bogberry_pi

How do you recommend coping with the feeling that you're not doing enough and should always be productive? College, and especially grad school, left me feeling like I couldn't relax or enjoy anything because I should be doing something else. So I was always stuck in the middle of "I need to take a break because I've been working too hard and can't focus" and "I shouldn't be relaxing because I still have too much to do."

Things are pretty good now that I've been out of school for a while, but I really hated college because I could never truly relax or stay focused on work for long periods (lack of sleep, motivation, difficulty with course material, etc). I always felt like I should be doing the opposite of what I was doing and it was miserable!

My brother had this surgery when he was a teenager. Took him basically a whole summer vacation to recover back to normal. The worst was when he went on a boat ride and the rocking of the boat left him in serious pain for a few days after. He's fine now, several years after getting the bar removed and thinks it was worth it, but it was a very long and non-trivial recovery.

Thanks for sharing the article. Looks like we were at the same school at the same time!

It really is interesting to look back now that I'm removed from the situation. I have long thought that a lack of sleep was the biggest contributor to the issues I faced. I have noticed that my ability to make good decisions (and resist procrastination) declines as I'm tired. I would resist going to bed because I still had work to do, but then I was just too tired to function and would not make progress, inevitably getting distracted in the process. That left me more tired the next day, making more bad decisions, and so on, getting worse as the semester passed. I eventually realized what was happening but could never manage to pull myself out. It took about a year post school to regain a healthy sleep schedule, but it has made a world of difference, mentally and physically.