As students, we all understand the importance of challenging yourself and trying to achieve the best you can in all areas of life, not just academically. But it seems that particularly at present, there is a real shift from pushing yourself, to now all about comparison, getting a one up, and in all, competition. The amount of times I have been asked, “How’s the dissertation going? I’ve only written 3000 words…” is truly ridiculous, almost all questions are of an academic basis so that the other person can feel just that little bit further ahead than you. Mark comparisons and discussions regarding averages seems to be at an all-time high at this time in the year, and we all want to boost our marks as much as possible now being in term two. But who is this for? Is it for you, or are you really doing it to see if you can beat your ‘friends’? There seems to be far too much emphasis on what everyone else is doing when really it is your degree and your life.
This extends further afield, with almost all of us in the position of hunting for jobs, work experience or internships. Being a third year student, I fully understand the competition to get a job. This isn’t just asked by students, oh no, over Christmas almost every family member, random friends of my parents, and to be honest people I hardly knew were quizzing me on my plans for after university, and to be quite honest, I really am not sure at the moment, although of course I gave an interesting range of potential options for a bit of fun- why not embrace it eh? We are all trying our best to make potential plans, and it really is amazing that some people have already secured jobs. But the balance between work, social and job hunting is a really tricky one, and it is ok that we aren’t completely sorted just yet. But for some reason there is still this niggling pressure to be ahead of the game and sort out our lives before we even have a clue what we’d like to do.
The competition to be the best seems to be creating an air of suppression in the library. In fact writing this article now I am surrounded by people glued to computer screens surrounded by books, and this makes me panic! I find myself thinking, maybe I should have more books, how can they concentrate for that long, maybe I should get a triple coffee from costa?! But actually if you look more closely, you are likely to find a Facebook tab in their internet search engines, and not exactly thousands of words being written each day. And you know what, that’s ok. No-one can work constantly, uphold an amazing social life, have a top graduate job secured and feel totally relaxed. Just remember that this experience is for you, and you can only do your best. When looking back at university, it is unlikely we will remember exactly what mark we got in the 10% module due in for February. Marks and work is important, and of course being here we all want to do the best we possibly can, but Her Campus Exeter feel that we all need to realise that it really is going to be ok.
There is no need to compare yourself to others because that won’t make you feel better. So the girl next to you in your lecture got a better mark than you in an essay, does it really matter? You probably will never see her again in a few months. You don’t need to feel bad about a night out or not going to the gym; have a great time, get a cake in Costa, we don’t need to take it all so seriously! There are so many great opportunities here at Exeter, and particularly to do well but also have fun. Do work hard and try your best, but bear in mind that we are students, and we need a little time off and encouragement every now and again. As much as we want to, it’s pretty impossible to be the best all the time, so allow yourself to realise you are actually doing really well, and you don’t need anyone else to tell you otherwise.
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