- Hey, playa.
We're getting closer and closer to graduation day.
And for those of you in middle school,
you might be wondering what is the next step here.
Going to high school, but what does that mean?
Does it mean you'll ever see your friends again?
Will you ever talk to your crushes?
What is high school gonna be like?
These are all big questions.
So, I wanted to share what my experience
was like graduating middle school
to help you start planning ahead
to get ready for high school.
♪ This is The Josh Speaks ♪
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Looking back at my own life,
it really wasn't until middle school
that I started to develop a core group of friends.
These were kids that I would hang out with
and talk to during lunch.
We would hang out and talk before and after classes.
And some of us even shared classes together.
It was awesome having real friends like that.
We would chat all the time about wrestling.
But as graduation grew closer,
I realized there would be a point
where I probably wouldn't see them again.
In fact, one of my closest friends and I
were trying to figure out how
we can really keep in touch.
Not just talking to each other online
but, actually, maybe even hang out
throughout the summer and see one another.
And this was a bit of a challenge for us.
We both lived in totally different areas.
There was a bridge and tolls,
and all that stuff in between us.
Which meant that it was gonna be
kinda difficult to convince our parents
to drive us and pay the tolls every single time
we wanted to see each other.
And I'll be honest with you,
the fact that I probably wouldn't
see my friends again was kind of sad.
And I'm sure that's kind of what you're feeling now, too.
It's never easy to say goodbye to friends.
I remember at the end of the year
we had our big middle school dance thing,
and, of course, me and all my friends got together
and just hung out the whole night and talked.
When push came to shove,
here's the reality of what happened.
Me and my middle school friends don't even talk anymore.
And I think part of the reason is
because both of us accepted the fate
that we probably wouldn't see each other anymore.
So, we just didn't even try to reach out
to one another afterwards.
If you're in middle school, though,
don't make the same mistake I did.
Always aim to keep in contact with your friends.
They're your friends for a reason.
So, do your best to keep talking to them,
even after you guys graduate.
Sdaying goodbye to your friends is hard but possible
because you talk to them regularly.
But what about your crushes?
The people that you never talk to
that you want to, though.
In middle school I had a ton of crushes
on a ton of different girls,
a bunch of them that I never even spoke to
and just liked from a distance.
And yet I felt this strong desire in me
to do something about it.
I needed to talk to them.
I needed to ask them out.
I needed to at least confess how I felt.
But that's what I want to talk to you guys about.
I don't think you should confess your feelings,
but I do think you should talk to your crush.
I talked about it in the last video I uploaded,
which I'll link up here.
But ideally, what you wanna do
is set up plans with your crush.
Try to get a lot of people together
so you can hang out with them in a group.
Now I know for a lot of you,
your crush hangs out with her own group of friends
and you hang out with yours.
But since it's the end of the year
no one really is gonna be opposed
to getting everyone together to do
one last big hoo-rah before the school year ends.
I know that in some ways you may feel
like you can't let go of your crushes.
You like them too much, and you can't imagine
them not being in your life.
But, as you move into high school,
as you meet new people, those crushes will fade away.
For myself and the tons of girls that I liked,
when I moved into high school,
I met so many new girls to have crushes on
that the middle school ones just kind of
faded to the background for me.
So, try not to get too hung up
on the crush that got away.
There'll be more crushes as you enter the high school years.
Enough about the sad things that you may be losing.
Some of the good stuff that's gonna be going away
are any kind of bullies that picked on you,
or any kind of drama that you got sucked into.
For me, in middle school, there's was one teacher
that took care of the lunchroom
that just hated my guts.
I don't blame him, I was a bit of a prankster,
and I was kind of the class clown at the time.
But I knew I would never worry about him
or see him again, which was pretty cool.
And there were a few bullies that I knew
I would never have to worry about again.
They're going off to different schools,
so I knew their criticisms, their picking on me,
their making fun of me would just go away.
One bully in particular was going to my high school
but let me just jump ahead and tell you,
once we got to the high school level,
I went on and developed a new group of friends.
He developed his group of friends,
and we never even interacted with each other.
And as far as the drama goes,
once you graduate, it's all gonna be left behind you.
Sure, when you go into high school,
there'll be new drama for you to take care of
and be involved in, but at least for now
anything you're experiencing in middle school
will kind of fall away.
I do want to keep in mind
that not anyone's situation is the same.
Some of you are going from middle school
directly into high school with the same group of people.
So, you may still encounter some of the same things.
But with that new high school mentality,
you'll be a lot more wiser now
to be able to handle it a little bit differently.
And all of that is in regards to the people.
But let's talk about one of the scary things
that people are afraid of as they go into high school,
the amount of schoolwork you're gonna have to endure.
When I was in middle school,
I was kind of scared of going to high school.
I didn't know what to expect.
I knew that it was a lot harder,
and everything I had seen on TV
made it seem like high school kids had it all together.
They were all cool, and they were all
doing just lots of things all the time.
I think I had gotten so accustomed to my middle school,
traveling the halls, I knew where every room was,
and I knew how to get anywhere
and do anything I really needed to do.
When you're an eighth grader,
you feel like you have it all figured out.
You don't have to worry about new things
because you've been at the school long enough
to have everything under control.
But high school was a completely new beast.
In fact, one of the most scariest things
before I even started high school
was the fact that while I was in middle school
I had a bus that picked me up in front of my house.
But now that I was gonna be in high school,
I had to take the regular public transportation bus.
And I had never done that before.
I'd have to walk from my house all the way to the bus stop,
take that public bus with real people,
real people going to work and stuff,
head on over to another bus stop,
only to transfer to continue going to school,
so I can then walk from that bus stop to the school.
This new travel plan was scary for me,
not to mention people were regularly throwing around words
like standardized testing and SATs.
Now I'm not saying this to scare you.
Once you graduate middle school,
you'll have a little bit of time
to relax, unwind, and get ready for high school.
And trust me, I truly believe
that you have what it takes to conquer
any high school work that comes your way.
I know it may seem scary
and like completely unchartered territory,
but once you get into the hang of things,
you'll learn the ropes and you won't be as afraid.
Just like you're not afraid now
as an eighth grader in your own school.
But I do wanna tell you what my personal
middle school graduation experience was like.
Since me and all my friends loved wrestling,
we knew we had to do something wrestling related
as we went up to get our diplomas.
There I stood in my blue robe with my blue hat
waiting for them to call my name.
And when they did and said Joshua Rodriguez,
I walked on over and did a Kurt Angle "Whoo"
as I grabbed my diploma.
It felt kind of bittersweet to graduate middle school.
On one end I had to say goodbye
to all my friends and the crushes,
some of them I never even talked to in person,
but then on the other end,
I didn't have to worry about bullies and drama,
and I knew I was entering a new stage of life,
which was kind of cool.
And that's what I really want you to recognize here.
You're graduating middle school.
You're growing and growing, and moving onward
into high school, which is a big step.
I know it seems scary, but I know
you have what it takes to move on forward
into high school, to learn the ropes,
to make new friends, to interact with your crushes,
and to be your best self for the next few years.
What do you think, though?
Are you someone in middle school right now,
not even just an eighth grader,
but anyone in middle school that's thinking
about what graduation is gonna be like
and is worried about any of the things I mentioned?
Leave your comments below and we'll talk about it.
I wanna help you start getting ready
for high school for now.
So, definitely check out the video linked on the side
where I talk about five things
you need to know about high school.
Also, there's a playlist underneath it
with a bunch of more high school videos
to help you get into the gear and prepare yourself
for the next phase of your life.
As always, guys, love and peace.
Congratulations to those of you
that you are graduating.