Fuzzable Blogs: February 3 – Back to School

After six blissful weeks of relaxation and catching up on sleeping, it can be difficult to get back into the groove of school. (Roger Federer just won his 18th Grand Slam title at the Australian Open. I want to stay in that moment forever.)

There really is no sugarcoating it. Particularly if the next two years of your life will be overwhelmed by senior high school studies. Yes, your you time will be hijacked.

School has treated me well… mostly. Of the four years of high school I’ve experienced, there have been no serious downers. I do well enough in my academics (the same can’t be said of my sports) and nothing too dramatic has happened in my personal life.

But I can’t shake the moments in those four years when there have been seemingly insurmountable moments, when I really would’ve wished that I was on holidays and not at school. Simple things like tripping over my own feet, incorrectly answering a question with full confidence, bad marks… They stick.

These terrible memories resurface often, even as the years pass, and they are often here to stay.

It’s fair to say that I’m not thrilled to be back in a place that has so often witnessed my down moments. The culmination of several small bad moments really does equate to one big, bad experience — at least, relative to my life outside of school.

Alas, I can’t very well ignore the rest of my education for the sake of sleeping and reading books all day.

Some helpful tips that I’ve been using for my first week back at school are:

3. Establish amicable relationships with people.

Regardless of playground politics, I knew that I would much rather have friendly acquaintances and classmates than hostile ones. Sometimes that might not necessarily be something that I can control, but it is something I can influence to the best of my abilities.

2. Work out a sustainable and healthy timetable.

It’s no exaggeration when former high schoolers say that senior years are a whole step higher than your junior years. There’s this thing called the Syllabus and everyone has their A-game on. It helps to relieve any unnecessary school-induced stress by ensuring you are on top of your work from day dot. It may take a week, a term, maybe even the better half of a year — but you must prevail at some point. A simple reward system is effective here: plan a study schedule that doesn’t impede on your sleep schedule, and reward yourself every time you complete a task.

1. Don’t lose the things that bring you joy.

Contrary to my last pointer, it’s essential that you don’t ever drop the things that make you happy. Whether it be watching tennis matches, watching movies, reading books — don’t completely banish them from your life. Mini stress-relievers do wonders on your mental health, and can be tied into a rewards system for every time you tick something off your to-do list. This pointer may fly over your head, and you may be thinking that it just isn’t possible to do the things you love without compromising your grades. If you love it, you’ll make it work. In all honesty, if whatever you’re doing — excessive school work, unhealthy sleep schedules — forces you to lose the things that bring you joy, it probably isn’t worthwhile.

What do you think of my three tips for the annual return to school? Have any tips of your own? Tweet us over at @Fuzzable!

Written by The Uyen Cao

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