214. unfiltered college advice: social anxiety, burnout, school stress, + more

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Sheep Assisted, the Gen.
Z mental health podcast. I'm your host, Sadie Sutton.
Let's get into it. If you're in college, you're put
in a situation where you have todo this all for yourself for the
first time and you don't have that skill set established that
like this is how I maintain my mental health and these are the
things I need to do to stay in agood spot.
So I want you to give yourself alot of grace that you're in a
really challenging time. I want you to understand what

(00:22):
habits and behaviors are in service of my mental health and
how can I get those in place. Hello you guys and welcome back
to another episode of She Persisted.
I'm so excited you're here. Today we're doing another Reddit
Reacts episode so I am reading stories, submissions, and posts
on Reddit about mental health. We have a lot on here related to
college, anxiety, stress, burnout, balancing your

(00:44):
schedule, a lot of things that Ithink a lot of us struggle with
or want to at least get better at.
If you guys want to submit your situation or story or whatever
it is for advice and insight in a future episode, you can send
me an e-mail, DM me, or you can post on my website.
I have an anonymous submission Google form that you guys can
submit things to and I can try and help out and offer insight.
This is the second iteration of Reddit Reacts.

(01:04):
We did one a couple months ago. You guys liked it.
It was really fun to record. So we're going to do a second
one. And without further ado, let's
dive in. So this post is called the
immediate Panic when the professor tells you to form a
group of four. I'm in my third year of college.
I still have not learned how to cope in a group setting.
I can somewhat tolerate group work if I'm put into an assigned
group, but this semester we haveto pick all of our groups and I

(01:26):
simply cannot do it. I have a few people I tolerate
in my main cohort, but there's aparticular elective where I only
have one friend. The teacher told us to form
groups of four out of 14 students.
No thanks, I have so much anxiety I'd 100% rather take on
all the work in my own or be forced into a group then have to
go up to an established group ofthree and beg to be let in.
No thanks. This is a super common

(01:48):
experience, especially if you'rein a new class or you don't know
anyone else, or you've had groupwork in the past where everyone
hasn't pulled your weight. It's a really tough experience
to be in and I have some tips. So what I'm hearing here is the
anxiety of having to join a new group, but also the anxiety of
control and not being able to determine the outcome When

(02:10):
you're with other people. There's like that unknown
element of how much work will they put in?
Is it going to be to the same standard I want my quality of
work to be? There's a lot of things that
you're unsure about here, which is really tough.
Honestly. In some classes you're like
flipping a coin of is anyone going to do anything?
And I hear this from my friends all the time.
We'll be like, we met about a group, this person didn't show
up or I've literally done all the work or someone took on more

(02:31):
work and we didn't realize and now they're upset about it.
It's really, really common. And I think it can absolutely be
avoided if you're really direct upfront, you set expectations
and you communicate. I'm going to give you guys an
anecdote. I was in a seminar my junior
year and I loved this class. It was so interesting.
It was structured as like you dothe readings, you reflect, you

(02:51):
have a conversation. And then there were like two or
three group projects. And the group project for the
final was a large portion of ourgrade.
And we were given class time with our group members to be
able to prep the project, begin working on it, do a little bit
of research. And then it was on us to set up
other times to meet. And I think we met out of class
twice. We all put in a lot of work

(03:12):
outside of those meetings and really collaborated.
But there's one person in our group who literally had only
written their name on the document, the Google Doc.
And like that was the extent of the work that they contributed.
They never responded to texts about meeting, they never did
any other research. They never did the tasks that
were assigned. They didn't work on the slides.
And the kicker here was that this was an in person class

(03:35):
presentation. And so you not only have this
element of I'm submitting something that someone
contributed nothing to, but we're literally presenting on
this and this person hasn't shown up, they haven't
contributed, and we're all beinggraded on this presentation.
And so the group and I talked about it, which again is
communication is a big part here.
And when we did that final meeting before our presentation

(03:57):
to wrap up our slides, we were like, OK, we're being graded on
this project. We're going to be graded.
If we don't fill all the components that the rubric has
suggested, even though this person hasn't shown up to
complete their assigned works, we're like we have to, to get
all these parts of the rubric done, even if it means taking
out a little bit more of their work.
It's not our problem. What she says during the

(04:18):
presentation, Like that's out ofour control.
It's not something we could solve for.
If she wanted to do on this project, she would have shown up
on the group meetings. She would have responded when we
reached out. She would have created the
slide. She would have done the
research. If she wanted to do well, she
would have taken those steps. It's not like we didn't tell her
when we were meeting or didn't assign things to her.
She just didn't show up. And so we can't control that,
right? And we can't control what she
says during the presentation. But what we can do is clearly

(04:41):
communicate to the professor that here's what happened.
This is supposed to be a group project with five people.
Only four of us did any work. Here's our Google Doc.
You can check at the editing history.
We're really not sure what's going to happen during the
presentation today because we took over the part of the
assignment she was initially assigned.
And we just want to give you that insight going into the
presentation and do with this information what you will.

(05:04):
And when this happens, I've had professors respond well to this,
especially if you have that Google Doc.
So if you guys can use Google Docs, Google Slides, whatever it
is with an editing history, I think that's really important
because you don't want to get into like a he said, she said
situation, but really communicate with the rest of
your group members. Like how do you guys feel about
this? What are your thoughts on us
moving forward and doing what wecan control?

(05:27):
If the other person isn't showing up and participating and
really communicating to the professor, here's what we did.
Here's what we can control. Here's the context of this
presentation. Again, do what this information
what you will, the workload wasn't shared evenly.
This doesn't really feel fair. And here's the Google Doc where
you can check out what work was done.
And as one will probably expect,she read what was on the slides.

(05:50):
It wasn't totally obvious that no work had been done.
And so that's why it's really important to communicate to the
professor with sharing that Google Doc and Google Slides
because maybe she was like, thisperson is more shy.
They don't do a lot of public speaking.
They feel more comfortable just looking at the slides.
And so I think the two pieces there that were really effective
were communicating with the group.
And if you're not comfortable communicating in person, having
that conversation, which is a very daunting thing, draft a

(06:14):
text, send an e-mail, have it inwriting.
Also, especially if you've made multiple attempts to reach out
to someone who's not doing the work, having that in writing is
also really important. When you communicate with the
professor and just get everyone's opinions, be like,
here's what I'm thinking. Check the facts.
This person hasn't shown up to our meetings.
They haven't done their assignedpart of the project.

