The first song that I recognised when browsing through the Nostalgia Machine was Uptown Funk by Bruno Mars, and though this song alone did not bring back any memories, I still can vividly remember about my life as a young, naive teen in 2015.

  I had just enrolled into a new school, new uniform, new faces, and a whole new environment to adapt to. I was a skinny and short kid, wore spectacles, and didn't have the best social skills, kind of like your stereotypical nerd, except my grades weren't so glamourous. Maybe I had wanted to seek out the validation that had been absent in my life thus far, or maybe I simply did not want to be considered a loser, for the most of 2015, I remember that all I wanted to do was join the popular clique. 

  Like every other class, my class was divided into cliques. We had the quiet kids, we had the gaming clique, and of course, there were a group of good looking, tall, and athletic guys that formed the popular guys clique. These guys had everything a nerd could wish for, they were respected by many, and usually hung out with all the pretty girls. I remember how I would walk up to them in an attempt to start a conversion, and I also remember how they would brush me off annoyingly, though I was too socially ignorant to pick up the signs. I remember how I got into trouble doing stupid shit to look 'cool', for example I got detention once for cyber-bullying another outcast. I remember how my grades had started slipping since I had lost motivation to study and complete my assignments. I remember sitting down with my parents and teachers, and them discussing that I was having trouble adapting to the new environment even though I knew better. This went on for the majority of 2015 and eventually I became the thing I feared the most; I became the loser of my class.

  So what happened next? In 2016, I fell (hard) for this girl from another class. She was really pretty, smart, and had good grades. I knew that I had to work on myself to impress and get her attention. I gave up on my stupid quest to join the popular clique and began working on myself. I started studying really hard; I made sure I completed my assignments all on time and occasionally would look for my teachers after school for private tutor lessons so that I could catch up with the rest of the class. I started to work out, and for better or worse, I became alot more socially reclused; I barely talked to any of my other classmates, and had even more limited interactions with the popular kids. Even though my initial motivation was to impress the girl of my dreams, I realised that I eventually started working on myself simply so I could release my fullest potential. Eventually my grades started to recover and I noticed my body looking aesthetically better, I was the best I had ever been.

  Eventually I graduated with rather good grades, and managed to make my parents and teachers proud. I never had enough courage to ask the girl out, but I managed to at least get her social media and yeah she is doing quite well now. As for the popular kids, I have no idea where they are or how they are doing now, and I didn't really care. My point? There is no point in trying so hard to win someone else's validation. Instead, work on yourself and aim to become the best person that you can be, the only validation that you should seek is that from yourself.