༚✧⁺˳aru-daily˳⁺✧༚

First Week Back at Uni – Entering Final Year

BOY, this year has started off strong. So, I am finally entering my first ever final year, which isn’t a huge deal to most people, but I dropped out of a degree before this and I have a bit of a habit of having huge ideas and never seeing them through, so I’m really glad I’m here.

First of all, September has always been my most favourite time of year, I LOVE IT! It feels like getting another go at new year’s and getting to start afresh and change old habits, it’s a chance to do better. Plus, I really like buying new stationery.

I usually enter a new academic year super prepared – I spend the whole summer with a revision schedule; I do all the pre-reading months in advance and work at least a little bit every single day. I didn’t really do that this year AT ALL. I played so much slay the spire 2 (I have about 700 hours, the game came out at the start of summer lmao, I went abroad for the first time ever! I went to Finland which was so fun! I also went to Greece after my summer placement, I HAVE ALWAYS WANTED TO GO, it was genuinely a dream come true! And I also got to speak Greek :). It was really lovely; I really think it was super important just to have an actual break. I usually burn out really quick, so it felt good to prioritise my mental health.

THE TERRIBLE THING IS, I GOT SICK literally right before uni started, me and Jason (my partner) got this horrible cold, and it floored both of us. I was determined though, it wasn’t gonna ruin my first day back at uni. I forced myself out of bed and went in, was that a mistake in hindsight? Absolutely. I felt atrocious and needed to take the next two days off to recover, on the way home from my first day I genuinely felt like I was fighting for my life.

But I pulled myself together and started streaming again (yippee), I have always FOR YEARS wanted to do study with me streams, and I was home and Jason was poorly so I had no distractions, it felt like now or never. The whole reason I have ever wanted to do these streams is because of the power of parallel play. Streaming makes me (and you) accountable to actually be productive, and it worked!!! I was able to work for 4 hours straight without looking at my phone once because I was using it as a camera! It was also really fun to chat in the little breaks in between.

I managed to keep up with lectures until I could come back in later in the week and actually function as a human being.

I carried on the rest of the week and streamed nearly every day, managing to do at least 3 and a half hours, which was fantastic! I feel super duper prepared and I have the energy to keep going! Usually, I have this little niggling feeling that I’m gonna be done and the volume of work won’t last -but not this time!

Even though the first week was not what I had planned, I feel like I am making good habits that I can actually keep up with. I intend to work when I can, as long as I don’t work past 7pm and I’m going try really hard to not work at all on Sundays and have a dedicated rest day to not burn out.

I have a big year ahead of me, I have you know, FINAL year, I’m looking and hoping and praying to be able to publish a paper in this academic year, I need to write another paper for a masters application and I’m also working :’) wish me luck! And I hope to take you along with me on this journey. Academia has always been such a huge and important part of my life, and I have always wanted to share it, and now I can 🙂

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