(06:34):
We have this deadline that we have to meet.
How should we move forward? I also think it helps prevent a
solution to be like, OK, I thinkwe should complete the project
and then communicate to the teacher that this workload was
not shared evenly. So present your best case
scenario, what would you like tohappen?
And then be like, what do you guys think?
Would you prefer we take a different course of action?
So that's what how I would approach people not balancing

(06:55):
workloads. Communicate in writing, make
multiple attempts to loop this person in, remind them of their
assigned work. And then when it comes time to
do the project, the paper, the presentation, whatever it is,
communicate just as clearly withyour teacher.
Here's the expectations that were set.
Here's the actions we tried to take to engage this person.
They didn't show up, they didn'tdo the work.

(07:15):
And here's the information we have to show that this workload
wasn't evenly distributed when it comes to the portion of the
group project that you take on because you don't know like how
others will do or how you'll getalong.
I think this is tough because I definitely have situations,
especially if it's a visual project, like there's slides to
be made or it's an infographic, like I want to make those
slides. I want to make them look nice.

(07:36):
That's my skill set. I can contribute there.
I also don't have any qualms about taking that increased
workload on. I would actually much prefer it
if I did that part of the project, as long as no one else
has a very strong opinion. And so I feel like it's up.
If it's something small like that where it's like, hey, I'd
actually love to do the research.
I'd actually love to do the literature review, or I'd

(07:59):
actually love to prepare the presentation materials, or I
like speaking in public. Can I take on a larger portion
of the slides that we present ifit's not going to cause
resentment towards others? I think that's OK to communicate
and ask your group members if they're OK with that.
But what I'm hearing in this is that you do resent others for
the workload they're not taking on and you feel the desire to

(08:20):
control the situation because itcauses distress when others are
not doing the work and you don'tknow the outcome.
And so that's where you have to be mindful of like what your
relationship is to the project, what are the intentions?
And then I think you have to go back to the assignment, which is
that your teacher didn't assign you do the project and three
other people tag along. You're doing a disservice to
them if you complete the whole project and they're just there

(08:42):
for participation points. You're also doing a disservice
to yourself because you're taking on an increased workload.
You're not building your skill set and ability to work with
others, collaborate, set boundaries, etcetera.
And so I think looking at it like that, like this is an
opportunity for me to practice my communication skills, set
boundaries, collaborate. And if I don't do that, if I
take on the larger role, I'm solidifying a pattern and I'm

(09:05):
doing a disservice to not only myself, but the group members.
I also think radical acceptance around my output and others
outputs is going to be different.
And this is again where it's helpful to keep track of like
how much people are contributing.
And again, if you have an end product where the work wasn't
distributed evenly, that's whereyou can go to the teacher and
say, here's the work I contributed, here's the work my

(09:26):
peer contributed. I just wanted you to have all
the information when you're looking at and grading and
working on this assignment. And then the last thing we'll
touch on here before we get to the next question is approaching
others to be in their group. This is really tough.
And it's one of those moments where it's like a short bit of
anxiety. And it's also unavoidable.
I would do a little bit of exposure therapy around this.
Like if you know that getting group projects, engaging with

(09:49):
people you don't know in class causes you anxiety, you're going
to want to practice that. So maybe you start by like
asking someone a question at thecafe, asking someone a question
in line to get coffee, asking them like do they know the Wi-Fi
password or making a conversation, ask someone in
class, did they do the reading? Were you confused about this?
Starting those smaller conversations that don't have as
high stakes attached to them, like having to work on a project

(10:09):
together, creating these smallersituations where you can work to
overcome that anxiety. Maybe you study for a test
together, maybe you share materials and notes that you
guys can both review. So like, how can you set up
these smaller situations where you practice working through
that anxiety so that the next time you have that group
project, it's less overwhelming?And then the other piece of
advice it'll give here is that Ithink this is a really common
experience. You have to remember that the

(10:31):
other three people, they need another group member, right?
Like if there's a group that's not fully filled and you need a
group to go to, they also need that other person.
And they probably don't want to have to do 30% of the work
rather than 25. And so I would check the facts
there and be like, they need a group member.
The professor told us to work ingroups of four.
I am the 4th person. So you're actually helping them.

(10:51):
You're meeting a need that they have, which is that they need a
fourth person. You are the first person you
have something to add and a thing of value that they need.
They're probably also nervous and anxious as like anyone going
to join our group, we need someone else to work with.
And so being cognizant that likeyou're not the only one that's
nervous and a little bit uncomfortable in this situation.
And then the other things that Itry to do to set myself up for
success and like avoid this in ahealthy way is that on the first

(11:14):
day of class, introduce yourself, say hi, ask, have you
taken this class 4? What do you think?
Just make contact with one person on the first day.
It's most socially acceptable ifyou wait like a week or two
weeks and then you have more anxiety because you're like
everyone already. We know each other and I never
introduced myself. And this is so awkward.
And the other thing that you cando is when they're like, do you
have a group immediately look tothe people next to you rather
than waiting for it all to pan out.

(11:36):
So just kind of sensing like when is the least aversive time
where I could potentially introduce myself or make a
friend or have an acquaintance or make this request that it
doesn't feel so overwhelming when the time comes.
The next one is, how do I improve my time management
skills? I've always struggled bouncing
my college workload and social life no matter how much I try to

(11:56):
plan ahead. I want to be able to keep up
with assignment, study effectively, and still have time
to relax and hang out with friends without feeling guilty.
Does anyone have any tips or strategies that have worked for
them? I'm open to trying new methods,
whether it's better scheduling, productivity techniques, or
anything else that might help. So I'm going to give you my
honest advice here, which is that something has to give.

