Free time is meant to be spent doing nothing
Every year, I hit a time in the semester when I have almost nothing to do. After surviving almost two weeks of midterms, I always find myself with virtually no assignments to turn in. Instead of enjoying this assignment-free period and filling my newfound free time with things that I enjoy, I feel the need to stay busy. Every time I do something for myself, like read a book or watch TV, I feel bad that I’m not using that time to get ahead in class, find an internship, or take part in some extracurricular activity. When I have nothing to do I feel as though I need to fill my schedule even more.
College has normalized always being busy. If your schedule isn’t filled with classes, meetings, jobs, internships or study seshes, it can easily feel like you’re not doing enough. When all of your peers are talking about the many aspects of their schedule that are keeping them busy and helping them get ahead, it’s challenging to not feel like you need to do more to catch up. This pressure to do more and to be more successful can be overwhelming, and it can make it impossible to actually utilize your free time to do something that you enjoy.
I have especially experienced this feeling this year. Coming back to campus for my junior year, I started to feel as though I was lagging behind. Some of my friends had just finished summer internships, networked with impactful people in their future fields and studied abroad in new and fascinating countries, and I haven’t done any of that yet. With everyone around me taking more and more steps into their future, I felt even more pressure to catch up. My free time was spent scouring the internet for potential internships, joining student organizations on campus and always trying to update my resume. I still sometimes feel as though my free time needs to be filled with activities that will hopefully make me more successful in the future. After taking a step back, however, I have realized that I don’t actually need to feel this way.
It’s been challenging to realize that I don’t always need to be doing something. Even as I write this, I’m trying to decide what assignment I should work on next. But it has become easier to realize that I don’t just need my free time, I also deserve it. I work hard during the day so that I can spend my nights doing the things that I enjoy, and I shouldn’t feel bad for doing those things.
I don’t always need to be working, and it’s okay to spend time just doing nothing. So as I get to a couple of days with no real assignments to do, instead of feeling forced to jump ahead, I’m going to at least attempt to slow down and enjoy any time that I have to do nothing before even more papers and exams once again get in the way.