In this world, there is one thing that most people will strive for in everything they do: success. It's simple and it's widely accepted, but it's almost impossible to attain true success. There is always something wrong, there is always something more to do, more to say, more to correct, and there is always room for growth. There is any number of problems you can still find even once you've reached your perceived goal.
See, the problem with this is that even though we can all acknowledge that you will never be completely perfect, there are two things seems unacceptable to do even if it is the best possible thing for you:
1. Stop drowning in the rat race and the day-in, day-out work to take a second for yourself and just relax
2. Acknowledge that when you can't stop, that there is a problem and tell somebody the truth for once when they ask how you are
I am a college student and I am BUSY. I really do love everything that I'm doing and that makes it even harder to slow down, take a step back, and reevaluate my daily load of schoolwork, activities, and socializing. I have 2 or 3 meetings every day, I conduct 12 interviews or more per week and memorize paragraphs verbatim as part of my fraternity pledging process, I am taking 16 credits of courses that are stimulating and interesting but also are very work heavy and quite difficult, I have a million friends in a million different places on campus that I struggle to find time for, and I am an active member of 3 clubs. Every single thing on that list means something to me, and it would kill me to give anything up, but after a conversation with a friend over lunch earlier this week and subsequent contemplation I was forced to face the truth:
I AM NOT OKAY.
He was telling me that this semester, he left every club except for one and took the lightest courseload he could possibly take because he was tired of being tired all the time. He knew that he was not okay when he only slept 3 hours a night and walked around to all his commitments like a zombie all the time. This sounded so eerily familiar to me that it was hard not to consider myself in his shoes.
I never feel like everything is right in my life, but I also never felt comfortable enough to admit 'defeat' before this interaction. Everything in high school was so easy for me, and I wasn't ready to say it out loud that college is just plain hard. I have failed time and time again, no matter how hard I try, and it eats me up inside. Even when things are going just fine, I always feel unsettled, unprepared, and off my mark because even though I never stop going, going, going, my best just isn't good enough. But when even so, when I sit down with a friend or pass someone in the hallway and they ask how I am, my answer is still "Good." I put up a front to the people who are supposed to know and love me best, and there is something fundamentally wrong with the mindset that makes this the norm.
The truth is that I'm not good. But I'm on my way. I'm starting to think about ways to take time for me, and trying to accept that if I'm trying my hardest then that should be good enough for everyone around me, too. I am going to fail, but I am going to get back up. Nobody is okay, but people need to start letting that show, because if everyone knows that someone else feels the same way they do, then they know that they are not alone and we can start to make small changes in the way we view this crazy world we live in.
This will take time, and I know that, but today I am just ready to admit that for now, I am NOT okay, but eventually me and those I surround myself will be able to accept it and get help instead of silently dwelling on something you may have no control over.