(12:16):
You can't give 100% to your academics, to your social life,
to your mental health. To work like that would be 400%.
That's not humanly possible. And so you have to get really
honest with yourself about what are my priorities long term?
Where do I want to be and what will get me there?
What is important for me for my health and mental health to be

(12:37):
able to have this be a sustainable and balanced
experience and what doesn't meetthat criteria?
So I'll kind of explain to you guys how I approach it because
it feels like I balance a lot, but the day-to-day is not
stressful. It feels manageable, it feels
sustainable. So giving you guys a little bit
of an overview of what my commitments are.
I have a class schedule. I'm taking I think 4 1/2 credits

(12:57):
this semester, which is like pretty standard for Penn.
Sometimes people take more, sometimes they take less.
But I'm a full time student so Ihave classes four days a week.
I try not to schedule stuff on Friday because love the three
day weekend. Also more sustainable and
balanced. It's not always possible, but I
try. I work in two labs.
One of my labs, we have a 5 hourweekly volunteer commitment for
the project that we're working on.

(13:18):
So I have lab shifts Tuesdays and Wednesdays and that is the
requirement to be able to be a research assistant, continue
working on this project and havethat on my CV, on my resume.
Continue to gain those research experiences in pursuit of going
to grad school. The other lab that I work in is
a little bit more flexible. I'd say it's also around 5 hours

(13:40):
a week, but it's on Zoom, so nota set schedule.
But I keep enough openings in mycalendar that I can accommodate
those five hours and meetings that get scheduled a day or two
before without a completely derailing my schedule and my
burnout and all these different things.
I also host the podcast again, we're going to talk about things
that give and where we give ourselves grace.

(14:01):
But ideally I release episodes once a week.
We have Monday minis, which are every two weeks, which Sam,
shout out Sam who's editing. This helps me put together using
past content. I have recordings kind of
depends on my schedule. I try to batch them over break
again so things are more balanced and sustainable.
But like every two weeks, I would say I have a recording or
two Almost every week. I'm doing an intro, I'm doing

(14:21):
the blog post, I'm scheduling the episode, but the day-to-day
commitments are generally prettyminimal and more up to like.
This is fun. Do I want to do this?
Am I feeling creatively inspired?
Etcetera. I'm a teaching assistant this
semester for a class. Also a pretty minimal
requirement responsibility. I host a recitation once a week
that's an hour. I prep my materials for that day

(14:42):
of day before that also takes about an hour.
I grade the materials also aboutan hour.
And then we have a check in callonce a week, also an hour.
So four to five hours a week andthat is scheduled into my
calendar and a workload that again is sustainable, not
causing me to burn out and not teaching experience and working
with kids and being able to TA in a psychology related class.

(15:05):
Again, it's helping me move the needle with respect to grad
school, this commitment to long term dissemination, psychology
education, wanting to do that inthe future, showing, hey, I've
taken steps to be able to do that.
I have these skills that I wouldbe using in grad schools at TA
and here it is on my CV, my resume.
And then the last thing that is kind of in my commitment area is

(15:25):
social media management. I do video editing and social
media management for a couple ofclients as like a little side
hustle. So I edit videos, I post for
clients. And this is something that is
part time. It's not scheduled on my
calendar except for client meetings once or twice a month.
It's a workload that doesn't burn me out.
It doesn't take my like creativemental energy away from these
other things that are actually moving the needle towards my

(15:47):
long term goals. And it's sustainable and
flexible. It allows me to balance these
other areas and then I hang out with my friends.
I am pretty flexible. It's not like I'm scheduling
this in. There's been some semesters
where I did do more planning so that I could continue to form up
more relationships, get closer to people when there wasn't
already. Like we are really close.
We see each other every day. That's the expectation.

(16:09):
But like, do you want to get dinner?
Do you want to grab coffee? Do you want to work together
now? It's kind of like I have
flexibility in my schedule. If I'm free, I text my friend,
see if they want to get dinner, hang out, work on something,
watch ATV show together and likeif I'm feeling up to it, if I'm
not exhausted, etcetera, I see friends.
So when I think about adding things to my calendar, whether
it's like a podcast, interview with someone else, a new

(16:30):
research project, a club, I ask myself, is this going to move
the needle towards my long term goals, which is to go to grad
school, become a clinical psychologist, be really public
facing with the podcast and public education when it comes
to youth mental health. Is this going to move the needle
with that goal? And is it going to do that more
than what I've already taken on?So like for example, the

(16:52):
podcast, I could very easily be running someone else's mental
health podcast. I could be helping a TikTok
creator post mental health content.
I could be working on like outreach for lab related to
mental health or like a professor who wants to be more
public facing and have a larger commitment to dissemination.
I know that long term and we're getting into like call her daddy
IP type stuff here. Me having this personal brand,

(17:14):
me being the one that's speakingabout about mental health,
speaking for my own lived experiences, connecting with you
guys, honing the skill, buildingthis community is something that
really differentiates me as an applicant in grad school.
It differentiates me. It sets me up for success long
term with other things I want todo like write a book, have
courses, launch products. It helps me get towards that

(17:34):
goal and it shows my demonstrated commitment to
mental health advocates. And it also allows me to build
skills that help me move the needle in these other areas,
like being able to openly talk about mental health, continuing
broadening my education around mental health interviews, all
these things that are things that helped me in my career,
whether it's interviewing for job roles, preparing to be a

(17:56):
clinician one day, engaging in research.
The podcast serves that larger goal.
And I think at least based on different avenues that I'm aware
of, it's been the most effectiveway for me to move the needle
and differentiate myself when itcomes to that long term career
goal. If it were causing burnout or
stress or wasn't in pursuit of this larger goal, I would look

(18:19):
at again, do I have to do this? Is there another way to do this?
Do I need to pull back on other commitments so that this is not
burning me out as much? Academics, I have a lot of
thoughts here and I think the same principle applies, which is
that something has to give. I think you have to be really
honest with yourself about your actual capacity and bandwidth as
a student. My freshman year, I've talked

(18:39):
about this before, but I made the mistake of just choosing
classes I was interested in and I took like three classes that
were about the same thing. And I mentally have never been
so exhausted, burnt out. Like first of all, freshman for
semester, you're so overwhelmed,you're adjusting to the schedule
on the workload. You don't really understand how
much work you have to do. And that was like compiled with
the fact that I was taking threeclasses on the same subject.

