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Taking Care of your Emotional Health

If you want to boost your emotional health then build the following into your life:

1. Develop a good group of friends. If possible, try and have quite a wide group of friends. That then means if someone moves away, or you change your school, your hobbies and so on, you’ll still a healthy support system in place.

2. Learn to appreciate solitude. Isolation isn’t the same as solitude. Isolation is being cut off from others for negative reasons; solitude is enjoying space and time for yourself – so you can recharge your batteries, and enjoy just being “you”.

3. Invest time in get fit. People who are fit and healthy generally feel better about themselves. Also, exercise releases feel good hormones so we feel happier, more optimistic and relaxed.

4. Allow yourself to “goof off” and have a laugh – as too much work will drain your energy.

5. Discover your passion and invest time in that. We all have something that brings us alive, and seems to resonate with who we are inside … So investing in your passion is extremely satisfying!

6. Plan for difficulties and problems. We all encounter problems and hard times in this life. Expecting that to happen helps us feel more in control - as we understand it’s normal - so we don’t just fall apart.

7. Work on increasing your self-awareness. As above, we all have blind spots and idiosyncrasies. If we can learn about ourselves, and our natural tendencies, we can learn to master weaknesses, and work to change and grow.

8. Be willing to take risks. Though it’s hard to step out into unknown territory, you’ll find it’s more rewarding to stretch yourself and grow.

9. Watch out for energy vampires. There are plenty of people who will drain your energy so learn how to say “no”, and to set some boundaries.

10. Ask for help when you need it. We all need support and encouragement at times … And offer help to others when things are tough for them.

It'd be my fellow dearest introverted jijino that is miles away from me 😭

the introverted urge to find 1 person you feel comfortable with and do literally everything with them

7.2.2018 Finished some calculus notes! Anyone else a fan of indefinite integrals? I’m in love💚

True!!

By the way, just in case this helps someone -

COOKING - creativity is okay

BAKING - stick to the recipe (you can usually adjust sugar content to taste, though)

BREAD - wait for the right weather conditions (or engineer them), be one assertive and self-confident motherfucker because dough can feel it if you aren’t, a blood sacrifice probably helps, trust the gods 

Want to learn something new in 2022??

Absolute beginner adult ballet series (fabulous beginning teacher)

40 piano lessons for beginners (some of the best explanations for piano I’ve ever seen)

Excellent basic crochet video series

Basic knitting (probably the best how to knit video out there)

Pre-Free Figure Skate Levels A-D guides and practice activities (each video builds up with exercises to the actual moves!)

How to draw character faces video (very funny, surprisingly instructive?)

Another drawing character faces video

Literally my favorite art pose hack

Tutorial of how to make a whole ass Stardew Valley esque farming game in Gamemaker Studios 2??

Introduction to flying small aircrafts

French/Dutch/Fishtail braiding

Playing the guitar for beginners (well paced and excellent instructor)

Playing the violin for beginners (really good practical tips mixed in)

Color theory in digital art (not of the children’s hospital variety)

Retake classes you hated but now there’s zero stakes:

Calculus 1 (full semester class)

Learn basic statistics (free textbook)

Introduction to college physics (free textbook)

Introduction to accounting (free textbook)

Learn a language:

Ancient Greek

Latin

Spanish

German

Japanese (grammar guide) (for dummies)

French

Russian (pretty good cyrillic guide!)

how I keep myself sane during summer break.

I think we can all agree that the mere idea of having holiday breaks from boring lectures and all-nighter study sessions sounds like heaven; although this romanticized idea of having so much free time often turns into wasted summer days, oversleeping, and basically an anti-social teenage version of house arrest. so, to help you out (or, more to help Myself) here are some things I do to keep myself busy, on a budget (kind of), and mentally healthy during long breaks from school.

continue your morning routine. this is important; by this I mean to basically treat your summer mornings as you would your school mornings, without the rush and alarm. brush your teeth, brush your hair, start/continue a skincare routine, get out of your pajamas and into real clothes, make your bed, make some coffee, eat some breakfast, do it with some music on, whatever you want. this keeps your mind and body into a daily routine. don’t let all your precious no-class mornings of summer go to waste!

savor sleeping in, but not too much. I know its super tempting to go to bed at like 2 AM and wake up the next “morning” at 12PM, but trust me, you’ll regret fucking up your sleep schedule once you actually have to set an alarm and get your ass to class next fall. I’m not saying you should force yourself to set a summer alarm (although, if you really want to train yourself this isn’t a bad idea tbh) but for the love of god, at least go to sleep and wake up at reasonable times. don’t waste your entire day!!

