Withdrawing acceptance to Master's Program in favor of another University

[olsettres]

I did see that a similar topic has been posted. My situation is kind of the same, but I was wondering if anyone here could give me any advice. I applied to a bunch of Religious Studies MA programs this past year. I graduated from undergrad at a good, but not great State school. I had a lower GRE score, and just didn't feel like I was 'top ivy league' competitive. My professors seemed to have confidence in me though, and suggested I might have a chance at top programs. I applied to programs such as Colorado-Boulder, Florida State University, Arizona State University, UC Santa Barbara, Columbia, NYU and then of course, Harvard Divinity School. My top choice was Santa Barbara, but they rejected my application. The best school I was admitted to up until today was NYU, who is also covering 75% of my tuition. It's a very small program, with a handful of faculty, and do not offer a PhD in Religion- only a terminating MA. I don't know what I was thinking... I knew I had until April 15th to get back to them. I guess I wanted to get a head start on planning and getting everything together for the fall, and I didn't think that I would be accepted at Harvard, so I an email to the head of the department telling them that I would love to attend their school. I haven't done anything more 'official' like sending in the deposit, hard copies of transcripts, or signing any documents. 

 

Today I heard back from Harvard, and I was accepted. I feel like an idiot for jumping the gun on NYU. And now I'm going to feel like a terrible person for backing out of my acceptance there. I was not expecting to get into Harvard at all. But I feel like I need to make this choice for my future career, and take the risk of making a few people angry, you know? It will be easier to get into PhD programs at Harvard or Yale, having come from the same tier, then trying to jump a notch up from NYU... 

 

Am I over thinking this?