(19:01):
So I took Spanish, which was a requirement.
And then I took children's language acquisition.
I took intro to psych and I tookcommunication children to media.
They basically all ended up going through like mental and
child developments. Like children's language
acquisition, we're talking aboutlinguistics, which you also talk
about in psych, talking about the year and like social
development, we are talking about the children's
developmental stages, which we are also doing in psych.

(19:24):
Communication in media was like heavy on the stages of
development. And because it's a visual
medium, we're talking about likeconsumption.
Basically learning the same thing in three different classes
three times in a row I was like I cannot hear anything more
about children development or I will cry.
And I learned that mistake the hard way.
Now even when I want to take multiple psychology classes, I

(19:44):
make sure they're in really different domains and they don't
overlap so I don't mentally burnout on a certain topic.
Because no one can sit in like 6hours of class about the same
thing a week right? Three papers about the same
thing. Study for a test and be like
it's just too much. So be honest and mindful when
you're taking classes. Like is this something where one
class can help me avoid burnout for another class?

(20:05):
Can I distract myself from studying for this final by doing
a? Reading for a different class,
are these in different areas where I'm not stressing myself
out about a different course by working on this course, if that
makes sense. So that's something that I'm
really careful of my academic schedule.
Like is it balanced as far as the topics after doing but also
the time. There have been times where I've
given myself like 6-7 hours of classes in a row.

(20:27):
And so you're like 3 hour block,one hour lecture, 3 hour.
You can't mentally do it. I'm not engaged, I can't consume
the information, I'm exhausted, I'm burnt out the next day.
So like time wise, if I I have the option, how can I schedule
my classes on a weekly basis so that they're balanced with
regard to my schedule and I'm not getting like physical and
mental burnout for that reason. The other important caveat here,

(20:50):
especially if you're a freshman or a sophomore or like you're
have a tough major, you're a preMed, you're engineering, you're
nursing, you're like, I have so many requirements like I can't
even choose what classes I'm take.
I just have to take these to getmy degree.
This is like me in Spanish, which mean Spanish have a tough
relationship. It didn't end well.
It was fine. I can, I completed the credit,
but I'm not going to Spanish. So there's sometimes you have to

(21:13):
do these things, you have to take these classes in pursuit of
a sub goal or an end goal. Like if I didn't take Spanish, I
wouldn't have met the language requirement and I wouldn't have
graduated. If I didn't take math, I
wouldn't have met the requirement and I wouldn't have
graduated. These are things you have to do
to get to that end goal. And then you have to be like,
OK, how can I do this in the most effective way possible
without adding stress and burnout and like derailing these
other aspects of my life? So we have to ask ourselves,

(21:35):
like, do we have a choice here? Is this necessary?
And if it is, what can I do to make this as least disruptive
and aversive as possible as far as the errors will content in
our classes? And maybe this is a hot take,
but especially in college, you can't do all the readings.
If you are doing all the readings and like properly
studying for your exams and fully completing your projects,
there's not enough hours in the day, especially if you're like a

(21:56):
social science major or English or something that's more reading
heavy. I know some classes require no
readings, but I have a huge number of chapters for all my
classes every single week. And if I did all those readings
and was highlighting and taking,there wouldn't be time.
And so I think you get better asthis as you go throughout
college. If, like, if it's a seminar, I'm
going to have to contribute, I'mdefinitely going to have to read
and have some things that I'm bringing to discussion.

(22:17):
If it's a lecture, if I read thesummary in the textbook of what
The thing is about and look overthe vocab words, am I going to
understand what the teacher was talking about?
Yeah. So you again, something has to
give. And if you are investing in work
or research or your social life,you can't give 100% to academics
because you don't have room for anything else.
So even within the classes you're taking, something has to

(22:38):
give and you get to decide what that is.
Is it how long you're studying for tests, which probably isn't
optimal? Is it how much of the the
readings you're doing? Is it going to office hours?
Like what are you prioritizing? And again, what gives you the
best bang for your buck with regard to your grade and
performance in that class? I definitely wouldn't say don't
study at all because you're doing all the readings.
Maybe you're like, OK, I'm goingto read summaries of the

(22:58):
readings. I'm going to get AI to make me
notes based on the readings and read those notes.
Or I'm not going to do the reading, but I'm going to listen
to an AI podcast about the topics or I'm going to review
the vocab and then I'm going to spend that time instead studying
for the test so I don't burn out.
So something has to give and youhave to kind of understand and
learn throughout the process of what can I give and what can I

(23:20):
pull back on in each class and in each different area, if that
makes sense. The TLDR, there is something has
to give even in academics. You don't have to do all the
readings except for some classesyou actually do, but most of
them that's not the case. So kind of applying that
principle of like, is this really moving the needle with
regard to my end goal? And that could be like the
career you want to pursue, the degree you're getting, the grade
you want in the class. Is this moving the needle there?

(23:42):
And if it's not, do I have to doit at all?
Or is there an adapted way I cando this so I can still achieve
this goal? And then we have to talk about
like mental and physical health because this is really
important. And my philosophy here is that
if my day-to-day experience is not generally in a positive
trajectory, I'm going to end up with worse mental health, right?
Like if every day I'm ending burnt out and stress and like a

(24:05):
little bit more overwhelmed thanthe day before, I'm like on a
downward trajectory that for me will lead to depression.
For others, maybe it's anxiety, maybe it's less sleep, maybe
it's conflict in your relationships.
Everyone's different. So I'm really cognizant.
Is my day-to-day experience generally on the up and up?
Is it sustainable? Is it positive?
Is it balanced? So that I know that when I just
get into my routine and I'm not paying attention to that

(24:28):
rigidly, I'm going to be moving in the right direction and not
setting myself up for failure. Another thing that I'm going to
mention here is understanding how your priorities and your
habits fit into your overall goals is really helpful.
So for me, I know that my numberone thing that I cannot mess
with is my sleep. Some people can go for five
hours of sleep multiple nights aweek.

