Surviving Zoom University: Daijah Edition
Let’s take a time machine back a couple months. It’s March 9, 2020, and you’re hanging out on the Haber Green with your best friends on a beautiful spring day. Music is playing all around you, people are laughing and singing, you’re eating from your makeshift college cheeseboard and vibing, when suddenly your Provost emails you to tell you you’re in the middle of a rising pandemic, and are being sent home. Home turns into quarantine, quarantine turns into months of online school, and now somehow it’s October?!
Something people don’t talk about in those blur of months is how they survived it, including myself. It’s very easy to tell people that you’re doing good and you’re getting by, and that everything was and is okay. But for me, I’m going to tell you all the bad times and the good times, what got me through and what currently is.
self-care /selfˈker/ [noun]: the practice of taking action to preserve or improve one’s own health
–
I spent a lot of days holed up in my bedroom watching Netflix series, learning new cooking and baking recipes, attempting home workouts, trying new takeout, and listening to music. I did all of the cliche Buzzfeed things that my wallet would allow me to do. But even those started to get exhausting! Something I’m really good at is organizing, so I began to make a plan that varied daily and weekly, and included super small ideas/tasks that I enjoyed. For instance:
Day 1: Do some morning stretches to awake your body.
Day 2: Go outside and get some Vitamin D.
Day 3: Treat yourself to your favorite food!
Day 4: Bake or cook something today. 🙂
Day 5: Browse Spotify for new music!
Things like these very easily improved my mood, and it was simply because I decided to do something that was different and was motivating to me each day. As a generation, especially as college students, we tend to let our mental and physical batteries run low, and continuously will let them do so. If you wouldn’t let your phone battery hit 1%, don’t do it to yourself either! Do what makes you happy, keeps you sane, and remember that you come first over everything.
As our Arcadia Fall break and midterm season comes to a close, I wish y’all a beautiful time of self-care, good vibes only, and exploring what keeps you afloat! I wouldn’t be as comfortable where I am today without organizing these moments and setting aside the time to follow through. Now more than ever, while battling a global pandemic, remote schooling, working, and several other factors, don’t forget to take some time for yourself through it all.
