5 Tips For College Students

1. Schedule your time- Manage  your time in order to be able to prioritize which assignments need to be done and when to do them. It can also be helpful to have 15-30 minute breaks to relax in between doing work, so that you are less overwhelmed and can focus more and write a better quality assignment, than you would have if you were stressed and frustrated.
2. Stay organized- It is important to be organized, so that you aren't searching for your assignments or misplacing them. You can stay organized by managing your time, keeping your notes clear,clean, and concise, have dividers to divide your binders for different chapters or subjects, and to keep your binder neat and clean.
3. Don't procrastinate- Procrastination is a hard habit to break but if you follow the first and second tip; managing your time and staying organized, then you can find time to study for all your assignments and tests, so that assignments don't keep piling up and staying organized so that you find all your assignments right away instead of searching for them last minute. Also reminding yourself why you are in college in the first place, to get an education then procrastination can be avoided.
4. Get enough sleep- This is important because you want to be aware of what is going on in your classes and not tired or falling asleep in class (literally.) Have a bed time so that you are able to get up on time as well as getting enough sleep to function well in class the next day and be energetic and aware in class.
5. Have fun- Remember to have sometime to yourself so that you aren't too stressed or overwhelmed. These are your college years; make plans with friends, watch a movie or your favourite show, and just relax for a while. Also remember to balance your life, too much fun or too much work is not a good thing, find a middle ground.

Keeping up appearances

For someone who always struggled with body image and self-esteem issues, keeping up appearances was always a big deal for me. I would put on a smile and act like everything was okay and avoid speaking up about my issues because I thought that the more I didn't address my problems, the more likely it would be that they would just disappear. I would put on this act for others to make myself seem more likable or more "attractive". Turning myself into whatever I think would please them. My close friends would get upset with me saying I wasn't being myself; I was still figuring who I was at that point in my life. I started to question my reasoning for caring so much about what others thought of me. Did it really matter to me that a random person I talked to once in my life connected to me because of a lie? I realized that the only person whose opinion of me that should matter, is my own. I am my own worst enemy and can be so critical of myself, but now I am more secure about who I am and don't bother keeping up appearances. I am happy with who I am now. In times of self doubt when I feel so overwhelmed and judged, I remind myself that many people come and go from my life but I will always have myself. That may sound really morose, but it is true. As long as what I am doing makes me happy and doesn't harm anyone else, then it shouldn't matter to anyone else what I am doing. In the wise words of Dr. Seuss "Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind."