Taking Time by Greta

Taking Time by Greta - January 2022 Scholarship Essay

More specifically, taking **me time**: The pandemic exposed many nasty habits that we were prone to all along, which poked their ugly heads out of the neat closet we tucked them in as soon as we were able to stay home. We stopped rushing, running, and stopped exhausting ourselves as much. Schoolwork was done at home, work at home, play at home, sleep at home, cook and eat at home, everything was being done stuck in…. well, the home. This invited us to procrastinate more, to lay back and spend the night (or two or three) watching Gordon Ramsay yelling at arrogant chefs on TV while we judge them with our doritos and frozen pizza in hand.
Now I know these all seem like terrible habits, unhealthy, inactive, and disorganized. However, through this process of allowing myself to relax and rest from the usual chaos of the school year, I realized that this level of self-pampering was not only pleasant but necessary, to recuperate and reboot in the middle of a stressful time.
All throughout my first semester in college, I took mindful breaks, mindful moments to simply sit still (in my car in the parking garage’s dark, obscure corner or in the middle of a busy school hallway) and realized as I took a deep breath that I’m doing okay, that the stress I feel won’t last forever. The three or four breaths I took in that moment refreshed me, gave me new energy, and grounded me to continue with my day. I learned through the pandemic that taking a moment (or a few moments at times) to reboot and reconnect really makes an enormous impact on my mood and productivity. We should all be more aware of these mindful moments, and take a breath, it will all be okay.