force yourself to see your friends a couple times a week, even if you really don’t want to. obviously this excludes mental health days, but I’ve found that spending time with my friends actually distracts me from any anxiety I’ve felt during the past week. I love my alone time, but human interaction is super important both mentally and physically. as college students we’re all pretty much broke, so don’t underestimate the power of free things- watching netflix at someone’s house, having a boardgame night, going to parks, you name it. as long as you’re with your friends, you’ll have a great time!

clean out your music library + make a playlist or two. y’all know I love a good playlist. this is something totally 100% FREE, and a perfect way to make use of your free time. delete all the stuff you don’t listen to anymore and make a few playlists of your favorite songs, or even go with playlist themes to organize your songs. it’s fun and your future self will probably thank you later for getting rid of so much audible junk.

get back into reading. this is something that was on my personal summer to-do list. I haven’t read a book for myself (aka not for a class) in sooo long, and let me tell you- I don’t know why I ever stopped reading. I know for a fact that once the semester starts I’ll have zero free time to read for myself, so summer is the perfect time to get into a new book or two!

eat your three meals a day +hydrate. I mean this. its very easy to skip/forget meals when you really don’t have any set schedule whatsoever, so plan your meals into your day. even make an alarm if its necessary. also: if you don’t know if you’re drinking enough water, you probably aren’t.

deep clean your room/workspace/closet. I’m super guilty for putting this off but, long breaks like summer are the perfect times to deep clean! what makes it easier for me to clean my room is to go section by section, which means not doing it all in a day (because that gets hella overwhelming and stressful, let me tell you). grab a garbage bag, put on some tunes, and pick a section to clean that day; you’ll be done with the entire space in no time!

outfit plan. for someone like me who has way too much in my closet and somehow still “never has anything to wear”, this is essential! set some outfits out on the floor/bed and take pics of them on your phone so that you can look back on them for some style inspo the next time you have “absolutely NOTHING to wear”.

find a new hobby, even if you’re bad at it. make some collages of your friends, make a scrapbook, learn photoshop, paint a little, learn how to sew, garden, cook, practice your phone photography skills… if there was a time for you to try out new things, it’s NOW.

make a post about all the shit you should do. I’m doing it right now. literally. you’re reading it right now. its not a bad idea.

if you know you have shit to do, plan it into your day! this is where the planner/agenda/bullet journal aspect comes in. having no class and no homework is not an excuse to stop planning out your day, your week, or your month. make some task lists and pencil in your dentist appointments and dates with people and whatnot; and even journal your days while you’re at it! if you’re a planner, never stop. Future You will thank you for it, I promise.

(Digital) Currently working on this one

One of the things that annoy me the most about the public education system is that everyone demands a paper but no one taught anyone how to write a paper. At a maximum, they might have mumbled something under their breath about accordions and being persuasive.

Here’s a quick and dirty about how to write a paper:

1. Get your topic down to one sentence and write an intro

Topic: AIDS is an economic issue.

Intro: AIDS first came on the scene as a sexually transmitted disease that only homosexuals and sexual deviants have as demonstrated by the reaction in the 1980s, however, it has been proven that AIDS is a sexually transmitted disease that affects all walks of life whether they are sexually active or not… … … 

Make sure to tie your topic into your intro.

2. Write down all of your points.

Prostitution for economic need spawns an environment of increased risk for sexually transmitted disease because it is more profitable to perform sex without protection.

The rate of AIDS is higher in impoverished Western communities and third world countries because of the availability of education and resources.

Stereotypes surrounding the disease and lack of proper sexual education create higher risk factors.

Point 4

point 5

3. Write down the point of your point. (Why is it in your paper?)

This is important because …

This ties into the argument because . .

Point A causes

Point B affects/ has the effect of

Point C represents

The point of this is …

4. Write down any sub-ideas into separate paragraphs but with the same  format as main paragraphs.

Sub-ideas are small branches off of your main idea, but are different enough to garner a paragraph of their own.

5. Find your quotes. If for some reason you can’t find a quote to support your point, write a new point.

Then explain the quote. Do not let the quote stand alone. There is no quote on the planet that stands alone. You must explain the importance of the quote with regard to the subject. I don’t care how great the quote is.

5. Write a conclusion by essentially summarizing, not all of your topic sentences, but all of your concluding sentences (point of your point).

—————————–

By the time you are done filling in all the spaces and resources and citations you have a nice, thick paper.

The way I eyeball it is I need 2 main paragraphs, not including intro and conclusion per page. So if it is a 5 page paper, I need 10 main ideas. If the paper goes over, then I can cut some thoughts here and there. It’s a wide gauge because it all depends on 1) how long your quotes and citations are 2) how succinct you are in making your point 3) what the professor/teacher actually asks for in the way of citation and opinion.

It all can be adjusted very easily because everything is in its own nice little compartment.

Thank you. I need this.

A brief informative guide to highlighting your notes/book the right way so it doesn’t look like your book/notes exploded into a rainbow.