When is it time to slow down?
I’m a busy person, but that’s because I choose to be. With heavy involvement around campus, a lot of my time is spent at meetings and events. Being involved in extracurriculars isn’t mandatory to graduate, so why get involved? It’s easy to get caught up in them and many students learn that they bite off more than they can chew.
There are many reasons to get involved in extracurriculars on or off campus. Some see them as resume-builders, ways to make meet new friends, or maybe it’s just in your heart to volunteer at the local shelter. This is what makes joining clubs, sports teams, or volunteering so appealing. With the plethora of options that the University and Guelph community offers, it’s hard not to get involved.
However, getting involved can come with negative consequences. Come second-year, I found it hard to juggle my time. I spent more hours in meetings than I did in the classroom. Scheduling time for studying and work was a challenge. I wanted to keep volunteering and being involved in clubs, but I had to pick and choose. My grades were faltering, and I had bad time management to blame.
If you are like me, you might recognize some of these signs that indicate you may be involved in too many extra-curriculars.
- Your calendar is filled with writing
You probably have two or more agendas that you refer to on an hourly basis. When you open them up, there isn’t any white space. Scheduling any time for social activity is next to impossible, unless it’s scheduled weeks in advance.
- You’ve spent more time filling out doodle polls than looking at all your course syllabi
Come September, your email is filled with doodle poll requests. You spend a lot of your time filling polls out and get nervous when you can’t make dates that most people can. It’s the second week of school and you haven’t even looked at your syllabus.
- When your schedule for all your meetings is set, you’re happy that you only have two or three conflicts
You’re always leaving meetings early or arriving late. You have a Student Council meeting at 5:00, The Ontarion volunteer meeting at 5:30, class at 5:30, and a Student Risk Management meeting at 6:00. Not as bad as last year, when you had four meetings all on Thursdays at 6:00. This is good.
- You’re always tired
You never have a day off. When you do—you don’t. Being busy is stressful, which can lead to a longing feeling of fatigue. You don’t get much time to yourself and rarely get a mental rest. You’re always thinking of your schedule and where you have to be.
- Your grades are faltering
You spend more time in meetings and volunteering than you do in class. Any extra time you have is spent sending out emails, arranging meetings, and scheduling appointments with peers or administrators. Finding the time to study is a second priority to you. When you do study, it’s late into the night, and you lose sleep.
- Stress is a natural part of your life
You’re stressed more often than not, and everything irritates you. You also find that you’re getting sick more often, which is keeping you in bed and setting you back on your plans. Stress can alter your immune system and make you more susceptible to illness, especially on campus where it is spread easily.
You learn a lot in university, especially when it comes to time management. Extracurriculars can certainly help with the tools you need to best manage your time. University is a stressful experience, especially in first-year. Being headstrong and diving into too much at once can make the experience overwhelming. Being involved in university has a learning curve, just as your first-year courses do. Once you get involved, through time, you learn what schedule works best for you. If you’re volunteering nearly 10 hours a week in the mornings, and you know that you study best in the mornings, it’s time for a change. Learning how to prioritize is incredibly important.
Photo by Mariah Bridgeman/The Ontarion.