Crunch Time

So it's that lovely time of the year where the flowers are budding, rain is pouring and "Springtime for Hitler and Germany" is sung:

Brace yourselves, winter is still here

But as pleasant as the beginning of Spring is supposed to be, every college student has that sinking feeling that for the next month or so, they will end up feeling something like this:

This computer is so hilariously '90's, it actually made me lol

Time management is a skill I've acquired over the past few months, but when all the professors schedule all the things in those precious few weeks, having a challenging but manageable amount of work tumbles straight into "kill me now." The worst thing is that, if you go to your professor's office hours and they ask how your other classes are going, they will give you that all knowing look when you reply with a huge-ass sigh.

Somewhere, someplace, a group of professors are grabbing coffee right now and cackling over the revenge they're gaining for their sleepless nights in college.

While this is my first year experiencing such high-level stress, I've compiled a list of "let's not die just yet" tips for getting through the next million pages one has to study for tomorrow's test you totally forgot to study for.

1) Establish a good rep with your professor from day one.
When you walk into a class with a many eight-hour nights of sleep behind you, it's easier to concentrate on actively participating in class, attending many office hours, and maybe even getting ahead on an assignment or two. You don't have to be a superstar student and start writing dissertations for that class, but if you show that you're enthused about learning and that you want to put the effort into learning, your professor will be more prone to understand when you get a little quieter towards the end of the semester and your assignments reach that dropbox closer to the deadline. You still have to put the effort into each assignment, but if you've gone above and beyond in the beginning weeks of class, your professor is (hopefully) going to realize what kind of student you are and be more understanding about a week or two of rough patches.
This doesn't work for every professor, and being overwhelmed is never an excuse for not doing your work.

2) Plan ahead, but don't think ahead.
There's a fine balance between being aware of how much you have to do and being freaked out about it. This is a time when a planner is basically your bible of college. It can be daunting to look at the remainder of your syllabi for the next five weeks and realize that, oh wait, you have four papers due that final week of class. I'd suggest writing down your daily homework and project assignments up to the end of the semester (that way it's harder to forget that pesky little math sheet in between five million projects), but once you've got the workload in that planner, stick to looking at your daily to-do list.

3) Give yourself breaks.
It can be tempting to try to power through five chapters of Dorian Gray (spoiler: Chapter eleven will put you the fuck to sleep), but you will burn out. A break doesn't have to be an hour's episode of Game of Thrones or five minutes turned into two hours on Tumblr. Give yourself a break schedule. Maybe for every chapter of your history textbook you complete, you get an M&M and one short YouTube video. Or after each exam during that hell week, you get a celebratory hour at Kiwi.

That celebratory "hour" may or may not have turned into three hours. Shhhh.

4) Exercise, but not at the gym.
I mean, this may be biased about this topic because I'm terrified of the gym, but it seems to eat up quite a bit of time. I mean, first you need to make your hair look presentable. Then you need to change. Then you need to find where the hell you left your ID card, and so on and so forth. The time it takes you to walk to the gym, wait in line, flirt with that guy who's been eyeing you from the treadmills, and cry over how skinny you aren't, it may be well past that group meeting you were supposed to attend. It's important not to neglect exercise during optimal stress, but whipping out a yoga mat and doing a few crunches saves way more time than making workouts this entire ordeal. There are plenty of ten minute workouts you can do in your room that are relaxing to both the body and the conscience.

And finally,
5) Quit the un-scheduled breaks.
You know how it goes. You open facebook in another tab. Maybe G-Chat just to be hip. Your friend starts chatting you. Then you remember said friend told you she was going to reblog that really cool post. So up comes Tumblr. Suddenly a five minute facebook perusal becomes your entire night. For no reason at all! It gets to the point where, as you keep refreshing your news feed, nothing changes. Imagine if you used that "I"m gonna stalk my ex" time for actually, y'know, securing future employment. Tumblr is always going to be there. That A+ that is dangling right in front of your face, however, is not.

And remember, after this month of hell, everything will be worth it once you lay on that beach in your bikini.
Then you get to worry about the stomach that has magically emerged during your freshman year. But that's for another time.

Namaste.