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Freedom at Last – Hello Stress

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Admit it, when you finally arrived for your first day at college, excitement filled you. Likely, it was your first time away from home for more than a few nights. Freedom at last. That night, you met some of your neighbors, walked around campus, and went home to settle into your new, and probably uncomfortable, dorm bed. Whether the stress hit you then or later, at some point you felt it. That sick feeling in the pit of your stomach. College is different from high school. Now, it is all on you to succeed or fail. Learning how to handle the stress of college can help make sure that at the end of the semester you have passing grades.

It starts with planning. One of the biggest mistakes a college freshmen can make is falling into the belief that there is time for everything – later. Once you have gone to all of your classes, take a few hours to check the work load and develop a schedule that will allow you to get all of your reading and assignments done. Plan extra time for tests and papers.

Next, remember that part of the college experience is having fun. It is all right to go out with your friends and enjoy the nightlife of a college campus. Don’t have so much fun that it impacts your studies. Going out every night of the week will cause you to wake up one morning late for an exam you didn’t study – automatic stress.

Finally, eat and sleep right. These two factors alone can help you deal with stress. Get at least seven hours of sleep each night. Eat breakfast lunch and dinner. When you have time, go for a walk or a jog. Keeping yourself physically healthy will make a big difference.

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Improve Your Grades: Get Healthy

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Struggling a bit in school? Looking to improve your grades? Eat a carrot and hop on the treadmill, because studies show that healthier students do better academically than their unhealthier counterparts. Here are some easy ways to get healthier and improve your academics at the same time.

  1. Get Some Sleep.
    Students who are “morning people” do better in school than “night owls.” You need to work on improving your sleep hygiene: go to bed at the same time every night. Wake up at the same time. Perform the same pre-bed ritual every night. This regular cycle will reset your body’s sleep clock, so you can have a much more fulfilling night’s rest. Improved sleep will give you more focus, more energy, and less stress.
  2. Start exercising.
    Exercise reduces depression and acts as a great stress reliever. Don’t even think about using academic work or deadlines as an excuse to get out of exercising. Nearly every college has an on-campus gym and machines like stationary bicycles or ellipticals can allow you to study and exercise at the same time.
  3. Eat healthier.
    Eating healthy doesn’t just make your body look better in a bathing suit. It also improves your self-esteem and gives you significantly higher energy. Keep some veggies in your microfridge that are easy to prepare in a dorm room, like salad mix or carrot sticks. Cut back on that cafeteria pizza, too.
  4. Stop smoking.
    Studies show that non-smokers have higher overall GPAs than non-smokers.

When you improve your health, you get a great burst of self-esteem that carries over into your academics as well. Recruit your roommate and get motivated to become healthier together.

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The College Concerns: Stress and Depression

The days can’t be conquered. The nights must be ignored. You sit in the silence of your dorm, refusing to abandon your bed, hiding beneath the sheets. The silence is deafening but you lack the energy to speak — and the words would surely be sad, you know. They would be as exhausted as you are.

A college life has not been the expected ease. There has been no relief. There has been no comfort. You have instead become overwhelmed by the constant obligations, the unrelenting assignments and demands. You hate your professors; you hate your courses; you hate… yourself. No happiness can be found, just the terrible tedium.

And you think you may be depressed. You simply can’t summon the desire to seek treatment for it.

Students entering the first year of their education often assume that it will be ideal. They will earn their credits; they will gain friendships. The experience will be invaluable.

The truth, however, proves to be a far less appealing thing: the hours are frantic and the duties are endless. Stress begins to build immediately — left ignored due to a simple lack of time. And eventually students begin to regret ever choosing to pursue an education.

They become depressed.

As of 2010 it is estimated that 52 percent of all young adults experience occasional bouts of anxiety — enough to effect their moods and grades. A staggering 13 percent, however, are plagued by more constant problems and have been formally diagnosed with a medical condition. And it is believed that (at least) 11 percent of all students have considered harming themselves. Suicide is an all too common thought.

