My record over the last month or so has been about an entry a week, which is probably on the lower end of my frequency of posting. Partly, I haven’t had much to tell (non-anonymously); partly, I actually don’t have anything interesting running through my head; and partly I just haven’t had time because I need a simpler life in general.

After that big presentation on Valentine’s Day, I really thought that I would have some time to myself. That, and I thought I would be able to sustain the drive/momentum coming off of the past month and a half of research, which has actually been pretty incredible.  Basically, neither one of these thoughts ever materialized.

Let’s use a hypothetical example with some numbers. Let’s quantify the school/academic work I have at 100, and let’s quantify the extracurricular stuff at an equivalent 100, bringing the total amount of work I have to 200. I picked these numbers because the truth is that each portion can easily be 100% of my work, and I would still have my hands full, so the two portions combined create 200% of work I am able to actually reasonably do in a week.

In any given week, I get done 60 units of extracurriculars, and 20-50 units of school work. I don’t usually work at max capacity, and I generally do more extra stuff than school stuff. The past month and a half, the numbers have been more like 30 units of extra stuff and 80 units of school stuff. A couple of weeks before my presentation, those numbers suddenly jumped up to 80 units and 100 units, meaning that I was working at 80% over capacity.  This also meant that actually, the busier I got with school, I actually did more of both school and extras, despite having less time.

I also stayed at lab until midnight almost every night, but that’s besides the point. Ever since the presentation, the numbers are around 90 units of extra, 10 of school. As in, I’ve done almost nothing school-related, but done almost all of my responsibilities in the extra stuff. I kinda had an awakening of some sort and actually decided to step up and be a good GSC Vice President, not be a half-assed GRT, follow up with friends and family (though I still try not to talk to my parents too much) … in general be a more responsible person and actually shoulder the stuff I said I would do instead of just making a big showy talk of it. In this process, I realized that I need to simplify my life.

When I can spend 100% of my time working on extracurriculars and still be working full 8-hour days, something is wrong with my life. I realized that I can make a profession out of answering emails. Besides meetings, I send emails. Most everything gets resolved over email, so that’s nice, but I basically spend 1-5 hours a day in meetings (depends on the day), and the rest of the time on email. I feel exhausted because I haven’t wasted any time, but I feel inadequate and irresponsible still because I am a student after all, and I’ve done nothing to contribute to my degree.

I’ve really thought about 1 or 2 relatively small things I can do after my term of GSC VP is over at the end of April, and I think my life will be a lot simpler after that.