Column by Allison Borthwick, Opinion Editor

Why is our instinct always to escape?

For instance, I just attempted to escape the responsibility of writing this column by watching an hour and a half of YouTube videos. That’s so many YouTube videos, you guys. And SO little writing.

It’s not that I dislike writing, either. I love it. But what kind of college student would I be if anything I HAD to do wasn’t like a human-version of insecticide for me?

This goes deeper than, “If I don’t like doing this, I’ll just do that.” We genuinely seek to forget and hide from the realities of life more often than not.

If we feel awkward in a social setting or if we’re sitting alone in public, we pretend to be doing important smartphone things on our important smartphones, when in reality we’re just deleting all those pictures of melted cheese we saved that one night. Or we’re texting nothing but alkdjfalkdjfaoieurkaxjlfakljfasda to nobody.

How ridiculous is that? We avoid human interaction by babbling incoherently to ourselves on a screen. What a time to be alive.

If we have an exam worth 20 percent of our grade, we nap the stress away. Stress naps are great because you don’t actually get any sleep and the only reason you get out of bed is to check WebMD for symptoms of heart palpitations. Such fun. Many anxiety.

If we have a 10 page paper to write on the entire history of the world, we watch 10 episodes of “Gossip Girl” instead. Nothing gets the creative juices flowing like watching a bunch of rich teens scandalize high school, am I right?

If we have a problem with the way our friends are acting, we avoid confrontation like the plague and subtweet to our heart’s content. There’s absolutely no way they will ever figure out that Taylor Swift lyric is directed toward them. It’s foolproof – until it isn’t. But that’s what escaping behind locked doors is for.

It’s a fight or flight world, and we’re all just fleeing from it. Life would be so much easier if we just faced things head on.

Imagine a world where we did our work on time, interacted with human beings in public and talked about our problems like adults.

Imagine a world where reality wasn’t something to escape from.

Invest yourself in the world you live in, not distractions. Everything we’re doing, even the papers and tests, means something.

Not everything has to be another menial task in the obstacle course between you and hours of mindless Netflix binging.

Learn and grow from the hard things in life. They may be intimidating and scary, but running from those things hurts a lot more than facing them.

Mostly because running is the hardest thing of them all. Unless you’re running to Murray’s grand opening of Krispy Kreme or running from a murderer, knock it out. There’s no way health is that important.

Stay in school, kids. Do your homework. Tell people how you feel.

Stop hiding and live your life.