Spring has officially sprung and for the college community that means starting the dreadful crawl toward May. I don’t know why the springtime treats all college students like a washed up friend, but it does. Spring semesters in college are made to separate the weak from the rest. Which means, we all soon find out how weak we are. It’s hard for many reasons: you hit the point in the syllabus where the professor decided to ruin your life with 10 page papers and exams every other week, your extracurriculars turn up the heat, and the sunny weather and bright blue skies is like the devil on your shoulder. But have no fear, I (hopefully) have some inspiration to get you through!

I can’t put my finger on the problem with the second half of the spring semester. It’s like all hope has vanished with the warming temperatures. Could we blame it on losing an hour to Daylight Savings time? Sure, we could. The hour is equivalent to our will to survive. Could we blame it on the professors? Easy solution. Maybe if they wouldn’t all gang up on us when the calendar hits the middle of March we could survive. Or could we blame it on the beautiful island of wild excursions and sleep labeled as Spring Break? Of course we can because all spring break ever is, is a tease of summer.

So here are all of us college students crawling back to our campuses, drowning in the commitments we left back in our dorm rooms over break. Spring break is an easy culprit of this springtime sadness because right after we return to school, we are faced with the stress and tears of spring semester. Yet, in my personal experience it seems like there is one other suspect on the list of spring stressors — extracurriculars.

Sure, they are great fun to sign up for and make commitments to at the beginning of the school year. It seems like every Fall you find more clubs, organizations, and societies to involve yourself with and at first, it isn't bad at all. You do some volunteer work, go to a few meetings, and get to know a lot of great people. Then, spring semester rolls around and you have them calling you to work their “annual spring chili cooking contest” and going to conferences seven hours away from campus every other weekend. Things get messy.

So what can we do as college students to stop the springtime slump? The easy solution would be to cut back on your extracurriculars, set a schedule and follow it, and get a good nights sleep every night. In a perfect world that would work, but we are college students. So instead, we need to think of more realistic ways to solve it.

Try your hardest in your classes is the most important. Next, rank your extracurriculars in order of importance and significance to you. Try to follow a set schedule for class, homework, and rest. Never neglect yourself and your body’s needs. Make time for friend dates for coffee, working out, and anything else that relaxes you. College is a very important time for your future, but it should still be fun. And, if all else fails, here is an inspiring GIF.