(24:49):
You're working, you're stressed.I am allocating like 14, 14
hours of my day every day for sleep.
Am I sleeping for those 14 hours?
No, because I'm not great at falling asleep quickly.
I'm bad at waking up in the morning.
We're doing CPTI. It's a process but I know if I
don't block out 14 hours of my day for sleep or my bedtime
routine or getting up in the morning, I'm not getting enough

(25:09):
sleep on a day-to-day basis. Then I'm irritating my
relationships, I'm burnt out in class, I can't pay attention
like all these other areas then start to fall.
I'm stressed, I'm burnt out and I'm no longer like working in
the direction of those larger goals.
And in fact, the day-to-day experience is really negative
and overwhelming and not enjoyable.
So for you, maybe it's working out, maybe it's having three

(25:31):
really set meals a day, maybe it's sleep, maybe it's
journaling. Like what are these behaviors
that are non negotiable? And that if you don't have them
in place, your mental health starts to like crumble and
disintegrate. And those need to be in your
calendar, whether it's physically or just mentally
understanding that like, we don't mess with those.
And most days of the week that has to be in place or I'm going

(25:53):
to struggle. So basically in my advice here
is that something has to give. Something always has to give.
And when you guys hear me describe my responsibilities,
I'm not in any clubs, I'm not inany on campus organizations, I'm
not in Greek life, I'm not dating.
Like these are areas that other people prioritize and are
investing a good amount of time and on a week to week basis for
me right now, those aren't things that I've prioritized

(26:16):
where I've established that they're not moving the needle
towards my long term goals. I'm not committing to those.
And you don't have to have the same commitments as other
people. It's going to look different, so
be really honest with yourself. Are these commitments moving the
needle with regard to my long term goals?
Is there a better way to get this thing done more
efficiently, effectively? Is it a different semester with
a different professor, etcetera?And then what is necessary to

(26:39):
have in my day-to-day life so that it's sustainable and
balanced and that I'm not on like a slow downward trajectory
of stress and burnout and anxiety and depression.
So the TLDR there is something has to give and you have to be
really clear and honest and mindful with yourself about
what's going to given my life and what are my priorities and
how is this sustainable. The next post is called College

(27:00):
is so lonely. I'm in my second year of college
and I have friends. I talk with them during class
and I have people to eat food with and I'm part of a few clubs
and I feel people just forget meduring the weekend.
I never get invited to stuff even if I ask.
Is this how it's going to be throughout college?
I have absolutely been there. I remember vividly like freshman
year of college being like, these people are going out this

(27:22):
weekend. Can I join you guys?
What's the plan? Like do you mind if I tag along?
Like getting ready to go out with them and they just never
texted? I never.
I literally got ready, didn't goanywhere, didn't have anywhere
to go, didn't wasn't invited. Like I totally get it.
And I remember like freshman year, my grandmother sent me a
birthday cake and I didn't have anyone to share this birthday
cake with. I had friends, I'd met people, I
actually had met my now best friend, but we hadn't formed

(27:44):
that close friendship yet. I had people to talk to.
I would get dinner with people sometimes, but you don't have
those close friends. And I think the other element
here is like being surrounded bypeople and having people to eat
with and sit with in class. That doesn't necessarily
correlate with being seen and understood and valued.
Like we can be surrounded by people and still feel really

(28:05):
lonely. And so understanding that it's
not just having people there or being in proximity to people,
but it's having that level of the relationship built where you
feel seen and understood and andvalued and like you belong and
that they want you there. So there's this incredible study
that Doctor Jeffrey Hall did. We had him on the podcast.
We're going to link it in the show notes.
It's one of my favorite episodesof all time, and I think he does

(28:27):
the most fascinating research about friendship.
I read this for a seminar, the one we talked about where that
person didn't help with the group project, but I immediately
read the stat and I was like, weneed to have him on the podcast.
Like this is so crazy. This is so interesting.
It was incredible conversation, all about like, what about our
friendships allows us to feel seen and valued and understood?
And even if you're around people, why is that sometimes

(28:48):
not enough? Why are we still lonely?
So you have to listen to that. I'll link it in the show notes.
But he found that it takes 50 hours to go from just being an
acquaintance to being a casual friend, 90 hours to go from
being a casual friend to being an actual friend, and more than
200 hours before you consider someone your close friend.
So if you're a freshman in college or you're a sophomore in

(29:11):
college, you probably haven't had that time yet.
And there's probably a lot of people around you where you're
like, they're on that team together, They're in that club
together. They take all the same classes
together. They probably are in a situation
where it's maybe easier or different for them to accumulate
those hours and get to know eachother.
So if you're like, I have peopleto sit with, it's not like I
don't know anyone. Give yourself grace.

(29:32):
Like it takes time to form that relationship.
And it's not a reflection of youor how you're showing.
Like it just takes time and it'stough.
So I want to remind you of that.And when I think about that data
and also how my friendships in college have progressed, that
really lines up. It wasn't until like second-half
of sophomore year, junior year senior that I really was like,
OK, this is my group of friends,this is my best friend.

(29:52):
See the people I'm going to see every single week and I want to
continue to spend time with and hang out with.
And that took time. It took a lot of hours, and it's
also really tough because there's things like finding
roommates and picking your new class schedule and figuring out
what dorm you want to live in orGreek life.
These things require, by nature,like a certain level of
relationship and friendship. And if you're not there, it kind

(30:15):
of feels like you failed. And so if you're just finishing
fall semester freshman year and you're supposed to select your
roommate for sophomore year and you're like, I don't know anyone
well enough to live with them, that's OK.
And it makes sense that you haven't had the free time to be
able to get 90 to 200 hours of time in with them to reach close
friend status and therefore roomtogether.

(30:37):
Give yourself some grace. This thing takes time.
It takes vulnerability. And college is really busy and
stressful, but it doesn't mean that it's not painful.
And then it feels like others are somehow doing it differently
and doing it right. And these external things like
finding roommates or figuring out your classes or what clubs
to join or what parties are happening, It does in some way
signal like, did I not do that right?

