feel it in your lungs, and appreciate its existence, your existence and all it entails.

Stacy Kasdin is a Collegian columnist.