This past week was a rough one for the Notre Dame community: blatant hypocrisy by our administration and national political attention all in the midst of countless midterms. Did I forget to mention no fall break? We got hit HARD. It is an objectively hard time to be any college student in America right now, but for Notre Dame students, it feels like we are a bug under a magnifying glass on a sunny day with the whole world watching. I’ve been fielding countless questions from my friends and family since the beginning of the semester about our experimental return to campus. Now I’m listening to podcasts and news stories about figures from MY school fueling the fires of a national crisis? As a 20-year-old just trying to get through my classwork during a global pandemic, It’s a lot.
I know I’m not the only one feeling this way. My roommate, Jane, and I are both avid listeners of “The Daily” podcast, and she’s come to the realization that she can’t listen first thing in the morning anymore. It’s become a pretty overwhelming start to the day. But as Gen Z students during a college semester that is so heavily digital, it’s impossible to avoid screens and media entirely. Like Jane’s decision to put the news on hold for a few hours in the morning, I’ve also realized I’m in need of some serious boundaries when it comes to my phone and the internet as a whole.
I feel the need to preface my thoughts on social media hygiene with the fact that we still have an obligation to stay informed about the world around us, but there has got to be a way to do this without losing our minds… because I am.
The first game-changer for me is identifying what I can and cannot control. What people are saying on Twitter about our university? Pretty much out of my hands. However, I can register to vote. I can finish my classwork. I can also try to limit the power social media has over my day as well. Closing out of Instagram and Twitter is huge for this. I’ve started putting checks on my social media time: if I see the same info-graphic on IG stories from everyone I follow, I know I’ve seen what there is to see and can turn off my phone for now.
With control over my social media also comes refining the content I consume and substituting stressors with things I enjoy. I have my go-to accounts for news just like I have my go-to accounts for lifestyle, fashion or a good laugh. Limiting the posts that I actively look at helps to cut out the extra noise. I’ve also figured out that with the total time I spend scrolling through Tik-Tok, being reminded that the world is ending, I can instead use that hour to watch an episode of Euphoria with my roommate. Thus I’m substituting an hour of catastrophizing with an hour where I can shut my brain off. (Yes, I realize Euphoria is not the most uplifting substitute, but anyone who’s watched knows it really takes you out of reality for the duration of the episode.)
When I’m walking to class I’ve started listening to some lighter podcasts. (My favorites are We Bought a House with Finneas and Claudia Sulewski and The Skinny Confidential.) one the morning it helps to be proactive rather than reactive at the start of your day. I still get in my episode of “The Daily,” but I sandwich it between more uplifting content. This has been especially key in the mornings so that I start my day as proactive rather than reactive to our impending doom as a nation.
And honestly, if all else fails, just turn it all off. I think as Notre Dame students, we all have a bit of the control freak gene, so take back your time and your headspace! Do what you can, stay informed and above all else, protect your sanity.
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