Ways to deal with stress whilst balancing lots of things

Being a student sometimes can come with a lot of pressure to maintain a balance between university, work, and life and we might think that it’s impossible to go through it without feeling stressed or drained. Luckily, there are a few steps that will help you to stay on top of your work and are so easy to do!

1. Be organised

A good organisation is my secret weapon when it comes to dealing with stress.

Try to create a weekly to do list (on Sunday/Monday) and then allocate different tasks to different days. This will help you to set yourself up for an upcoming week and keep a track of everything you need to do so that you won’t forget about anything important.

For example, make use of the calendar app on your phone and add your timetable as well as upcoming shifts (if you have a part-time job). Then, see when you have free time to focus on your independent study or other tasks, like grocery shopping and laundry.

2. Prioritize

Some of our responsibilities are more important than others. For example, an approaching deadline of your assignment is way more urgent than reading you still have a month to complete. This is when prioritizing comes into play! Decide on what things are more and less important and put them in the right order in your to-do list so that you know what to focus on first.

3. Set time for yourself

When having so many responsibilities, we often forget about ourselves. So, make sure you treat yourself every day with small things you enjoy, whether it would be listening to music, going to your favourite coffee shop, or just simply taking a moment to close your eyes and relax.

Don’t beat yourself up if you don’t manage to do everything on time. Sometimes it’s just not possible to complete all the tasks and that’s absolutely fine. Taking care of our mental health is crucial – we are humans, not robots!

4. Try not to procrastinate

Have you heard of procrastination-based stress? It happens when you leave your work until the last minute and it becomes so overwhelming that you just simply don’t know what to start with. When procrastinating, we allow ourselves to get haunted by the task we know we have to complete at some point.

This is why it’s so important not to put off your assignments and projects. Start with the small steps to get going, and then move to the more complex ones. Another way is to follow the 5 minutes rule. If the task can be done in less than 5 minutes, start it now and your to-do list will become complete before you even know it!