The beauty of the Pursuit of Happiness is that no matter who you are, where you live, what you know, when you were born, or who you love, you can be happy. True happiness is above the five W’s and so are you. Learn how to find happiness in the good and bad times of life. Believe it. Read it. Be happy.
Joe Douglas
– Editor-in-Chief –
Week four: hell.
It’s very easy to associate school with overwhelming stress, unnecessary work, failure, confusion and just plain boredom. These associations prevent us from doing a good job on projects, completing homework, or learning what we’re taught in class. The problem is we associate these things because of the mental pressure, and these negative thoughts further increase the tension.
We’re getting in our own way of finding happiness. Luckily, there are techniques that can help ease that tension. One of those techniques is called “keepin’ it real.”
By making homework, studying and school what it’s not, we’re not keepin’ it real and it’s doing us a lot of harm. Don’t make it something it’s not.
It’s the fourth week of school and it already feels overwhelming. The dramatic transition from care-free summer days to sleeping with notes at night is hard on the mind, body and attitude. Teachers are already pressing students to read whole chapters at a time, perform seemingly countless calculations, and take the first tests of the year.
The thought “I can’t believe I have to do this” is counterproductive because, well, we’re going to school in order to learn and to do. That’s the way it is. That’s the real.
When we let these negative thoughts permeate our academic careers, it’s putting not only our wellbeing in danger, but our grades, ability to learn, and overall college experience are being jeopardized. In order to combat these degenerative perspectives, the associations attached to school and everything related must be changed.
Instead, try to associate homework with the opposite of the above. Consider it a healthy exercise; that completing it is absolutely necessary; that it will make you successful. You will then understand the information and maybe even find it interesting.
Homework was invented to foster an easier life, student success, and understanding of new material. School facilitates this process of learning by having its faculty teach the material, provide related assignments for application, and using a system of reward and punishment to facilitate the growth.
By convincing ourselves otherwise, that homework only exists to mentally torture us, that class is optional as long as we read the book, and that we’re doomed to receive a certain grade, we’re altering the original meaning of what it means to go to school.
School will be challenging. That’s real.
College is an opportunity to learn excellent information. Professors are here to challenge their students by providing new material. They ask students to complete homework to make it easier to learn the material and apply it in life, not just to do it. Week four and five will introduce new challenges and assignments. Try to take these things in their original meanings, as opportunities to learn, to grow as individuals, to earn a degree, to become successful, and ultimately be happy. Don’t wait until after college to find happiness. You can find it now with a change in associations and perspective.
Keep it in mind. Keep it in context. Keep it real.
Be happy.