The stress of a university can cause even the most balanced of individuals to suffer from depression. The inability to cope with the burdens of classes and competition leaves them unable to continue — and this concern must be recognized by all so it can properly be addressed and treated.

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The Food Concerns: Stress

The night is endless, sprawled out before you with sad intentions — you must devote each hour to studying, trying to master information that you don’t even understand, trying to answer philosophic riddles. The efforts will be tedious and the rewards will be scarce (such facts can’t be applied beyond the borders of school, you believe. They will be forgotten as soon as a test is completed). You deserve a little slice of happiness therefore, a little taste of perfection. And pizza is ordered, shoved then into your mouth. It’s a burst of grease and hot flavors.

It’s also a source of stress.

The university lifestyle is one of immediacy — individuals struggle to balance classes, assignments and social connections. Every task must be performed quickly; every need must be given a fast reply. There can be no hesitation. There can only be impulses. And seeking food becomes a quest for the snacks and sugar soaked morsels, the caffeine saviors. Energy can be earned from these, as well as comfort. It’s the ideal solution for the less than ideal days.

But this assumption is incorrect. Food — when drenched in high doses of fructose syrup and saturated fats — provides no value. It instead sends your body crashing toward poor health: heightening cholesterol, lowering energy and leaving you susceptible to stress.

Individuals who rely on the aptly named junk foods will see their worries increased. They will not have the proper nutrients to maintain their levels of activity. Instead they will suffer from exhaustion, sickness and constant worry (if only because they must forever seek out more sugar to satisfy themselves, to gain even hints of clarity). This forms stress. And all students will find themselves consuming more and more food but receiving no benefits — only an excess of pounds.

All diets must instead be balanced, ensuring that health can be secured and energy can be renewed. Individuals must eat right to live well.

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Determining the Cause: Stress

Panic is not a familiar companion. You have been without it through the days of your life, have been greeted only with smiles. There have been no concerns to consider. There have been no burdens of stress. You have been fortunate instead — with the efforts of school always branded easy. Knowledge was never to be a challenge. It was instead to be a reward; and you earned it always.

But now you merely fret over every single page. College has shaped your seconds into miseries. You worry about your studies, about the competitive snarls of your peers. You despise the constant assignments and demands, the need for perfection. Sleep has been forgotten. Health has been neglected. And you remain perpetually hunched in your chair, sore and exhausted.

An education is not as you imagined. It’s instead a terror — and the stress is overwhelming.

As of 2010 85 percent of students admit to being panicked each day (unable to keep pace with their studies and their obligations). 60 percent of those individuals confess to skipping classes on more than one occasion, just to find some relief in their routines. And 33 percent of all first year students will eventually leave school completely, unable to bear the strain.

Stress is a genuine problem and it must be addressed by all individuals; including you.

Understand what is causing your concerns. Recognize if specific assignments, classes or peers are frustrating you. Know when you are most upset and when you are finally able to relax; and then generate ways to balance these two feelings.

By determining what is making you stressed you can better combat it. Do not allow the sensation to simply grow. Statistics do not favor success if you do. You must instead acknowledge the problem and then find its origins. Only then can you create the necessary methods to ease it.

Know the causes to reshape the effects. Admit your worries before they escalate.

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The Dangers of Reminders: Stress

Failure is imminent. This is your great fear, is murmured with the beginning of every hour. You worry about succeeding. You fret over learning. A university is not the wonder you wished it to be. It’s instead a demand for your sanity; and you spend each day reminding yourself of the possible costs: losing a scholarship, being forced to leave, returning in shame to your home. So much could go wrong and the possibilities consume your every thought. But this is necessary, you believe. You must forever be aware of what you risk by making even one single mistake.

You offer yourself unreasonable standards — and then you become stunned when the stress eventually overwhelms you.

