A brand new school year is upon us. THIS IS NOT A DRILL. I REPEAT THIS IS NOT A DRILL.
All jokes aside, I like to look at a new semester with a new years mentality.
“New year, new me” - Everyone on New Years
This is your time to reflect on what you did right and wrong in the previous semesters and adjust accordingly to continue to reach your goals. Maybe your grades were not as high as you wanted them to be, or maybe the Freshman 15 caught up to you. Whatever happened, good or bad, it was a learning lesson. Now you can enter this next school year with a better understanding of what you need to do accomplish your goals and keep your College Triangle aligned.
Oh wait, you don’t know of the College Triangle?
Well, it’s a myth that suggests that when you’re in college you can choose only two out of these three options: Social Life, Sleep, and Good Grades.
I use to believe this triangle was 100% true. However, through experience and sticking to my planning, I’ve learned that this is not true. You can have a thriving social life, excellent grades and plenty of sleep. You just have to be strategic.
Here are the things I usually gravitate towards doing when I start a new semester. Sometimes, the habits stick, and sometimes they don't. If they do stick, it's because I was persistent and did what I had planned to do despite how I felt. The ability to discipline yourself, I believe, is very beneficial in trying to make anything a habit or trying to change an old one. The more you practice discipline, the easier it will be to complete tasks accordingly.
Exercise - Exercise can increase your self-esteem, help you sleep better, live longer, and all these claims are backed by research! Exercise is generally not everyone’s favorite activity, but if you start working out and are consistent with your time at the gym, you will either slowly start to like exercising or be so into the routine that it's not hard to get up and go. I can attest to this. Last summer I worked out every day after work and sometimes on the weekends. I would work out 5-6 days a week, and at first, I didn't really want to exercise, it was just something I was forcing myself to do. By the end of the first month, I was all in. I would workout even when I hadn't planned to, and it was fun to me. I felt stronger. I was accomplishing more, and I was overall happier because no matter what was going on in my life, I was still on track with my body goals and that empowered me. So, try and workout. Make a schedule for working out maybe 2-3 times a week to start off. Set a time to workout that you know will always be free of plans and go to the gym every time you have it scheduled. Take pictures to track your progress and try to make working out as enjoyable as possible for yourself. Wearing cute clothes and listening to hype music is how I do it. This tip needs its own blog post! (Soon to come)
Find new places for social interaction - If you're like me, you really enjoy social interaction and your level of social interaction is a determining factor to the success of your semester. This isn't to say that you don't enjoy your alone time. Instead, you can have your alone time and a balanced social life at the same time. I’ve found that the more involved I am in my community and the more organizations or clubs I am a member of, the more my social life flourishes for obvious reasons. If you're a member of a club that meets once a week, you now have friends that you see at the least once a week to talk about a topic that you all have interest in. This is a great way to find out what else you have in common with people and start to form those genuine friendships organically.
Buy a planner + make a key - Planning has changed my life for the better. Religiously planning things like your goals/how to accomplish them, when things are due, and all your events will help you stay on top of your goals and will aid you in completing tasks quicker and more efficiently. I write down everything because i’ve found that the more I write down my plans and goals, the more likely I am to follow through with them. While planning, I follow a key for different types of events I have. Using a symbol or color key also makes the act of planning more enjoyable because color/symbol keys make your planner a lot more bright and attractive which could make you more likely to stay consistent with writing in your planner and sticking to your plans. I could talk about how I plan things forever, so I will definitely be making a planning guide soon and will update this with the link when I do.
Make an outline of an ideal day with your class schedule - My freshman year of college, I made a schedule on Google Docs that was color-coded based on the type of events were written down. It had my class schedule for every day in planner format and I blocked out ideal times to work out, study and chill. I laminated my schedule and put it in my binder so that I could see the schedule daily. Whenever I didn't have set plans for the day, I would look at the chart that was already pre-planned for me, and I would follow it. I was more productive this way because I had my day clearly planned out and I knew exactly what I needed to do and when I needed to do it. I also was able to focus more on my goals because I would schedule in things like working out, mediating or other things I was trying to make a habit.
Write out your goals and make a plan to accomplish them - This is by far my most important tip in this article. This tip has helped me accomplish the most and overall has the best success rate (for me) out of all the tips thus far. At the beginning of a new semester, I always write down all of the things I want to accomplish during that five-month period. I try to keep this list short, so I am not overwhelmed, but that really depends on how long I expect it to take to complete the tasks. Applying to 10 internships might not take as long as writing a short film. So, this is to your discretion, but I usually keep my goal list under ten major goals. After I decide on the ten goals I want to accomplish, I write out how I plan to accomplish them. I find all the steps that I could take to reach that goal and chose the best method for me. Then, I plan out what I would need to do each week, or day, to reach that goal. Once everything is planned out in this manner, it's only a matter of sticking to the plan I have created, and it is a lot easier for me to reach my goals. If I hit roadblocks, I just adjust my plan and keep moving forward.
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