The summer before packing my bags and heading up to bright SUNY Oswego, I had a job. Well, that’s what my dad liked to call it. My job was applying for scholarships. It was tedious work, but I did not really understand tedious until I got to college. While there was no more high school busy work, there was so much more. More papers, more expectations, more projects. Exactly what college was supposed to have.
For the past two and a half years, I have been doing work constantly. I have been holed up in the library overnight, I’ve lugged my laptop around with me to work in between classes, I have seen the sun rise from my bedroom window. For my whole college career, I have been tired. I had made every single one of my environments about getting work done. “Ain’t no rest for the wicked”, so they say.
As a Resident Mentor, I am trying to encourage my residents to take care of themselves. The hierarchy of care should be yourself, schoolwork, jobs, then clubs. All too often, we do not put ourselves first. Hell, I even wrote an article about self care. Sure, anyone can practice self care, but when you make an environment where everything is directing you to do your work and have it done, and only then can you rest, makes it so there is no rest. College is project piled upon project. You can finish an essay for the next class but then have a reading due in another class, or even if you are ambitious try to get your work done in advance. There is always something more.
I decided, for my final semester of college, to make a drastic change. My room would be a place with no homework. No projects, no studying, no work. Going on four weeks of this semester so far and I am still on top of all of it all. This is do-able. I go to lounges in my hall, I work in the library, I stick around in the academic buildings. I do work when I can. As soon as I get back to my room, however, my bag goes to the floor. No folders for work and no agenda comes out.
Creating a space dedicated to relaxation has made my mental health better. My stress is down and when I want to focus on just me, I can do that. My subconscious has come to understand that when I am in my room, this means only makeup, reading for pleasure, Netflix, and sleeping.
When filling out online applications for current work, college students fill out “full time students” underneath employment. We have a job, it is dedicated to our education. Traditional jobs, where the work is outside of the house, consist of doing work at the place of business and not bringing it home to work on (yes I understand there’s the exception to the workaholics who bring work home every day. That is not healthy however and I advise against it).
So if college is our full time job, why don’t we have breaks from our work as well?
