After clarifying my intention for my university education ahead, I want to explore what it takes to succeed in it.
Before starting my university education, I asked my friends, flatmate, and other people whom I came to know in New Zealand, about their lives at university. All of them seem to have a successful university life—the right people to turn to for advice. My question took them many years back to the colorful memories of their university lives. They started naming their friendship with other students and professors, the dynamics in their relationship, and the sports they were involved in. Some put education as a second and some even last in the order of importance. It was challenging my notion of university, a place where you get a mere education.
Why did friendships, relationships, and clubs come first on that list? A question I would like to hear your thoughts on in the comment section. I think a balanced friendship, involvement with desired clubs, and a healthy relationship help with the education itself. All of them feed into our well-being. A happy mind absorbs better the course material than a distressed and depressed mind. The challenge is where to draw the balancing line between your education and your other desires and needs. How much time should you dedicate to your friends and family so it does not steal you from your education? How much activity should you get involved in the clubs so that they do not get in the way of your education? I think many university failure comes from an imbalanced life.
Last week, I was working on my mid-semester essay. Having my usual sharpness of mind, I managed to write two-thirds of the essay. I stuck on writing the conclusion. I wrote sentence after sentence but no words were lining up on the page. My body was tired and my brain was foggy; I saw other people complaining of the same thing. A mild seasonal flu was circulating here. All I wanted was some rest and I refused to. For hours, I was sitting behind my laptop screen – lingering on the promise I made to myself to finish the essay. Another thing I wanted besides resting was to listen to a song that recently came to grab my interest. I had the song on repeat in my ear at high volume. Normally a song on this volume sounds too loud and annoying. Every now and then it is not with a random song, from a random singer, in a random language, from a random country, in a random bodily state, from a random time. After half an hour, I returned back to the easy and wrote the conclusion.
There are dozens of things like the song that are unrelated to what we do yet they help to achieve our goals. At the same time, many unrelated things are distractions. The challenge is figuring out what are distractions and what are not. I would like to hear your thoughts on it. My solution is to recognize your desires and needs and see if they complement each other. My need to write the last part of my essay was a peaceful state of mind that was in touch with creative flow. I couldn’t achieve it by staring at my laptop screen which I had done for hours. Whenever I engage in a song, it diminishes the noise in my head as if I have taken a drug. Given into my desire to listen to the song complemented my need to finish the essay. It is the awareness of your desires and needs that mark the difference with having your best interest in mind.
We all know what directly helps with a university education – a good studying routine and studying strategy that fit each course material.
I wouldn’t have been as reflective without writing to you all. Thanks for your presence here.
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Such wonderful questions and reflections here! I’ll be attending my 40th university reunion soon — and yes, the friendships and extracurricular activities are what I remember most vividly, although my educational experiences also helped shape the person I am today. I have a burning question for you in return, Hussain: what’s the song you were listening to??
“All I wanted was some rest and I refused to.”
I think a key part of the process is listening first to yourself.
In other parts of your post, you begin to answer your questions! I agree with you that balance, overall and on many smaller levels, is so important - but a dynamic and flexible balance open to adapting and changing and growing, never a static balance that closes off and shuts in.
Wishing you continued happiness and success (notice which one I mention first) as you continue your semester!