College is never the simple event students expect it to be. It is far different than their high school obligations and, for many, it can cause anxiety. This feeling is intensified, however, when individuals continually remind themselves about the dangers of failing.

Classes are challenging; assignments are forever given. There is pressure to succeed in all elements — to be both the valedictorian and the social master. And some students try to maintain their levels of perfection by constantly warning themselves about what will happen if they don’t give everything they have at all times. They frighten themselves with talks of missed deadlines and low test scores, the plummet of grades. Every day becomes an echo of the potential problems.

And this only serves to increase stress.

Worrying over possible complications is the best way to ensure those complications occur. By not offering yourself time to simply relax (focusing on the positive rather than the impending catastrophes), you strain your mind, body and esteem. Emotions become wild; health deteriorates; and your ability to study is lost completely. Stress is the only component you can recognize and it is not worthy.

You must therefore remember to breathe. Don’t focus on what could happen. Keep yourself thoroughly within the present instead.

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Seeking Help: College Stress

The world is defined to silence, to the refusals of confessions. You admit none of your worries. You offer none of your fears. Instead you tuck them all away, certain that they will disappear if never voiced, that they will lose all relevancy. Stress is to be conquered alone, you believe. You can’t burden your friends and family with such little complications. They have their own lives to consider — and they don’t need you cluttering up their moments with your college concerns.

And so you face all of your problems without assistance. That’s assumed to be the only solution. But, when it fails to offer any relief, you are baffled. The stress hasn’t been eased. It’s instead only grown; and you don’t know what to do.

The answer is simple: you must seek help.

Pursuing higher education is a lofty goal. Your desire to increase your knowledge and improve your abilities is one that shouldn’t be denied. But this is not a simple affair — the expected satisfactions and lazy classes. It is instead an experience that can cause strong feelings of anxiety, depression and anger. It can overwhelm all individuals, leaving them unable to cope with the transition from children to adults.

They do not speak of this panic, however. They choose instead to hide it, certain that others should never hear of it: if only because pity would be just as great a burden as stress.

But it will not be pity that is offered from your friends and family. It will instead be relief. When a mind is filled to worry, it cannot function as it must. All thoughts will be shaped to stress and all efforts will become considerably more challenging. You must express these problems to others, allowing them to provide the support (and advice) you need. Do not try to combat this on your own. The results will not be satisfying.

Seek help. Gain encouragement. Ease the pain.

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The Hobby Relief: Stress Reduction

There once was a time when you were happy. You remember it, even if the days seem too distant now, the recollections curled vague and surreal. You were not devoted to your education then. Instead you had a collection of little hobbies, passions, reliefs. They were yours to enjoy — and the indulgence was always welcomed, was used to counter the monotony of life.

Now, however, there seems to be no time for such things. You are scrambling instead toward a degree, working hard to fulfill the demands of your major. All seconds have become tributes to studying. There is no moment offered to relaxation. There is only the constant quest to succeed — and the stress that always seems to follow.

Students must dedicate themselves to knowledge. This is understood by all to be the purpose of a university. But refusing to offer yourself occasional hobbies will serve no intention beyond generating panic. Your mind cannot sustain the perpetual stream of facts and figures. The strain will be too much. It is essential therefore that you create ways to relax your thoughts and grant them a reprieve, however brief.

Choose a pastime. Discover what makes you content, rather than what will simply help your major. Ignore all classes and routines. Instead find a passion that is purely selfish: meant to offer nothing beyond a grin. Allow it to become part of your schedule, setting aside at least one hour a week to maintain it.

For many students this seems to be a waste, keeping them from their essential studies. But stress can creep into any mind if it becomes overwhelmed. Having a hobby will ensure that all excess energy is channeled productively and intentionally — rather than being ignored and causing anxiety.

Ensure your own success. Choose a passion to pursue and find satisfaction. An education will have little meaning if it can’t be enjoyed. Be certain therefore that you are happy once again.

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