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Hi guys, so I started grad school this semester because I need it in order to move up in my company past my current position. Im working 45+ hours per week and taking night class 4 days a week (two classes). The weekends are completely consumed by homework, projects, and presentations. For anyone that's never been in grad school there is a TON of group work and presentations. Its not like undergrad where you just practice problems and are tested on them, then have the OCCASIONAL presentation. The level of work involved is almost like an educational boot-camp, where the degree just shows you can handle massive loads of work. I'm getting stressed out by the complete lack of "me" time, even just an hour to sit still and not think about anything. The second I complete one assignment three more are due, on top of any work I have to take home from my actual job. Have any of you been through this and have any recommendations for how to just unload this stress?
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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I did that a long time ago, with all of my graduate classes two days a week. The drive to school and back was 90 minutes, and for me the drive back was my time to unwind. Fortunately it was not at commute time so there was never a traffic problem. I had to grab whatever minutes I could get with my fiance and that usually meant leaving for school an hour early and visiting 6-7am at her house over breakfast before she went to work and I headed to school. I suppose what got me through it was knowing that it would only last for two years. Everyone has different ways to relieve stress. For me today, it's taking a walk along the waterfront near my office on a break from work. For others it may be a 15 minute jog, meditation, or even spending half an hour on City-data.
I did that for two years in grad school--working full time, school full time, and also doing my field placements. For me, every week night was for reading tons of stuff for school, and every weekend was writing a big paper (20+ pages usually, and one or two really long ones at the end of a semester).
I used to carve out Friday nights to specifically not do anything for school. I would go to happy hour (happy few hours) with co-workers, and then come home and watch a movie and read something for pleasure. I would tell myself not to feel guilty about it, or worry about all the work I still had to do, because I would start that Saturday morning, and if getting the paper done meant not sleeping over the weekend, fine, but at least I had those Friday nights.
What also kept my sanity together was knowing that it would only be like this for two years. It had a firm boundary around it. It would be over. Four semesters only. That helped.
Sounds like you might have Friday night off. If so, can you resolve to only do something fun that night? Or maybe go to bed early that night so you can get up early Saturday morning and have 3 hours to yourself?
Your life is just going to suck for a while and you'll be living for semester breaks. But the reward is that it will help you move up in your company. It's not going to last forever and for now you may just have to resign yourself to keeping your nose to the grindstone and finishing grad school as quickly as possible.
I work like an animal Mon-Fri and keep my weekends mostly free of school work. That gives me time to unwind and recharge.
You HAVE to put time aside for yourself or you go nuts. Go to the lake, read a book, gym, bicycling, whatever floats your boat, but you have to find a balance.
Move closer to work? Take less classes? I am taking online classes so I can work on it whenever my schedule allows it.
That's the way college is. Forget about any sort of personal life and lose all interest in world events, the news, TV, etc. You can catch up with what has been happening "out there" in a couple of years!
i have found a day at the shooting range works wonders.
five or seven guns. couple thousand rounds.
some guns shoot one shot many into same hole. others shoot for "effect"
like my .17hmr i shoot all the shot gun hulls left behind. (placed 50 - 150 yards away) great targets. nothing to set up.
couple rounds for other rifles blow the targets to many parts. (more targets for the .17hmr).
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