This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at DePaul chapter.
Winter quarter is in full swing, which means waking up to dark mornings and cold walks to class. After a six-week break and coming back to the coldest temperatures in a decade, it’s hard to get back into class mode and study mode. But as much as you want to crawl into bed and forget that homework exists, you have to power through! Here’s my advice on how to stay motivated in school during the harshest months of the year:
First, watch what you’re eating. Make sure you have three meals a day, especially breakfast. Comforting sugary foods like chips and chocolate are tempting to eat in these cold months, but after you crash, you’re in a worse mood than before. You can beat your sluggish mood by throwing some fruits and veggies into your meals. An apple a day keeps the bad mood away!
Need motivation to get your butt to class? Find a class ‘crush.’ It sounds silly, but it just needs to be someone who interests you! If you see a boy whose hair fascinates you or a girl whose fashion sense you want to steal, you’ll find yourself coming to class solely to see what gel style he pulls off next or what shirt she pairs with which pants. And maybe you’ll even do some learning along the way!
Download a planner app for your phone and add all your assignments to it immediately. If you add everything that’s due to your planner now, you’ll be able to organize your life a little more easily. Apps like iStudiez and iHomework are effective because they leave assignment notifications on your phone’s homescreen in the same way that your phone notifies you of unread text messages. In addition, each of these apps has settings to add your grades for each assignment, so you can keep yourself on track even if your teachers don’t post to D2L.
Get Self Control for your Mac or Freedom for your PC. Each of these apps allows you to block certain sites you add to a blacklist (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest) for a certain amount of time, so you can get your work done when you need to without distractions from social networks.
Finally, check out what’s going on on-campus. The best way to get out of the dark winter funk is to get involved! Check out different organizations pages on OrgSync and look at their calendars to see when their next meetings are! As tempting as it’ll be to stay in and watch Netflix by yourself when you have a break from classes, being social is a basic human need. If you want to talk to some organizations one-on-one, the Loop campus involvement fair is this Tuesday, January 21st from 10-2 on the 11th floor of the DePaul Center!
Hopefully some of these tips will help you beat the frozen temperatures and stay on track during the rest of winter quarter! Best of luck, Blue Demons!