We all start the term running fast. We stay on top of classes, hang out with friends, go to the gym, and minimize our procrastination. We feel excited for a new period in our life; being able to get a fresh start at our goals can be very motivating to work hard towards them. The first 2, maybe 3 weeks of the term are often the best because we can stick with all the ambitious goals we’ve set out for ourselves. We sprint -- and moving fast never felt so good. But slowly we begin to get tired: In order to stay on top of all these goals, we’ve maybe lost some sleep here and there, maybe we’ve over-ambitiously reduced our social media use, or maybe we haven’t seen our friends and family as much as we're used to. All these little things start to pile up in the background, and slow us down. Much like a running race, starting out too fast hurts us in the long run; the lactic acid of life begins to build up, making it impossible for us to continue at the pace we started at. As we slow down and catch our breath, classes start to pickup and eventually we spend the rest of the term playing catchup.
So, what’s the solution? I mean, you gave it all you had – you worked as hard as possible and it still didn’t work. Why even try if your very best isn’t good enough? Well, here’s the thing: you didn’t actually do your best. Sure, you worked really hard, but you didn’t do the best you could; working your hardest is not the same as doing your best. This, I think, is a very common misconception among students. We often think that if you are constantly working as hard as possible that you’re also automatically doing the best you can, and that that’s what is needed for you to be successful. But the truth is, working as hard as you possibly can is probably not going to be your best. For the same reasons pointed out above, you will burn out quickly and end up playing catch up for the rest of the term. The successful among us treat the term as a marathon, pacing themselves as they go, not sprinting as fast they can to burnout within a month. Sure, there are a select few that, for their entire lives, school has been the main focus of their life. They eat, breathe, and sleep studying and so coming to University they were used to this extreme schedule and continue to work that hard throughout the term. But for most of us, doing that amount of work is not only too difficult, but not even worth it.
Okay, so working hard is not the best one can do – so what is? Pacing yourself. Just like the runners in a marathon, you need to figure out a challenging but achievable studying schedule, where you can consistently put effort forth, and not burnout after a few weeks. Pacing yourself is about looking ahead, predicting what your schedule is going to be like, taking breaks, catching up on sleep, and managing your energy (spoiler for future blogs), as well as your time, to build the most effective term overall. Pacing yourself is about strategy, and its not as easy as you might think. For example, if you’re at the library with your friends, who want to stay up until 2am working on an assignment, but you know you need to sleep and can finish it a lot faster tomorrow morning, what would you do? Chances are, you’d sprint along side your friends, not catch up on sleep, and slowly lose motivation and energy that you needed to last throughout the term. Pacing yourself is very difficult, but I assure you it is worth it.
Why then would we want to over-work ourselves in pursuit of “success”, when there is a much better solution? I think for a lot of us, myself included, we liken success to a race; that there is one finish line that is the same for everyone, and it is an all out competition to see who gets there first. Although competition is good, school and life more broadly are not as simple as a running race. The point of my marathon versus sprint strategy was not for people to compare themselves to others trying to get to the finish line, it was so that people could compare against alternate versions of themselves. Namely, the version of oneself who wants to give everything they’ve got during 1/5th of the race, versus the version that paces themselves to get the best overall result over the entire race. We get too caught up in how much other people are working, and think that we need to do what they do in order to stay ahead. There will always be people who can work harder than you, and maybe that is working for them. But what works for them may be too much for you, and although you can keep up for some time, it will end up hurting you in the long run. Success is not about beating the other person, it’s about beating yourself to find the best version of yourself. Afterall, isn’t doing your best the best you can do?