There is the time, when exams, presentations, paper projects and so on are waiting all the time. The to do list becomes longer and longer although everybody’s day only has 24 hours. Everyone is in stress, and for all people out there who aren’t: Please give us some tips, so we can learn how to organize our stuff a bit better.
Many people would probably describe me as an organized, structured person who seems to be able to handle all what is coming up. Although I would agree partly to it, it is sometimes also for me absolutely overwhelming to cope with all the stress. As I’ve begun to think about my study attitude, my charakter traits, my behaviour, my routines etc. in the 3rd grade, I wanted to change something. I tried to optimise myself as ideally as possible. I was inhaling study videos in which someone told you how to stay motivated, how to get excellent marks, how to … – mainly on YT. I learnt so much about discipline, studying, learning, routines, ideal behaviour, etc. It was inspiring in the first place, but over the years I used the information in a wrong way, watched videos which showed the perfect way for another boy*girl but not for me. I haven’t adapt the routines, habits and behaviour to my life, to myself. I copied them and expected that they would help. It worked for a while, but at a certain point my diappointment was that high so that it made me despairing, and I felt depressed. I didn’t optimise myself, I tried to be someone different. I supressed my emotions, my behaviour, my strengthes, my weakness, … my own character. Moreover, I always felt bad, when I made a „mistake“ by being nice to myself. I didn’t accept the sickness of my body, my thoughts, my actual attitude. I went ahead, over and over again.
Don’t get that wrong, I also learnt much about thankfulness. Today I am not only telling me that I am thankful for so much, I feel the thankfulness, and I live it – sometimes better, sometimes worse. But that’s not the right post talking about gratefulness in detail.
Back to my self-optimizing trip or at least what I thought it was. Over the time the pressure that I put on myself was rising until I couldn’t handle it anymore. I decided that I have to change the way how I process fails as well as my attitude at all. It didn’t work for me anymore to overload myself with habits I should adapt. I tried to be myself, to act like myself, to express my emotions like myself. It was becoming better although there appeared new problems I had to handle, but I used my own solutions, as my own self.
However, I’ve noticed that I am still triggered when it comes to the study bubble or study community on several social media platforms. I don’t want to blame people who are trying to help others by explaining their attitude and strategies to get better marks or living a better life. I also do that. For this reason, it was really hard for me to post something lately. I was in an inner conflict, I am still in that conflict. In my eyes it’s important that such videos are existing, and it shows that people are willing to help others. Nevertheless, it can also trigger people like me who try to stay in distance from a poisoned trigger. Only seeing the video suggestions is kind of horrible for me bc the desire to click on them is always there. In a world like nowadays in which performance has that high priority, it’s hard for me to give myself time for calming down, to pay attentionto myself or for enjoying the moment.
In my opinion I have developed. I am proud of myself that I can accept when my body says no or when I am not the ideal of a girl who handles all perfectly. I am proud that I don’t regret paying attention to myself and my own energy and possibilities. I am still struggeling and I will be struggeling with it in the future, but it’s one of my goals to live as myself now 😉
What do you think about this? How are you handling the pressure on everybody to show performance all the time nowadays? Write it in the comments.
* Little Disclaimer: English isn’t my mother tongue; therefore, there can be mistakes in my text. I want to post in English bc more people can read through it and can understand about what I write – that’s kind of important for me.
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