Oviya Ravi Week 11; Should I Finish My Psych Notes?
This weekend I was talking to a friend of mine about how we had to know our choreo before we went to practice and her response was, “technically, we don’t have to do anything,” which, in reality, is extremely true. Nothing mandatory is truly mandatory. There is no real way to force someone to do something; everything is a choice. If I told myself today that I was never going to take another set of notes for my psychology class, that would be a choice I am able to make. The only reason people feel as though they are “forced” to do something, is as a result of the fear of consequences.
The reason I am going to continue taking psychology notes is because I know that my grade will suffer if I don’t. The reason me and my friends learn our choreo before practice is because we know that if we don’t, our teacher will likely yell at us. These are not consequences that force our hand, they rather propose a situation that we would rather not get ourselves into. However, there comes a point when many of us feel that we can no longer keep doing everything asked of us. The notorious junior year, I’m sure, has left all of us feeling burnt out at some point. But at what point do the consequences we fear no longer outweigh the struggles we are going through to get everything done?
Balance is incredibly important. It is important to stay on top of school work and put as much effort in as we can but that is the key. We can only put in so much effort until that effort begins to drain us. Sometimes, a bad grade is not worse than feeling like you cannot stay up a second later or dreading waking up in the morning because you have to do it all over again. The consequences that we have been conditioned (thank you psych notes) to fear stop feeling like the worst thing in the world. We all have the power to choose what we want to put our energy into.
A few weeks ago, a friend of mine said “next year, I want to live. I’m just surviving right now.” This has become a reality for so many of us. School and extracurriculars and the fast approaching shadow of college applications have taken over our lives to the point where we are only living for the future. The present has purely become a stepping stone on the pathway to our final destination. I choose to change this. I choose not to let the fear of consequences stop me from living right now.
Hello Oviya, I found your blog this week incredibly relatable, and I find that slightly alarming. I fear that the most relatable or prominent aspect of my personality is my emphasis on my academic performance, and then the notion of what college I may or may not attend in the future. In the Bay Area, the definition of intelligence (which I happen to be debating with a friend of mine as I write this) is incredibly narrow, and as school gets harder, applicant pools become more competitive, and admission officers become more selective, this positive feedback loop will only increase. I have a response to one of the points you made in your blog this week. You mentioned that draining yourself for a grade or whatever other external factor in your life is not always worth it. But I argue sometimes it is. Take, for example, finals, whether spring or winter, you have weeks to recover after. My view is stay up all night, drink as many energy drinks as needed, talk to yourself for hours explaining concepts, talk to no one, and never leave your room. Because, well, what happens in these two weeks will be solidified. In today's era of "I refuse to round grades" with teachers this is what must be done to survive, because your body and mind have two whole weeks or months to rest and heal after you push yourself, but let's say you prioritize your mental health, due to the human brain's inability to multitask, your grades will inevitably reflect your shift in priorities and this is not something teachers will work around. So I would much rather deal with personal issues than an unrelenting, unmerciful high school teacher, as would many other students, given that one of the two evils I mentioned is significantly worse. Regardless of my take on your blog, I found your writing incredibly profound as always. Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteHi Oviya! I currently love that our cohort is mostly talking about our personal experiences right now and how we need to focus more on the present and be more observant, which is giving me more motivation to do my own version of my “psych notes.” When your friend said, “Technically, we don’t have to do anything,” she was entirely correct, as I have found myself saying the same. Whenever I don’t want to do my work as I stare at the endless tasks of the day, I say “technically I don't haaave to do anything,” which is only feeding a negative, but persistent, mindset. There are consequences, even good ones, to everything, and each action we take will have an outcome. The reason I, too, push on is that I know that if I don’t, I will regret it later. Whether it is doing my work or working on my extracurriculars, all of this will ultimately play a role in my future in college. I agree with you that balance is “incredibly important,” as my dad always says that to me. To live a life we enjoy, we need to take control, and the only way to do that is to learn to balance. Although I don’t agree with you that a bad grade might be worth it if we are extremely drained, that does happen to me. When my body is so utterly drained that I can’t process anything else, I do sleep and just accept the bad grade, although I wish I didn’t. Maybe it is a good thing that I am prioritizing my mental health compared to academics, but I do wish it would just be over as soon as possible so I can actually start living.
ReplyDeleteWhile saying that nothing mandatory is truly mandatory is not wrong, an easier way of phrasing it would probably be “eventually required.” It's not always mandatory for your immediate situation, and not even always required for basic survival, but it is needed for something to align the way you want it to in the future. I find that this is similar to the free speech argument seen online sometimes where somebody declares that, if taken literally, the right to free speech should mean that anyone should be able to say anything and get away with it. But in reality, no-one is free of social consequences and reactions from those around them.
ReplyDeleteYour statement that the present has “become a stepping stone” for some “final destination” hit close to home, and it also reminded me of some of the sources we were given for the American Dream essay not too long ago. Multiple sources, as far as I can remember, spoke about this same conclusion you came to in your blog of wanting to “liv[e] right now” instead of aiming for things you may or may not accomplish in the future. From a psychological standpoint, this honestly sounds like a much better conclusion to come to than defeatism. We’re all stuck in this weird gap between winter break and spring break right now where everything just keeps going, so it's no wonder that we are looking for some way to escape or come to terms with it.
I agree with your friend, I too want to survive junior year so I can live next year. It will be our last year in high school (and for many, our last year before we turn 18), after all. Good work on your blog!
Hi Oviya! The idea that we truly don’t “have” to do anything in life is one that is very interesting, and something that is truer than we realize. As you said, the only reason that we ever feel compelled to complete something or act in a certain way is because we determine that the potential ramifications of not acting that way outweigh the temporary discomfort or unpleasantness of having to do it. This is something that I find I have to constantly remind myself of every time that I don’t want to do my math homework or study for that biology test that I currently know absolutely nothing about…
ReplyDeleteHaving just recently come out from what might just be the busiest and most stressful, breakdown-worthy, tear-inducing couple months of my life (thank you to my eleventh and final year of piano exams!) about a week ago and somehow making it out alive, I can confidently say I understand that sometimes, pushing myself to my limits or even past them can bring results that are much better than I could’ve dreamed of, if only I have the courage and the strength to put in the extra effort to get there. However, after escaping from that pressuring period of my life, I haven’t been able to return to normal, as I am suddenly now dealing with all of the burnout and exhaustion that I forced myself to suppress in order to succeed. And yet, I do not even slightly regret how hard I pushed myself to get to where I want. My point in saying this is, I think that we have to just evaluate what we consider to be worth the pain and effort to us personally, and then use that to guide our decisions. As my mom always likes to tell me, you have nothing in life if you don’t have good health, so I definitely believe that we need to try and set limits, but we are the best judges of what we can handle. Thank you for sharing!