Dear student who needs a break,

I hear you. For the non-students who also need a break, I hear you, too. College students, it's mid-semester and burnout time. If you're anything like me, the first month of the semester felt great. This semester would be different because you wouldn't let your work pile up until the day it's due, and you were going to keep yourself feeling good, eating healthy and working out. Everything someone who has control of their life should do.

Now is the mid-semester burnout point. For my non-students, it’s the middle of autumn and you’ve been pushing hard and working at full capacity for a couple of months nonstop now. For everyone, we need a break. People aren’t machines. We cannot go and go and go continuously for weeks on end. Sometimes weekends don’t cut it as a break. Weekends are filled with runs to a ramen shop, then right back to the grind of homework, study groups, rehearsals and everything else that comes with being an average college student.

My mom recently told me on a phone call she didn’t know how I did it all in college. Between dancing, academics, still having time to sew my pointe shoes and to knit, I still sound happy and excited while talking to her. (Keep in mind, she earned her Ph.D. in Mathematics while raising me, so I think she maybe just forgot what it was like).

Truth be told, when I sat down to write this, the only thing I truly wanted to do was to take a nap. There are many benefits to napping. In my case, I wanted to only wake up once my problems and work magically disappeared.

I want to tell you it’s okay to take a break because sometimes we get overwhelmed and tired. No one can do it all all the time. Yes, I tell you all these usual things, but I know, if you’re like me, you’ll brush it off because you don’t have time to take a break, and it’s easy for me to say and such. Instead, I won’t push upon you words you’ve heard before because you’ve heard it all. You know you’ll feel better after a break when you take care of yourself (and after that big project you’ve been working on is over).

Instead, I say I stand with you. Here’s to the tired ones -- the people who, honestly, need a short nap of about 10 days or so. We’ll pump our fists in the air in solidarity from our beds while our laptops lay open to three different assignments we have due tomorrow. We’ll get through this. For now, it’s okay to complain a little. Don’t forget to treat yo’ self when you get the chance.