With no other forces pushing against us, we simply keep rolling.

Then there comes a day when it comes to an end. This natural force that has always existed is suspended and you’re left dangling at the edge of some unknown chasm.

I graduate in two months, and I want to say the unknown that is to follow is something scary and daunting.

I want to attribute this to my procrastination and newfound poor academic habits – as if delaying my scheduled work will somehow delay the inevitable doom of a postcollegiate career.

But that’s not what I feel.

It’s more like a coasting feeling, riding out my final days and going through the same motions I have been going through for the past 16 years.

It’s a more gradual approach, rather than being abruptly cut off from the educational system.

Realizing you’re part of this system bigger than you is what is daunting. And when I step back and look at it is when I merely go through the motions.

The world of employment isn’t what scares me, but the life of unthinking inertia.

Life up to this point has been easy. It’s great to have professors give out assignments, to follow them and then be evaluated on performance.

And what comes next isn’t quite as simple, which is why so many people are scared of it. It’s not as easy to go out on our own and be the agents of change or the ones making our own assignments and giving our own evaluations.

Because of this, so many people wind up working cubicle jobs where they’re in the same position we are in now – assign, complete, evaluate, repeat.

As I approach the postgraduate realm of infinite possibilities, I am trying to not fall into the same inertial state.

Instead of being forced to stop abruptly once I graduate, I have taken my senior year as an opportunity to be the force pushing myself against inertia. That way, when my educational safety net isn’t there, the fall won’t hit me so hard.

Matt Flint is the arts and culture reporter. Share senioritis woes with him at flintmat@msu.edu.