With the onset of the new year I've been doing a lot of thinking about who I want to be in 2020, what the year will look like for me, and what I want to accomplish. These thoughts have ranged from "I just want to have fun" to "I need to apply to thirty internships in one hour and oh, by the way, I think I kinda want to take the LSAT." Aside from big picture thinking, getting back to school and establishing an altered routine for this semester involves microdecisions I have to make every day. One of these decisions was what to do with my first Friday back to school.
I think that priorities influence our decisions more than we think about. What drives that inner feeling of what you want to do? Not that I was ever only focused on fun, but recently my main focus has shifted to prioritizing my job as a fitness instructor. On Friday afternoon, I worked my administrative job within fitness services for three hours and then blew off some steam at a fellow instructor's dance cardio class. By the time I was done with these things it was 5 o'clock. A friend asked me to go to a twenty-first birthday party and I…. oh god I don't even want to admit this on the internet. I declined! My first thought was "how do I make myself want to go to this". Sure it's raining but what am I, ninety years old? It's my first weekend back to school and I'm being a loser.
But it got weirder. As I went home and sat in bed watching "Breaking Bad" (which I'm willing to give a three hour minimum TED talk about if anyone is interested) I heard my neighbors playing music, shouting, all the sounds of fun. And in that moment I didn't wish I was them. Have I lost my FOMO? What is going on????
The point is, I had a really great relaxing night and was able to be productive on my Saturday (that sounds like something a dad says to another dad at a kid's little league game but whatever). Once I let go of wanting to feel a different way then I felt, I felt pretty great about my choice. I am trying to tell myself that this doesn't mean I will be a hermit for the whole semester. Not even close. It just means that maybe sometimes there is an ebb and flow relationship between me and the party.
If you've made it this far reading this, my advice is to do things you actually want to do. Stop trying to make yourself feel a different way. This doesn't mean "I don't want to do my homework, so I'm not going to." Not like that. More like not doing things that you feel like you should do because you want to be cool or you're afraid of being labeled as lame. It's okay to take some down time. It's okay to feel different levels of wanting to socialize from week to week. Keep in touch with what you actually want to be doing and then go do it! This is ~your~ semester.
