Friday, February 04, 2011

And now, a school update...

I realized it had been a while since I blathered about school. I figured I'd give us all a break from my blathering about my VSG journey, mostly because it'll all start to run together after a while. :-) Things are going well on that end except for the fact that I currently have a cold so I'm not able to exercise as much. But I'm taking care of myself so that I can start back at the gym, hopefully this coming week. *crosses fingers*

So, school...

I'll preface this by saying that I didn't really have much of a life -before- I started grad school. I don't have a lot of friends, and those I do have are on different schedules than I am, so I don't see much of them except on the weekend. I still make time for them because I need some sort of contact with people. That being said, if I had known when I signed up to take the GRE to get into school and if I had known when I sat down to write my application essay and if I had known when I accepted the scholarship that working full-time and taking 6 hours/semester of graduate work would leave me this bereft of a life, this tired, and this stressed (too much to do, too little time) I might not have even bothered. So it's probably a good thing that I -didn't- know. Heck, I'm lying. On some level I knew. I don't believe the being bereft of a life will change a whole lot, and like I said, I didn't really have one to begin with. But I think I can do something about the tired and stressed.

It all comes down to time-management. I started grad school in a summer semester. If you can avoid this, do. :-) But the thing is, I wasn't nearly as stressed or tired during that semester, which you'd think would not be the case seeing as it's a truncated semester. The reason? Because I spent time EVERY DAY on school. Whether it was reading, researching or writing, I spent a couple hours daily on it. I got everything done that I needed to, and ended up with two As to show for it. Last semester, I didn't do what I needed to and ended up with an A and a B+ to show for it. The A was in a class I could've completed blindfolded but the B+ was in a class that I should've gotten an A in. Thankfully, it's not too late in the semester to rectify the situation. Luckily, my gym and the downtown branch of our public library are about a block away from one another. So I'm thinking of going to the gym Monday & Tuesday, then going to the library until it closes at 8PM. That'll give me about 2 hours at the library those two nights. Wednesday & Friday, I have class but I can do a little after class both nights, and more on Friday. Thursday is my evening shift, so I can do school stuff in the morning. That's scheduled time every weekday. If that's not enough time, I'll do some on the weekends, as well, but I would really like to leave a day free where I don't have to think about school or work. :-) I know that might not be possible, but I can dream, right?

Wellness is all about taking care of one's mind, body and spirit. I'll get right on that. ;-)

As a side note, in May I will have completed my first year in the Program. :-) I'll finish with my coursework in August 2012. I can survive four more semesters. Right?

2 comments:

Chrissy said...

I was just thinking about this very topic the other day. I used to be so good at time management and keeping house, homeschool, part time work, etc was all pretty Zen. I got surgery and got thrown off my schedule and never got back on. Time to get down to a little every day of most things. Thanks for the motivation

Anna Galyon said...

You can definitely do it. I found that the 3 core courses were some of the most demanding on my time. Other classes certainly CAN take up a lot of time, but at least they should be in areas that are of interest to you. I'm sure you can do it and do it well. :) Let me know if I can help with anything!