(31:00):
Why am I not ready and feeling prepared in this situation?
So I want to give some validation there because it
really sucks and it's really hard.
And it feels like you're supposed to find your friends
really fast to make all these decisions and figure out all
this stuff. So you asked, is this how it's
going to be throughout college? No, you're probably not at the
point where you formed those friends and close friends and

(31:21):
best friends takes more time. And as you're further into
college, you continue to accumulate those hours, solidify
those relationships and get to astage where you feel more
comfortable and seen and valued and like you belong.
The other piece that I want to mention here is you said I have
people to eat with and I'm in clubs, but like I don't feel
like I have close friends. I don't feel like people are

(31:44):
miss me and want to hang out with me and reaching out.
And that sucks. And that's the part of being
lonely that people don't always realize.
Like just because you're surrounded by people or you
spend time with people doesn't mean that you feel seen and
heard and valued and like you belong.
And that's such an innate human need that we have.
And when that's not met, it's painful and it causes anxiety

(32:05):
and depression and stress. And so understanding that like,
yeah, I can have someone to sit with and I, I know who's in my
classes, but that doesn't necessarily correlate with not
feeling lonely. And that can be a hard pill to
swallow, but it's also somethingto be aware of.
The TLDR here is like lonelinesscan happen even when we have
people in our life and it seems like we're surrounded by others

(32:27):
and it takes a lot of time to build relationships and I want
you to give yourself grace there.
It's hard to build relationshipsin college and to remind
yourself of how long it takes tobuild friendships and how early
you are in that stage and that it's going to happen.
Your relationships will deepen and keep putting in the hours
connecting and spending time with your friends.

(32:47):
This next question is what should I make sure to do during
my freshman year of college? Tips and tricks would be greatly
appreciated. OK, I have a lot of advice here
and I'm going to try and go quickly because I want to answer
more questions. The first one is to get a
mentor. It doesn't have to be a mentor
for all four years of college. It doesn't have to be someone
that you are attached to for therest of your life, but having a

(33:10):
mentor in college was determinant of lifelong
outcomes. Job placement, salary,
relationship status, feelings ofbelonging, depression, anxiety,
all of these things years after college and also the experience
within college was correlated toif you had a mentor or didn't.
Do you feel like there's someonein your corner?

(33:31):
Do you feel there's someone you can go to when you're having a
tough time and ask them questions, get support?
Do you feel like there's someonewho will listen to you and offer
their insight in moments that you're struggling?
We know that young adults have better outcomes when they have
someone in that mentorship role,and it could be a parent, it
could be a family member, it could be a teacher, a coach, a

(33:52):
professor, literally anyone. But someone who's been through
this before you and can offer insight and support on the
current stage of life that you're in is incredibly valuable
and has lifelong repercussions in every area of life.
So I want you to find someone who again, can offer insight
into your current experience. And I want you to keep that

(34:13):
person in your corner. Send them updates, ask them
advice, check in. It's great if it's someone who's
in your major, like a professor or an advisor, someone that
you're organically going to continue to build that
relationship with. But it could also be someone
that you admire and you just want to start to form that like
mentorship, mentee status. And I don't want you to put so
much pressure on like I have to find a mentor.

(34:34):
I just want you to be like, thisis someone that I can go to and
do go to for advice and support.It doesn't have to be this
really structured thing, but just knowing that you can have
someone to go to who's been through this before is really,
really, really valuable. So don't put all the pressure on
it like I have to find this mentor.
They're going to guide me through my whole college
experience. It's just about knowing that you
have someone there and you can switch mentors.
It could be a mentor for the semester, for the year, for just

(34:56):
college for 10 years. But make sure you have someone
who's been in the position before that can support you.
There's so much research backingthis up.
Related, but maybe not totally. I want you to find someone who
is in college with the same major as you or has recently
graduated or is in the next stage of their career path.
So maybe they're in grad school,maybe they're working, maybe

(35:17):
they're doing an internship, maybe they're a senior, maybe
they're a junior. And I want you to ask them what
they recommend you do and what they would have done
differently. I didn't do this and I've done
this. Now anyone I get to interact
with who's at a later stage, I asked him like, what would you
have done in my position? What do you recommend I should
be doing? What advice do you wish you
would have heard? And you are saving yourself so

(35:38):
much time and effort by not having to trial and error your
way through college. So I'm going to give you the
advice. If you want to be a clinical
psychologist, if you want to go into research in psychology, if
that is your end goal, I want you to give yourself grace
during freshman year. I want you to take the basic
site classes, confirm that like I'm still interested in this

(36:00):
when it's information that's presented in like a college
class style way. Like maybe you love mental
health Tik Toks, maybe you likedpsychology in high school.
But like when I'm taking these lectures, when I'm tested on
these topics, do I still enjoy this?
Just confirm. Make sure you don't want to
switch your major because you always have that option in the
beginning of college to pivot and switch if it's not aligned
with what you want to do. Give yourself fresh in the

(36:21):
semester to do that 2nd semesterfreshman year.
I want you to go to the head of the department, your advisor for
the department, someone who's inthat role or you can ask, hey,
what labs are on campus? Here's what I think I'm
interested in researching and I just want to hear like what labs
did you join? What have you heard good things

(36:42):
about which PI's primary investigator is what that stands
for are nice. Like who would you recommend
that I look into and ask your professors this who work in
psychology. Ask these people that are more
in these like departmental rolesthat work with a lot of students
and hear from other students what they like to do.
And I want you to have an understanding by the end of

(37:02):
freshman year that like here aretwo or three labs that I think I
would enjoy working with. I've heard good things about and
I'm going to apply to be a research assistant.
If you want to be a clinical psychologist, if you want to go
into research and psychology, you got to get research
experience. People have told this to me and
I was like, no, like I surely that's you need research.
If that's the path you want to take at some point or another,

(37:25):
you have to get that experience.A great way to start building
your CV, gaining experience, meeting people, understanding
what you like and what you don'thighly recommend.
And then sophomore year you'd really, you could do something
over the summer freshman year ifyou want to.
You don't have to. It's not going to make or break
your career sophomore year. I want you to join a lab.
I want you to apply as a research assistant and undergrad
research assistant. Maybe you can get paid for that,

(37:45):
maybe you can't, maybe it's volunteer.
Typically it's about like 5 to 10 hours a week.
Very doable. It's a great way to meet other
people in the department, understand what the research
process looks like, understand how a lab hierarchy works.
So like, what is my role as an undergrad?
What are the post backs doing? I would say generally a larger
lab is favorable as an undergradbecause you're exposed to more

