College is tough, and attending school in the middle of a pandemic is harder. Stress builds up, and students say that trying to balance Zoom meetings, home life, and the demands of schoolwork while struggling with isolation and a restricted social life has created a number of problems that can’t be easily undone. All of this combines to create a sense of burnout, leaving many students confused and upset that they are struggling with their daily tasks. So, what can you do to avoid burnout in a time of enhanced stress and unprecedented challenges? In this article, we’ll take a look at ten ways that you can avoid burnout in college so you can have a more positive experience.
How not to burn out in college
First, let’s go through some of the most evident signs of burnout.
- First, 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep are not enough to make you feel more fresh and ready for your studies. Even without working out late or being sick, you wake up already tired and slow.
- Second, you feel more irritated than ever, you feel like people don’t understand your problems and don’t want to help.
- Third, you become much more cynical towards what you do and people you communicate with. It is a way your brain uses to protect you from spending limited resources on true emotions, sincere engagements, etc. Being cynical is an efficient short-term coping mechanism that also marks a middle stage of burnout.
- Fourth, your life choices are far from optimal. It is true that burnout makes us lead less healthy lives. Your willpower is a limited source.
Now, when you know exactly what stage you are at, we recommend you to follow this anti-burnout guide step by step.
- Alter your planning and organization system for a fresh perspective. A key player in burnout is a lack of productivity, and following the same system day after day can sap your productivity. If your current system isn’t maximizing your productivity, try something new to make getting work done easier and keep you engaged.
- Have a healthy and satisfying daily routine. Routines are comforting and they also help to keep us productive and on track. Help yourself stay productive by instituting healthy routines that will keep you well-fed, well-rested, and ready to work. If you find that your daily routine isn’t working for you, or leaves you bored, switch it up for a fresh new perspective.
- Don’t forget about self-care. It might seem like writing essays and attending Zoom meetings are your top priorities, but don’t forget to take care of yourself. Giving yourself permission to relax for periods of time, to enjoy a few small luxuries, and to stop thinking about school work can make all the difference. Make time for fun.
- Create a list of achievable healthy goals. To help motivate yourself to achieve, develop a list of short-term goals that you hope to achieve. These goals should be achievable and realistic, and they should be healthy. When you start to accomplish small goals, it will make the bigger long-term goals in your life seem achievable.
- Develop a mission statement. Articulating key values that you hope to live by is just as important as having a list of goals that you hope to achieve. Develop a mission statement and put into it the values you hold in the highest regard and how you plan to express them in your life and your work for years to come.
- Have a regular leisure activity. No one can work all day every day without experiencing burnout. Build leisure activities into your daily routine. Have a time when you play a game, exercise, socialize, or otherwise participate in some activity that is not related to school work, even if it is just watching your favorite television show.
- Develop a new hobby. Similarly, having a passion or interest that isn’t related to your school work or future career can give you a creative outlet for some low-stress fun. Develop a hobby you can pursue without worrying about the outcome, grades, or its impact on your future.
- Read for fun. Too many college courses can leave a student hating the process of reading. Who wants to read a dozen textbooks at once? Restore your love of reading with a fun book to throw into the mix, or even short stories—anything to give your mind a quick break.
- Have a device-free period. Nothing creates stress like the constant bombardment of requests from family, friends, instructors, and classmates demanding your attention. Schedule a period every day, even if it is only fifteen minutes, where you unplug from all of your devices and enjoy some uninterrupted peace and quiet. The texts will wait.
- Get a full night’s sleep. It can be tempting to pull all-nighters to try to squeeze more work into every day, but this isn’t healthy for your body or your mind. Getting a full night’s sleep will leave you more alert, more creative, and ready to take on any challenge.
Burned out? Prioritize and Delegate
If all else fails, there is one more way you can take some of the burden off of yourself. You can fast and easily pay someone to write your paper at a cheap price. When you prioritize your tasks and delegate some of them, you make the risk of a burnout much less. An online paper writing service like WriteMyPaperHub.com has a team of experienced academic experts who can provide you with the fast and affordable help that you need to take care of your most challenging essay problems. Why struggle with college essays when you can free yourself from the stress by turning over your hardest essays to the experts? In the current climate, students don’t want to write essays and instructors don’t want to read them, so hiring an expert to write a paper that your instructor will only skim to fill out a bubble sheet rubric is the smart choice for avoiding unwanted essay stress.