It's finally summer for the tar heels! After two long semesters, it's finally time for the familiar sounds of summer. Here at UNC, how great your summer is isn't marked by how many parties you go to, or how many trips you take. In the world of academia, summer is for internships, shadowing, summer classes, and anything else you can fit into the three and a half months until fall semester. Productivity is very much the name of the game, and everyone is expected to play.

Throughout the year, people equate their stress with their success. While it is true that you should work diligently on your craft at any point in your life, I find that many students take this too far. Contrary to popular belief, there is a difference between stress and growth. At times, well-meaning people add unnecessary conflict to their life in order to fit into the standard.

This pressure to always stay busy goes further than UNC or any institution for this matter. The United States as a whole has pushed for years that productivity means profit. However, this "productivity" has quickly spiraled into a prolific stress culture and burnt out citizens.

Stress has been glamorized as something that marks the worthiness or quality of one's abilities. What many have chosen to ignore are the detrimental effects stress has on both the mind and body. When we become stressed, our bodies release cortisol to heighten our alertness and prepare our bodies for "flight or fight". In small doses, cortisol is extremely helpful and necessary for daily function. The problem with stress culture is that constant stress leads to prolonged use of cortisol in the body.

High levels of cortisol in the body can cause weight gain, a weakened immune system, headaches, sleeplessness, depression, loss of bone and muscle tone, and even the decrease of cell regeneration. Lately, there has also been a positive correlation between high levels or cortisol and heart attacks, meaning stress can literally kill you. On September 17, 2018, a woman took to Twitter to share the sudden death of her friend's son from stress and warned other students to de-stress.

http://www.nettagists.com/21-year-old-student-dies...

This is not an article bashing ambitious college students, but rather a warning. If you want to proactive within your education and career over the summer, then, by all means, go ahead! But if you are going to stress yourself, make sure you also learn to de-stress. Take a day-trip to the beach, see a movie with a friend, even take a nap, but make sure you are doing something to relax your mind and body if only for a minute. You can have your cake, and eat it too, as long as you take time between slices.

Whether you're planning on working all summer or taking it easy, take time to relax and reward yourself for all the hard work you put in this semester. Being kind to yourself goes farther than constant stress. Summer is for recuperation and reflection, not constant conflict.

Keep it cute (and relax a little)!