The press reported yesterday that Harvard’s acceptance rate reached a record low—5.3 percent. The previous low was 5.9 percent. The headline might as well have been:

“This just in: Harvard is STILL absurdly difficult to get into…and so are all the other highly-prestigious colleges.”

These headlines run every year. And while the repetition will be of little comfort to those students who are licking the wounds inflicted by denials from their dream schools, for those students following them this year, here’s what you can learn from the same old stories.

You can do everything expected of you in high school—take the hardest classes, get the highest grades and test scores, participate in the most interesting and successful activities—none of that will be enough to guarantee you an admission to a college that 1) receives applications from the most accomplished students in the world like yourself, and 2) denies almost all of them. It’s not fair. It’s not personal. And it’s not going to change. I’m not saying you shouldn’t be applying if you really want to attend one of those schools.  But your chances of not getting accepted are exponentially greater than your chances of acceptance. That’s the reality.

But there are many college admissions stories that don’t get enough press, like the fact that there are just so many great colleges out there from which to choose. The press doesn’t write about those wonderful high-achievers who get over the denials and become happy and successful college students at places that were smart enough to admit them. The fact that most of the students in this country who apply to college get admitted, the existence of the roughly hundred other colleges whose offerings are nearly indistinguishable from those at Harvard, the way that everything always seems to turn out OK for good kids who work hard—those tales never make the front page.

As you gear up to begin your own college admissions process, whenever that may be, remember that the college admissions stories that make the news don’t represent broad college admissions reality. You can have an enjoyable, exciting, positive journey to college. All you have to do is believe in yourself enough to know that your hard work and character traits are more important than whether or not a famous college accepts you.

Just because they’re the same old stories doesn’t necessarily mean you must make them your own.