It’s probably fair to say that we’ve all been through some rough times lately.

We have less than a week remaining in this semester, and whether you’re a freshman anticipating your first round of finals; or a sophomore scrambling to remember what happens in cellular respiration again; or a junior frantically writing 45 journal entries while restudying your polyatomic ions for the umpteenth time; or a senior finishing up the last of your college applications, only to wait for months in suspense to see if you made it or you didn’t — it’s been rough for all of us.

And current events so far have run the gamut from bizarre to exhausting to downright terrifying. What we see in the news everyday takes a toll on everyone, regardless of ethical alignment or political affiliation. Especially after Nov. 8, the country seems to be divided not into two perfect black-and-white halves (or red-and-blue, what have you), but rather, into a thousand smithereens.

So I get it. It’s been rough. But it’s going to be OK.

I’m not trying to paint too rosy a picture for you and tell you that everything will turn out stupendous and that you should just calm down. I’m not saying that the ongoing humanitarian crises in the Middle East, or the riots and hate crimes in our very own country, should just be cast aside to the back of your mind. I understand that emotional reactions in a time of uncertainty are completely justifiable.

And of course, I also understand that the stress accompanying the close of any semester is inevitable. You’re left drowning in a sea of unfinished projects and last-minute extra credit assignments amid all your blood and sweat and tears — struggling, fighting, clawing to bring up that borderline grade! Before you know it, your parents are nagging you, your friends are complaining to you, and you just want everything to be over already.

But guess what? It’s going to be over soon.

Winter break will come. You will have the chance to spend time with the people and things that make you happy, free from your teachers and all the people at school who give you stress-induced pimples on the daily. You can binge on those Netflix shows you’ve been putting off. You can restore contact with the people you’ve been too busy to talk to. You can sleep in until 1 p.m. every day, waking up only to eat snickerdoodles and gingerbread, completely and utterly free from the judgmental eyes of your peers.

And if there’s anything holding you back from doing those things — if there are conflicts between your family members, or unfavorable circumstances beyond your control — then remember that Christmas is still a time of overcoming differences and getting together. Even the troops of World War I ceased their fighting to declare a truce and just party with each other Dec. 25, 1914. It’s appropriate that winter break should be a time of ceasefire between all the people around you — and you and your grades.

The holidays are a time of reprieve. Freshmen, sophomores and juniors alike can start anew for the spring semester, while seniors will be set for a completely clean slate come graduation. Regardless of whatever’s gone wrong this semester, you will still have the opportunity to do better in the future — to prove to your parents, your teachers and yourself that you are a human being, you make mistakes, you don’t always perform to the best of your ability, but you are capable of doing so and you will do so soon.

If this past semester didn’t live up to your expectations, you still have one at the very least and seven at the very most to change that. And even outside of school, if there have been rifts between your friends, or incessant bickering at your family dinner table, remember that almost everything heals with time. And for the things that don’t, you will learn how to make them right, and you will be OK.

You will be OK because you will still have at least one person out there supporting you, even if the support is coming from the sidelines and it doesn’t seem readily available at all times. You will be OK because you have endured hardship before, and each and every time it happens, you leave with a better understanding of your capacity for pain, and your capacity for forgiveness. You will be OK despite hard conversations with your parents, or your friends, or your teachers, because each and every relationship is complete only with some strife mixed in with all the good that remains. And you will be OK because you are imperfect and flawed just like everybody else, but you never stop evolving, you never stop changing and you have so many more opportunities to become better than you already are.

In the future, you might be better than OK. You might someday be great.

But until that day comes, you’re going to be OK.