When I started as a student counselor, I realized that stress and burnout would be a theme. In practice, however, I only notice how important this is and how personal this effort is. The struggle we all fight to be good enough, to belong or to realize all-of-what-we-are. There is an incredible amount of energy in students, an enormous desire. But also an uncontrolledness, an inability to limit and limit.
Students want everything from associations, socializing evenings to double bachelor's or master's degrees. Constant pressure on the boiler. Once a moment of peace in sight, we grab the smartphone and endlessly scroll through meaningless posts from others that we hardly see in real life. Why are we doing all this? Who is really happy about this? Is this a good life? How can I help? How do I ensure that I do not get a burnout myself?
These are all questions that constantly run with me in my work processes. That is why I want to see if I can provide a perspective. A perspective to take into account when looking at your stress or burnout. When I feel what happens when tension or stress arises, I notice that there is a tendency to reach for more. To the phone, to Facebook, getting up for a while, walking away, stowing away a pack of Oreos, daydreaming, and so on. What exactly is happening to me? I experience a kind of inability to be present in the moment with the turmoil that life sometimes is.
The chaos, the bustle, the all-embracing pulling and pushing of all impulses around you. I want to get away from that. So my system looks for the simplest forms of entertainment or distraction to get me out of that tension. It works great, I am distracted in no time. But note that the way it takes you out of the tension is not sustainable. It's a short-term policy. It works for a while, quickly, but the next day everything is exactly the same again. I hear you think, what do we need then?
We need some kind of inner cleansing. We need it to give a place to the turmoil and tension that lives in us. In addition to cleaning our appearance through make-up, beautiful clothes and eloquent language, we also need to take care of our interior. However, taking care of our inner self means doing something that most of us are not very good at: stilling & feeling. Taking the journey inward means sitting in everything you experience and looking around you. It means that troubled child embrace within yourself and say, calm down, there is nothing wrong.
Then you will find that your mind and your consciousness can slowly settle down, like a pool of water into which a stone has fallen. That pool is not calmed by constantly throwing more stones into it. Leave it alone, leave yourself alone. Don't do anything, withdraw. This is the time of year to turn inward and let go of everything that no longer helps you to live well. To let aspects die. Don't let it die, let it die.
I wish you a lot of resignation & delay.
Patrick
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