Meditation for the Mind

I, by no means, am a meditation expert. In fact, I’m barely a beginner. I would say, however, that I am an expert in finding new ways to control my anxiety. College can bring out stress and anxiety even in the calmest of students. Controlling this stress and anxiety can become challenging at times, especially with grades, internships, friendships, and family. Here are a few things you can incorporate into your routine to help you stay level headed during the whirlwind of navigating college life.

1. Guided Meditation

I’ve never been one to consider meditation. As a generally anxious person, I usually struggle to sit still and thoughtless for periods of time. That was until I tried guided meditation. There is a free app called Headspace that I started using about a year ago. It consists of a 10 session course, and each includes a short animation and  a ten minute audio of a voice guiding you through meditation. You can pay to unlock more sessions but I typically reuse the 10. Depending on your personal preference, it is applicable in many different ways. For example, I usually use it to fall asleep but some could use it to start their day or just to calm down. If my rambling on about it isn’t convincing enough, check out this tweet from Emma Watson:

If the queen of having her shit together said so herself, then it must work.

2.  Making a to-do list

I know, this sounds cliche, but bear with me. I consider myself an organized mess. For the most part, I have my stuff together, but for the times when I don’t, I find it most helpful to make a to-do list. I have a constant note on my laptop in which I add and cross off what I have to do that week. It helps put in perspective how you need to manage your time and honestly there’s nothing more satisfying than crossing something off your list because it gives purpose to your day. I’m not gonna lie, I occasionally write down miniscule stuff to cross off ,

just to feel accomplished, but hey, it works. It also helps when feeling overwhelmed because it puts in perspective what you need to do.

3. Set aside you time

I know as you read this one you’re thinking “Oh cool, phone breaks are a good idea.” Honestly, you might not have even made it all the way through this article without checking your phone. I’m actually making a point against phone breaks (sorry to disappoint). All of us, especially me, are guilty of checking our phones in the middle of something important like studying. This is a whole other problem that goes into the psychology of technology addictions that I won’t bore you with. It is important to relax between tasks during a stressful week or period of time. By relax I mean take time to do something where you leave your work behind. Go to dinner with friends, go for a run or walk, take a trip to grab ice cream, do anything that takes your mind off of the endless responsibilities you may have. I personally find leaving my phone behind de-stressing too. Or if you are too attached, like I am sometimes, put it on airplane mode so no notifications suck you back into the endless black hole of social media.

Simple put, college and life in general can become overwhelming at times, and it’s okay to feel like you don’t have it all together.  A key to overcoming this is remember to take time for yourself, and to do the simple things.