Finding that perfect balance in life can be hard enough, let alone finding balance in college as a student juggling the stress of getting perfect grades and maintaining an involved social life, all while staying on top of personal well being.
Having gone through my first year of college and experienced first hand maintaining this balance, I will be sharing with you in this post what has worked for me.
Placing high priority on both physical and mental health as well as school work and social life is crucial. Recognizing that the key to maintaining a balance between all three of these things consists of properly managing your time and learning how to say no when the time is right.
As both semesters went on, the importance of saying no to distractions grew increasingly more obvious, whether that meant getting ahead on some work or getting in a few extra hours of sleep. It is not easy to say no to friends when they propose a fun plan to go out, but deciding that a night to yourself would be more beneficial is what allowed me to maintain a healthy mind and body.
It was possible to maintain a strong GPA both fall and spring semester of freshman year while working out five days a week and getting to experience the social scene. In fact, freshman year is the year in which you will meet more people than ever before regardless of how intimidating living on campus can be. It is possible to go out and experience every new club and organization while remaining on top of your academics.
One of the major steps to first year success is to join clubs and organizations in your first year in order to meet a wide variety of people and have as many new experiences as possible. As many new and different things as possible! It is through all these extracurricular activities that freshmen are able to meet some of the most like-minded people and figure out what sparks their interest.
As far as maintaining a good GPA, it is necessary to be consistent with your studies and learn right away that doing well in college requires a different effort than what would have allowed you to do well in high school. Succeeding in college means studying the material you have learned as you go along through each semester. Cramming for an exam the night before was no longer sufficient for success solely because the material was far too difficult and dense to grasp all at once. Make sure to not be too hard on yourself when it comes to perfecting individual assignments, but remain consistent with your study habits and have a high degree of academic diligence.
Prioritizing yourself comes first when it comes to mental and physical health. It becomes more difficult to accomplish academic goals and maintain a social life when you do not feel secure and confident in your own mind and body. Setting specific goals for yourself to workout every morning ensures that your day is set up for success. Working out in itself is a productive task. Therefore, this tricks your brain into wanting to continue to be productive if you are able to get in a workout for that day. Not only does working out set you up to be constructive, it releases endorphins in your body that help you to feel better and give you more energy (which you can utilize to fulfill other tasks, either academically or socially related!).
These tips might seem like a lot at first, but with practice and time, finding the right balance in college comes much easier than you would think.
BIO: Mira Camunez is a Sophomore at Barrett the Honors College at Arizona State University. She is studying Business Entrepreneurship and is a summer intern at GradGuard.
