Hectic Days are Far Behind, But Looming in the Future

There is a time in your life when everything feels like too much. A time when you wish that everything that you have to get done would take a break so you could catch your breath. But most often it's not the case. And then there's that moment when you finally find time to yourself, time to do whatever you want: catch up on your favorite T.V. shows, finish reading the book you started a month ago, take a walk pausing to smell the roses and embrace your surroundings or continue your hobby that was postponed months ago because you were too busy to finish. Yet when the time to yourself comes, most often it takes a bigger toll than you think. This free time, the time you've been wishing for, for days, weeks, months, years has finally arrived and pretty soon you have nothing left to do. When there's no deadlines to rush towards, you finish the tasks that you've been waiting to complete in record time. All the free time you wished for becomes too much, because you don't have enough activities to fill it with, while still maintaining sanity. When you applied to colleges, there was a stress on your shoulders. Being a high school student, waiting for decisions based on your achievements and your triumphs, is the most nerve wracking experience. And the time leading up to those submissions is filled with, club meetings, sports games, homework, community service, studying, applications, all along with the social pressures that come along with the high school moniker. Then college comes and while its still challenging academically, socially it becomes easier to adapt. In college your next phase of life isn't dependent on all of the A's you get and the difficulty of your courses. In college, the clubs you join are just for your own satisfaction instead of using them as resume fillers. In college, unless you are a truly gifted athlete, sports no longer dominate most of your time. College gives large pockets of free time, time to unwind and find happiness in things outside of school work. But there comes a point when the monotony of your life becomes a bleak existence and nothing else can fill the void, no matter what you would love to do. It's played out. Free time after awhile can become boring, practically begging your body to give up its needed break to find something to occupy time. Stress is cyclical. If you've been stressed before, you'll be stressed again. And stress causes the desire for a little bit of a breather to constantly float through the mind, pleading its case of being overworked. And once there is free time, it begs to once again to rejoin the stressful environment from whence it came, and once it returns there it longs for the freedom from the damaging effects of stress. Yes, it's true, there is a need for a hectic schedule. The crazy days that were a constant part of high school life are in the past, but somewhere in the future you'll long for the break again, and when you do, enjoy it while it lasts.