Taking Care of Yourself

Recently, I have been extremely busy... and when I say busy I mean that I legitimately have not had even a minute in the past week to take a moment and gather my thoughts. It has been go, go, go... wake-up, get ready, grab breakfast and head out the door to walk to class. Then, since my school schedule only allows for ten minutes between classes, I have to rush from class to class, only to rush home and head out the door for work. Then, to no surprise, after work I grab dinner I grab dinner and head out the door to the library until 11:00 when the library closes and end up falling asleep around 11:30 from pure exhaustion. This has been my what my days have consisted of this entire week, and let me tell you... I am drained, tired, feeling under the weather, and have been somewhat aggravated in general.

Today I have realized that self-care and "me" time are essential to maintaining my well-being and well, my sanity. I have not taken one moment to myself this week; not one moment to gather my thoughts and destress, and I think it has really took its toll on me, both mentally and physically. In light of this realization, I decided to take one hour and dedicate it to myself; meaning that I wasn't going to worry about homework, who was testing me, what was going on on social media, or even stressing about my work schedule.

I decided to grab my yoga matt and head out to shoreline. I have always loved doing yoga, but since yoga studios are a bit on the expensive side in Santa Barbara, I haven't kept up with it as much as I would have liked. So having a love for yoga was only one reason why I decided to use my "me" time to go do some peaceful destressing. The other reason was just that; yoga is extremely peaceful, for me at least and when I practice yoga, my mind seems to center on that very moment instead of on every other nitty-gritty detail concerning my life thats usually passing through my mind. Boy key me tell you, I felt extremely better after taking sometime to take my mind off of my busy life. I even felt that I was way more motivated to be productive when I got home as well!

To all of us that are lucky enough to live in Santa Barbara: We are so fortunate that we live in such a place that has so many options for destressing and getting away from the hustle and bustle of college life. By this I mean that if we need to take a break from the enclosing walls of the library or realize that we need to stay grounded and take a break from the party scene, we have so many options to keep us busy, or help us destress. I mean what's a better destressor than the sound of the waves crashing up on the beach? So if you are feeling overwhelmed or stressed out go take a walk on the beach, do some yoga in the park, go kayaking, whatever it may be that you enjoy, go do it - make some time for yourself and I'll bet you'll see a difference in more than one aspect of you life!