I think we can all agree when I say: these last couple of weeks have not been easy.
Having to suddenly move off-campus and adjust to being back at home was hard. There was very little time to plan and there was so much to do. I don’t think I have felt more unorganized in my life.
At first, being back at home felt safe and made me feel at ease (and in many ways it still does), but then the idea of school began to worry me. I didn’t know how this situation was going to impact my classes or how professors were planning to adjust to this sudden shift in learning. With so much uncertainty, I began to panic.
During this first week of having classes online, I tried to stay extremely motivated and kept a strict schedule to keep me busy throughout the whole day. In addition to this, I made sure that all of my readings and assignments were done promptly and I made sure to be very direct with my professors through email, if I had any questions.
Although this strategy worked well, I also realized that I was being super hard on myself throughout the week. I wasn’t allowing myself to have any time to relax and be at ease. Instead, I was getting overwhelmed with doing homework all day non-stop and felt even more stressed out than usual.
Moving forward, I will continue to implement the strategies that I found useful, but I will also keep in mind that it is ok to put aside time to focus on myself. Self-care is still important.
So, here is to another week of online classes and self-care! We’ve got this!