I cannot tell you how many hundreds of times I have heard students joke about their grades, their lack of sleep, and the fact that they’re always having to pick between studying or socializing. If you could only pick two of the three, would you choose grades, sleep, or a social life? Why pick only two? I’ve learned how to stay on task when I know I need to, even when I’m with my friends. In fact, my answer to the age-old joke is that I don’t have to pick two, I’ve found a way to have all three.
Instead of having to choose, I combine my social life with virtually every day-to-day aspect of my life. It’s almost comedic, but I know that if I want the best of all three, then I need to compromise my time spent on all three. Some responsibilities absolutely must come first. In my opinion, the order of importance is as follows: Good Grades, Sleep, Socializing. So how do I keep all three in my life? By including my friends and family into almost everything I do.
Photo by Emily Macdonald
I have made two of my closest friends that I’ve ever had here at Oxford, and we’ve become so close because we do EVERYTHING together. One way the three of us socialize is by being present, talking minimally, while we focus on completing our workload. The three of us take a lot of the same classes, study together every day, work together, and volunteer together. Even if we don’t speak, it’s nice to have their support by just having them present in my life. In fact, it makes me appreciate their friendship that much more because they respect me and my work just as much as I respect theirs.
Another way that we incorporate our social life into the other aspects of our life is simply by taking care of ourselves…together. College has made me realize just how precious time is. Part of how I keep conversations and relationships going is by doing every chore of a task at the same time. For example, sometimes we just nap together. As silly as it might sound, we will have group nap times several times throughout the week. I stand by the saying that, “Friends who nap together, stay together.” Similar to how we don’t have to talk while we study to know that we’re friends, just simply sleeping at the same time is almost a sign of love and understanding among my friends. We also make use of the adjacent stalls in the communal showers by showering at the same time so we can talk and catch up without giving up too much study or sleep time.
Photo by Emily Macdonald
We also hang out together in the way that people usually consider socializing (partying, watching movies, going out to eat, etc.) but we know that we are here at Emory for a reason and with a purpose. Knowing this and simply spending our time together while we accomplish our daily goals is one of the reasons I’ve made such great friends at college. They understand and appreciate me in ways very few people can and I couldn’t love them more for it.
Photo by Barbara Marin