Your college year goes by so quickly. From the moment you step on campus, you have clubs and orgs and classes and jobs begging for all of your time and attention. You have a calendar that quickly fills up and often times its not even with the things that are supporting your priorities.
Before you get overwhelmed with all there is to do in your schedule, here are a few ways you can simplify your college year before it even begins.
There’s so much to consider going into a new school year. It’s easy just to jump right in without taking the time to think about how you actually want it to look.
- Figure out your priorities. I’ve detailed more about determining your priorities in this post, but figuring out your priorities should direct everything else you do for the semester. Once your priorities for the semester are determined the next few steps will be much easier to apply. Remember, you can always revisit and change your priorities if they aren’t working for you.
- Get Organized. This is pretty obvious, but the more organized your space and calendar are, the better you’re going to feel going into the year. Whether you organize your schedule on paper (I love these products!) or digitally, figure out a system that works best for you and stick to it. Carve out some time to write in all you have to do for your classes, student orgs, your job, and your social plans. Include things like working out and prepping meals and you will have a full picture of what you have going on this semester.
- Edit what you can. Once you get organized, you may feel a sense of overwhelm. This can happen before your school year even begins! I’ve known Seniors who already had all weekends accounted for before their semester classes even began! If there are things on your calendar that feel stressful before you even begin them, consider what it would look like to uncommit to them for the semester. Look around your room. If there are things that are adding to clutter, get rid of those. You need way less than you think you do when it comes to commitments and belongings.
- Carve out time for rest and fun. I know this can seem like something that will just happen — but once your semester is in full swing, rest and fun can be the first things to go in your schedule. Maybe this looks like signing up for a weekend away or an event with a student org off-campus. Maybe it is as simple as writing this down in your weekly schedule. However you make it happen, scheduling this in now and following through will help prevent the overwhelm and burnout that are bound to happen mid-semester. Here are a few simple ideas you can try.
- Figure out some morning and evening routines and set boundaries around the things that matter most to you. Even if it’s just an ideal plan at this moment, thinking through what you want your mornings and evenings to look like, will be so helpful when the semester gets going in full swing. Knowing the boundaries you want to set (ie: always getting enough sleep or never having too many meetings in one day) will help you shape your ideal calendar this semester and beyond.
There’s so much to consider going into a new school year. It’s easy just to jump right in without taking the time to think about how you actually want it to look. Figure that part out now and adjust your commitments and schedule as needed so that you can live your best college year yet.
Subscribe to receive all things simplicity + college in your inbox!