(38:07):
people and more parts of the research process.
There's more opportunities to feel like part of a community
and feel engaged. You meet other undergrads
through research. So look at which labs have a lot
of undergrads working, which labs need a lot of help versus
being in a lab with like two other people.
And so if you decide you want different experience, like if
you want to work with a clinicalpopulation and your lab studies,

(38:28):
language development, maybe you switch labs and you get more
experience on screening for mental illnesses.
Or if you want to work with kids, but your first lab that
you start with is adults, you now have that experience.
You can apply to a different labto work in and then you can gain
more hands on experience with working with kids rather than an
adult population. So end of sophomore year, you're
going to decide, is this a lab that I want to stay at for the

(38:50):
rest of college? Is it the Pi that I feel is a
great mentor? Do I feel supported?
Do I like the projects I'm working on and am I going to be
able to get posters and publications from working in
this lab? You are going to either stay in
your lab if the answer to all those questions is yes.
If you say no to those questions, you're going to look
for a different lab with those criteria.
Is the research fit as aligned as possible?

(39:12):
This is hard as an undergrad because you don't have as much
control, but like is the research fit there or am I
getting skills that can be applied to a different area of
research later on? Do I enjoy the process?
Do I like my mentor? Like, would I want to write a
thesis with them senior year? Is there going to be
opportunities for me to be on posters?
Is it possible for me to work onprojects where I get

(39:33):
publications? And you can ask all those
questions in your interviews. And in fact, you should be at
first when you have no experience, you are just like, I
just want to learn. I want to gain experience.
But after you had a year under your belt working in a lab, you
are allowed to ask those questions and make sure you're
being set up for success in the role that you're in junior year.
I want you to continue in this either same lab or the new lab

(39:55):
that meets those criteria. You want to keep an eye out for
ways that you can get involved in things that would lead to a
publication. You want to see if there's
options to be an author on a poster at a conference, like a
national conference, like I've been to ABCT and ADAA.
You can go to APA. Like there's all these different
psychology conferences. They're really fun.
It's a great experience to get exposed to the field and see
what research is happening. And a lot of schools offer

(40:17):
funding either through the lab or through university to get.
Undergrads travel expenses covered, get the cost covered
for printing your poster and youcan also have a closer
relationship with your peers by doing this because you're
probably going to be a co-authoron a poster and on a paper.
So you'll get paired with other undergrads to work on this
project. And again, like have people talk
about about what they're doing, how are they furthering their

(40:39):
career, what is it looking like,etcetera.
So ideally junior year, if you can, working on a poster is a
great goal to have, seeing if you can do a research role over
the summer. So like summer of sophomore,
junior year, I probably continuing to work in that lab
over the summer and doing like asummer fellowship.
A lot of universities will offersummer funding, so you can get
funding and paid to do research at these different labs.

(41:02):
So they pay for your living expenses, you get a stipend.
And as part of that, you probably do a poster or
presentation about the research you're working on.
Also, if you can, junior year, looking for any of those funding
opportunities. So at Penn, it's called the
Center for Undergraduate Research.
There's also another thing called Penn Undergraduate
Research Mentorship where it's like a more structured
mentorship of faculty and student to work on a research

(41:25):
project. Look at those options like what
are things that I can put on my CV where like I was part of this
perm program. I got funding over the summer, I
got funding for this poster, I got funding to go to a
conference. These are things that you want
on your CVI mentioned CVA coupleof times.
That is my number one advice. If you don't take anything else
away from this is psychology major who wants to go into

(41:45):
research, start your CV right now.
I didn't start my CV until senior year and mentally trying
to remember like what tasks was I working on?
What skills do I have? How can I qualify all these
experiences and past things I'vedone on the CV?
Just start it now and add to it as you gain experiences.
It's so much easier than waitinguntil you need it for an

(42:07):
application or for grad school and then having to like put this
all together. Just start on a blank document.
It doesn't matter if it's perfect.
Use it for your own use. But like, write down what skills
you're gaining, what things you're trained on, what do you
know as far as statistical analysis and literature review?
Like all these skills and the classes you're taking that are
relevant to your research interests, Write those down,

(42:28):
keep track of it, work on that CV start it early rather than
having to like work backwards and remember what you did senior
year. You want to decide if you're
going to try and apply to clinical psych PhD program as an
undergrad or are you going to doresearch?
And we're going to have to do a whole another episode on that.
But kind of understand the difference.
Understand if you want to apply,get a lot of advice.
Get ready to run your application by a lot of people.

(42:50):
Ask your mentor again. We talked about the importance
of having a mentor. Do you think I have a shot if I
apply to clinical psych programs?
Do you think I have enough experience?
Do you think I should wait and get more experience?
And then senior year, you want to write a thesis.
Penn has a honors thesis in psychology.
Sure that a lot of other schoolshave that as well.
Figure out when that applicationis, probably like spring of

(43:12):
junior year. See if you can apply to be in
the honors program. See if you can write a thesis
about the research you're working on.
Being able to have independentlyworked on a research project is
a skill set that's really important and something that you
can gain as an undergrad by doing a thesis.
I would also try and do another poster your senior year, see if
you can still continue to work on projects that will lead to

(43:33):
publication and continue to workas a research assistant.
And then from there, you're going to kind of know what your
next steps are. Are you going to apply for a
post back or a lab coordinator role?
Are you going to apply to a master's program as IDAPHD?
You'll get more guidance and have more understanding at that
point, but that's what I would do every year of college if you

(43:53):
want to go into research as a psychology major, what I wish
someone had told me. So going back to this question,
the tips and tricks are find a mentor, someone you can go to,
you can lean on, you feel supported.
Ask someone who's a couple stepsahead of you what their advice
is for you and do that. Don't trial and error it.
Don't wait to come across the answer.
Ask people who've been in the position that you are and do

(44:16):
those things. Listen to their recommendations
and if it doesn't work, if it's not aligned, if it isn't advice
you want to take, you don't haveto take it, but ask and get
exposure to the information. And then as a freshman, the
other thing I'll give here is like if I could wave a wand and
give everyone better mental, physical, academic, social life,
health. If I could just improve

