In a post I put up last week, I talked about how taking care of your physical health can help improve your mental health and general well-being. Today’s post is somewhere along the same lines, only that this one caters to an audience I feel particularly close to: university students.
I am a university student myself, and since I started my degree I’ve become more and more aware of the ways university culture pushes people like me towards unhealthy lifestyles. Yes, your eyes aren’t fooling you right now. University culture makes people like me live unhealthy lives. You’ve got to bear with me on this one.
It is not the academic environment itself that encourages students to pay less attention to their health and well-being; in fact, I struggle to put my finger on the exact sources of these ideas and beliefs. Where they’re coming from doesn’t matter all that much, because all of us have subscribed to them at some point, could it be through pulling all-nighters, binging on convenience food or studying for hours on end without a break. Because university is truly stressful and demanding of our time and energy, we start to believe that the only way for us to keep up is to override our basic needs and work as hard and for as much time as possible.
With this post, I want to demount this belief and suggest you an alternative that will actually make you feel a little better, physically and mentally.
Staying healthy at university is not impossible. It is more difficult than giving in to tempting bad habits, that’s for sure. In my opinion, though, it is more cost-efficient: you will be getting the rest that you need while staying on top of everything that you need to take care of. Also, surprisingly enough, staying healthy at university does not depend on a routine. I am here to vouch for that. I hardly have a daily routine myself, because every single day in campus is entirely different from the previous one, and uni life is generally all about hitting the ground running and rolling with the punches as you go. You don’t need to live a perfectly put-together, balanced life to stay healthy at university. The only thing you really have to do is be mindful.
Being mindful of your sleeping pattern
Waking up early in the morning is a drag, nobody likes it. Even though I consider myself to be a morning person, I still hate waking up early and I probably always will but with university, it is often a requirement that you are up at around eight AM. Waking up early is even more dreadful when you’ve barely gotten any sleep the previous night. Maybe you are a night owl and you’re better off doing your work at night; but yet, your body will thank you for making an effort to go to bed at a decent time the night before a day of lectures starting at nine.
After having pulled a couple of completely unnecessary all nighters back in my first year of university, I have learned my lesson: there is literally no use to refusing yourself a night of sleep when work can be caught up on just as well, if not better the next day. Moreover, all nighters will throw you off for at least a day after, because even night owls have a normal circadian rhythm, which expects us to be awake during the day. If completely necessary for you to make a deadline, an all nighter is worth pulling once. Do yourself a favour and don’t make it a habit, though!
Being mindful of your diet
With all due sincerity, we are students: we don’t have a whole lot of money to throw around, and many of us are in debt for wanting to get an education. In such circumstances, going for unhealthy food choices is extremely tempting. Take it from someone who battles an incessant craving for sugar every. Single. Day.
But financially speaking, convenience food and snacks will cost you more than an actual investment in ingredients you purchase for healthy meals. The reason for that is, they are processed in such a way that they will hardly satisfy your hunger and fill you up. And the more you have of them, the more you’ll crave them moving forward. Healthy, home-cooked meals are boring, indeed. I love a take-away as much as the other person and my partner can confirm I suggest ordering pizza at least three times a week. But making that extra effort to cook for myself and buy ingredients for meals rather than snacks has proved to be more financially friendly choices – and if you try them as well, you will soon be able to confirm.
Budgeting and meal-prepping in advance should become your best friends at uni if they’re not already: make yourself a shopping list before the start of a new week and cook all your meals in a bulk, then store them away and get one out whenever’s lunch time. That saves you both time and money! Fruits and veggies are also financially accessible food choices. And all the money that you’re tempted to spend on another Chinese take-away? Save that. Indulge appropriately.
Being mindful of your study habits
As a student, a lot of your time will be spent, you guessed, studying. So the way you study often has a major influence on how you feel, both physically and mentally. A bad studying style will take its toll on your health and drain you of energy much faster than smart work done in a way that’s suitable for you. In that regard, developing appropriate study habits will not only make studying less of a tedious process for you, but it will also greatly improve your academic performance.
It is essential that you find the right approach and techniques for your memory and information processing. Are you more visually inclined? Do you tend to memorise better when things are explained to you? Sit down with yourself and figure out what works best for you as a student. Whatever you come up with, that’s what you need to practice moving forward. If you are a visual learner, highlight your notes in different colours and draw diagrams that summarise the content that you need to learn. If you learn by listening, record yourself going through the material and play it back to yourself whenever you sit down to study. Study styles and techniques would make an entire post all by themselves, so I will leave that for another time.
It is also important that you learn the distinction between working hard and working smart. Working hard means spending hours after hours in the library, cramming the material, not taking a single break. Working smart is using the right tools and techniques in order to limit studying to just a couple of hours, but still managing to cover all the material and gaining a very good understanding of it in the process. Hard work is what burns students out; smart work is what all students should seek in order to maintain a balance in their lives. Make your choice.
Finally, don’t leave things until last minute. At least try not to. You will be tempted, but don’t. Like, there is literally nothing I can add to it. Just don’t.
Being mindful of the people you spend time with
I am just twenty-one, I am still too young to preach about peer pressure and the like. One thing I think I can allow myself to talk about, though, is the importance of surrounding yourself with the right people. People that appreciate and support you, people that look out for your needs and take care of you like they would take care of themselves. Finding such people is fairly hard, and to this day I can’t say I’ve had many such friends. Au contraire, I’ve actually spent a lot of my time and energy on people that sought to use me for their own benefit, filled me up with negativity and brought me down whenever I dared aspire to something bigger than myself.
The thing with uni is, there is just so much to be done. So many opportunities can be sought, so many dreams can become a reality. With all of these amazing things out there waiting for you, there is literally no time to waste on anybody that doesn’t give back. So toxic people, cut them off. It’ll be hard, absolutely. But if you are still reading by this point, that one person you might be thinking about? Stir away from them.
As far as activities and pastimes within your group of friends are concerned, try to find a balance between partying and studying. Too much of each can do you more harm than good, so aim to be somewhere in the middle. Getting enough sleep and eating a healthy diet will be of no use to you if you wake up hungover every day. And that studying won’t be as good either.
In my case, living a healthy lifestyle at university has done wonders for me: I feel better physically and mentally, I cope with stress more efficiently, and I find a lot more energy to distribute between studying, my job, my creative projects and my personal life. A lot of that I owe to making healthier, more mindful choices for my life – and frankly, anyone can take this step. So can you.
I do hope you’ve enjoyed this post! Feel free to share your thoughts and suggestions in the comments section below: I would love to hear about your experiences with staying healthy at university!
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