Take a pause.

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Taking small pauses in our everyday busy and hectic lives is one of the hardest things to do. Time flies. And you know it does. One day you were sitting down in your first college lecture and the next day you are walking down the aisle during graduation.

I may not be graduating in a few weeks, but as I look back on my life, I realize how many things I have taken for granted. Have I lived my life to the fullest? Have I done everything I can within my reach to be a successful human being? What does it even mean to live life to the fullest or to be successful? A French philosopher named Jean-Paul Sartre once stated that “Human beings define themselves through their choices.” Now if you ask me, that puts a lot of pressure on a person. Sartre is well-known for his philosophy known as “existentialism”, which argues that man is nothing but what he makes of himself. Existentialism, he says, “Is the first move to make every man aware of what he is and to make the full responsibility of his existence rest upon him.” Even though Sartre said these words decades ago, the expectations of society that he talks about are still relevant and very much present today.

It is hard to live a life where your words and actions are supposed to not only define you, but the entire society to which you belong. However, it is easy to live a life where you are not present in each and every moment. All day long, CNN releases an article reminding us of the tragic world that we live in. Emails, tweets and Facebook notifications never stop popping in our devices. Similarly, we feel the need to watch every single Snapchat story and Instagram post in order to not feel left out. We run from one class to the next, and from work to bed until these actions eventually become a repetitive cycle. Life is itself a constant demand that never stops.

This is why taking pauses from our everyday lives is so hard. If we take a day off to Netflix and chill, we feel like we are wasting time, so we feel guilty. We call ourselves "unproductive" if we are not constantly thinking, planning or creating. The world that we live in is a world where everyone must contribute to each other’s successes at all moments.

With such being said, the goal of this article is that you may be reminded to enjoy life to the maximum. Life is too short to compete with yourself at every second of the day. Take a break and a pause from the repetitive cycle that is life and remind those around you how much you love them. A pause may consist of moments aimed at realizing how happy your friends make you. A pause could mean spending time with yourself or your family members. A pause could mean walking from place to place not staring at the screen of your phone and simply embracing your surroundings. A pause is what you make of it because, in the end, it is you who is completely in control of your life and future.

"Existentialism Is a Humanism" by Jean-Paul Sartre.