Experience
A few things you need to survive in college (that you have prolly made it thus far without)
Money. SURPRISE! A billion dollars, roughly. And working at your crappy little retail job just ain't gonna cut it.
Flexibility. You will get screwed over, multiple times by multiple people in multiple offices. Hopefully, you'll discover you actually like it rough.
Rationality. No. Even if you sit in front of it begging for hours, the computer will not write your Latin American and Caribbean civilization term paper. Time management can also be found here. If you'd written it a few days ago instead of producing some facsimile of a sham of a graphic organizer and calling it a day so you could go ahead and watch House for the next four hours, you might not be in this position. Work early, and work hard. And realize it probably won't pay off like you expected.
Maturity. No you cannot demand a sticker for every assignment you hand in on time. No you cannot wait for the professor (re: NOT TEACHER) to praise the excellent point you made about how the post colonial economy in Chile affected Mexico's decision to join the rest of us in the open market. It's just not gonna happen. You also need to be able to know when to defer gratification. Accept that working your ass in college and, for some of us, graduate school isn't going to pay off for a couple decades. But that's no reason to slack off. Or clearly, it will NEVER pay off.
Determination. You should probably understand that you're going to need a certain amount of devotion to achieve anything. So stick with it. Even when people straight out laugh at you efforts, keep pushing. Giving up can't be an option, you're going to have to grow out of that. Don't mistake determination for complete single-mindedness. Keep your options open. If one path doesn't work, start running full force towards the other.
Standards. The ones you hold yourself to should be completely up to you. But know that everyone else also has them for you. Some professors don't care if you drop their class. Others will be very disappointed if you don't make it into the honors program by your second semester. Decide which ones matter, decide which ones don't. And be realistic. Don't underestimate yourself, it's gonna do you absolutely no favors. Conversely, there's nothing wrong with overestimation. You can always do better than you think you can. Keep on pushing yourself. The trick is, don't flip a shit if you don't graduate in 3.289 years with a 4.0 and an internship opportunity with Microsoft. Know your personal best. Unfortunately, this can be a trial and error process.
And possibly the most important,
Self confidence. You won't make it without this. You need to be aware, every second of everyday, that you CAN do this. You are capable, you deserve the opportunities, you earned the rights, you have no limits. Questioning yourself is a big gigantic waste of time. Doubt is a humongous black hole of doom that will suck up everything you've worked for, leaving you empty handed and filled with regret. Not a great way to spend the next couple years. So suck it up and ignore the excuses, "I'm bad at math, I can't write a good thesis, I'm not good at memorization and therefore will never be able to remember all of the cranial nerves!!!!!" Idiot, there's a song for that. Knowing your worth makes life harder in some ways. You have no excuse for doing badly, because you should damn well know you can do better.
All that being said. I still don't know if I have it in me.
B.