Work/ School Balance

I work as a pharmacy technician and it’s a beach store. I love my job, but our busy time is from May until November between beach goers and shots. I work a lot and I work hard. Let me tell you, there are times when I get home and I don’t want to do schoolwork. But I have to. I have to do it and do well so I can move on to my next chapter. My Master’s.

What I learned early on is that I need to set aside time for me. I work hard at work and I go home and work equally hard on school. There have been times when I get home after a long and busy shift I just have to sit and relax. If I didn’t do that I would be useless on my homework. My brain was fried and I would just be wasting time trying to concentrate on something that wasn’t going to get through the exhaustion. That is what life as a college student and full-time employee really is. Time management and trying to keep your head above water.

I spend most of my weekends doing nothing but homework. I set aside time from my first year of this round of college to just unwind. Every Sunday is Sunday Movie Night. It is sacred. Have there been times when I did something else like watch TV? Yes. But that is the time when I’m not allowed to do any homework. I have to unwind and clear my head. So, I set aside three hours to just relax. There are no exceptions to this. Sunday night is taken by Sunday Movie Night. In 3 years I have not worked on schoolwork on Sunday night.

This sounds like something small. It is only 3 hours a week when I’m not working or doing school work, so how am I not pulling my hair out? I do take other time off. My school work is due on Tuesdays so I generally take off Wednesdays, not always, but generally. I look at my work and school schedule and just try and work in time. There is something about knowing that one day a week I get three hours off from everything.

I get overwhelmed easily. I’m not going to lie. I have a high-maintenance dog and I have other things going on. I go to a few comic-cons a year to sell books and sometimes I like to hang out with friends and family. I don’t get the time much, but I do cherish it when I can. It doesn’t take much to get overwhelmed when taking two classes in an eight-week block, working 40 hours, and trying to live

What gets me through it is counting down how many weeks left. I also don’t take two classes consistently. I do that once a semester. I’m in the middle of an eight-week block of two classes right now and I’m counting down. I keep telling myself that I only have three weeks left. It’s only for three more weeks then it’s over. Plus Movie Sunday helps. I generally pick light-hearted movies to help me relax. Watching war movies may be relaxing to some, but after fighting to get everything done for the past week, it’s a little hard to try and relax while people are shooting at each other.