I heard a multitude of things before arriving at university about what would happen to me over the course of my degree. The thing I heard most often was “Cassidy, you are going to learn so much in the next four years!” Here are three things I’ve learned by my third year of being at Queen’s:
1. It is okay to struggle, and just because you’re struggling does not mean you are failing.
There have been several things an undergrad student can have difficulty with; from struggling to understand a certain difficult concept in a certain course, to struggling to balance a full course load at busy points in the semester, to struggling to maintain personal relationships when academic and extracurricular obligations begin to pile up. It is okay to feel overwhelmed when being faced with the multitude of expectations and pressures placed upon us as students, and almost all of us will experience some kind of doubt that they aren’t doing the best they can with something. There are several resources all over campus with the sole purpose of helping struggling students succeed, and reaching out to these resources does not mean you are failing, but instead taking a great step to help yourself.
2. Self-care is more important than having every single assignment have a perfect outcome by the deadline.
This is something we have all been told multiple times throughout the semester; that self-care should come before anything else, and that we will all succeed far better if we regularly take time for ourselves. This can be so difficult mid-semester as we all find ourselves neck deep in assignments and midterms. For many of us, with the thoughts of achieving the perfect GPA for whatever graduate program or internship we want to get accepted to in the future, it can be so easy to fixate on getting full marks on all assignments. It’s important to take that bubble bath or hour to talk to a friend and take a break from the work you have been focusing on all day. It is always so much more worthwhile to take a break from an assignment than to continue staring at the same paragraph on a Word document for an hour on end. It can even be helpful to take extra time for self-care and hand in assignment a day late; the 5% mark deduction is never more important than maintaining your own wellbeing, and taking that extra day for self-care can even help get a better grade than something you would have handed in without it.
3. Your undergrad experience will not determine the outcome of your entire life.
Just because you may not be involved with all the clubs on campus that have to do with what you want do with your career, you may not be in a serious relationship, or that you missed certain goals you thought you would have already achieved at this point in your life does not mean that this is the end of the road. Your undergraduate is just one chapter of your life, and while it will help you determine where you may want to go next it does not restrict you to one path.