College wouldn’t be quite the same experience if every student didn’t feel stressed at least once. When times feel especially difficult, students can ease their stress to help them overcome the challenges of college.
How can they ease their heavy load by finding stress relievers that help with their mental health status and their academics? Applying stress relievers can help students take their minds off college and refocus on the next phases of their coursework.
There are various activities that students consider stress relievers. Some involve being active, while others involve sitting down and enjoying the pleasure of watching or playing a game.
Digital animation and game design sophomore Robert Wiles listed music and video games as two of his stress relievers.
“Recently, when things got really stressful, I realized one of my favorite ways to recharge is just sitting down, hopping online with one of my friends and playing a game with them,” Wiles said. “For music, I started playing my guitar about ten years ago. Ever since then, I’ve found it very calming because it felt like what I was meant to do.”
Wiles has found his stress relievers very beneficial for improving his academic performance.
“For academics, when I’m thinking about a thousand things at once, I find it very hard to focus,” Wiles said. “It’s sort of an escape and a distraction. It lets me think about something other than stress and gives my mind a break to think about something more calming. When I come back to doing schoolwork, I feel revitalized to the point where I can get things done and do things to the best of my ability.”
Many students’ stress relievers are ones they’ve picked up over time and tried before. This can lead one to understand that a stress reliever is worth using to calm the body.
This is true for social work freshman Leila Leonard. One of her stress relievers is yoga, which she started in high school.
“My senior year of high school, I had a yoga class every morning,” Leonard said. “That was my first introduction to yoga and it was great. Once I started doing it, it made my days go so much smoother. It’s very good for relieving anxiety. It gives your body a chance to relax, and stretching is just so good for your mental health.”
While stress relievers can still work, the thought of having homework is on every student’s mind throughout the semester.
Radiography freshman Hallaway Baumgardner reminisced on the joys of reading books, watching movies, watching YouTube and making crafts. Baumgardner considers these stress relievers for her because they shift her mind away from homework.
“I tend to lean more towards the things that don’t distract me, but give myself a break to where I can focus on something,” Baumgardner said. “I could read for hours. That gives me something to focus on, and it’s good for my brain. I always feel better when I talk to my friends. It’s become natural to me to talk things out.”
Baumgardner has multiple stress relievers, and she never hesitates to use them when they can be used most effectively.
“I see [stress relievers] as a reward,” Baumgardner said. “If I do my homework, then I can watch a movie, or if I get all my homework done during the week, I can do whatever I want during the weekend. I need to find time to take a break, otherwise I can’t think straight. I need time to reset.”
When stress occurs, students can apply many methods to help them overcome it. Developing or finding a stress reliever can go a long way toward helping students feel more comfortable in their college experience.
Despite the barriers stress creates, students are creative in finding ways to persevere, and they refuse to let it consume them.