(44:36):
everyone's overall functioning in college, it would be to only
sleep in your room like all the other hours of the day.
I want you to be out of your room.
So you are eating in the dining halls or on campus, You are
studying in the library, you aregoing to all your classes, you
are working out, you are seeing friends.
You are giving yourself as many opportunities as possible to

(44:59):
connect and be engaged and have that sense of purpose if you're
in your room. Other than that, maybe that's
where you study. Like everyone's different, but
generally speaking, people tend to be more anxious, more
depressed, less engaged, more withdrawn if they're in their
room a lot of the times rather than being out and about and
engaging. And I'm not perfect at this.
I spend a lot of time in my room.
But I noticed generally I'm doing better mentally,

(45:19):
physically, academically when I am out of my room, I get more
done. I feel more productive, less
burnout, more connected. If I'm in my room as little as
possible. And I call just tough, right?
Like you want a nap during the middle of the day.
You don't just want to be wandering around.
But I've seen this on social media as advice that people
give, and I absolutely agree with it.

(45:41):
Spend as little time in your room as possible.
And this will be good for your sleep schedule, your mental
health, your relationships, youracademics, all of the things and
we just talked about in the lastquestion, like putting in so
many hours to build your relationships.
If you're not spending those hours in your room and you're
giving yourself more chances to study with your friends or run
into them on campus, you have a greater chance of accumulating

(46:02):
those hours and working towards those close friends and best
friends. OK last question is, I never
thought college would be this emotionally tiring.
The work I'm doing for my major isn't even tricky.
It's just I've never been this stressed out and depressed
before. It's making it an awful
experience. I've been going to therapy, it's
not helping and my friends and clubs aren't helping either and
I don't know what to do. This is really tough.

(46:26):
And I think something that I've become really aware of being on
a college campus and trying to like be aware of other people's
experiences mentally as much as possible is that college is the
first time a lot of people are solely responsible for their
mental health. And I want to explain that in
high school, there's a lot of things in place to set you up

(46:48):
for success, right? You have school from 8:00 AM to
3:00 PM every day. You're probably doing stuff
after school. Maybe it's a club, maybe it's a
sport, maybe you're volunteering.
It's pretty common to have afterschool activities, probably a
family dinner. Maybe you have siblings, maybe
you have friends. You're seeing your siblings
every day, you're seeing your friends every day.
You have parents probably checking in on like your
academics and how was your day, what's going on, What do you

(47:10):
have planned? You are put into classes with
the same group of people that easily allows you to accumulate
those 8200 hours of time together to facilitate close
friends, best friends, friend groups.
You have set three times of meals a day, Breakfast before
you go to school, lunchtime at school, family dinner.

(47:30):
You are forced to do physical activity, whether it's a sport
or PE class. You have a pretty regular sleep
schedule because you have to be up for class most likely by 8:00
AM five days of the week. All of these things, whether you
realize it or not, are good and generally are in pursuit of good

(47:51):
mental health, right? Like if we're waking up around
the same time every day, if we are getting 3 meals, we're
staying active. If we have a sense of purpose
and things to do during the day,if we have friends, if we feel
connected, all of these things help our mental health.
In college, that goes away. College is really optimized for
avoidance. No one is making you go to
class. Maybe you have an attendance

(48:12):
policy, maybe it doesn't. Probably doesn't impact your
grade that much. No one is making you study.
No one is making you eat your meals.
You don't have set people to eatyour meals with.
You have classes with different people every single day.
The classes are giant so it's not like you're assigned next to
a person that you organically get to know and make friends
with. You don't have people checking

(48:33):
in on your mental health and asking at dinner, how was your
day, what happened? No one cares what times you go
to sleep or wake up. You can nap during the day.
You have so much flexibility in your schedule.
No one is forcing you to be active.
None of these things are done for you.
And so if you are not intentional, it's really,
really, really easy to have a lot of habits and behaviors that

(48:54):
make it hard to have good mentalhealth.
And if you are someone that's prone to avoidance when you're
anxious or when you're depressedand you're someone who more
easily falls into the pattern oflike not doing these things that
are good for your mental health,it's really possible that's what
you're experiencing as a freshman.
You also don't have these solidified relationships to fall
back on, right? Like you have a support system
most of the time in high school.You have teachers you see

(49:16):
everyday. You have a guidance counselor
assigned to you. You have maybe a coach or
teacher who overseas a club thatyou're in.
You have your parents, you have your friends, you have your
siblings. Like all of these are people
that are in your community that you've established.
When you go to college, that disappears completely.
And it's not only that you don'thave your support system that
you previously had, but who alsoexpected or have to put in the

(49:39):
work to build that new support system.
And that's really hard. So not only are you in a
completely new environment that you are for the first time
learning how to live life in a way that doesn't derail your
mental health, but you also don't have the emotional and
relational support that you're used to.
And you also have to build that support by yourself.
And so I think understanding that like this is hard and this

(50:00):
is not easy and a lot of people struggle with it.
And if you're in college, you probably were like pretty
motivated in high school, did pretty well.
High school GPA is correlated negatively with well-being, self
esteem and optimism. So people with high GPA S are
generally less optimistic, have lower self esteem, and have
worse well-being. So if you're in college, you're

(50:21):
already probably in that group of people that are like, maybe
like mentally not as doing well as you could be.
And then you're put in a situation where you have to do
this all for yourself for the first time and you don't have
that skill set established that like this is how I maintain my
mental health and these are the things I need to do to stay in a
good spot. So I want you to give yourself a
lot of grace and understand thatyou're in a really challenging

(50:43):
time. And then you, I want you to
understand what habits and behaviors are in service of my
mental health and how can I get those in place.
So I want you to have somewhere to go every day.
I want you to have commitment most days of the week.
I like to have at least one day a week where I have nothing
scheduled so I can just do work at my leisure and not be
stressed. And like I have to be somewhere.
Like I like to have a break, buthave somewhere you have to get

(51:04):
up and physically be most days. You have a commitment, you have
a sense of purpose. You have to show up somewhere.
If it's classes, if it's a volunteer role, a club meeting,
something with friends, having that sense of purpose and
interest in your general collegeeducation rather than like I'm
being forced to be here, I'm going through the motions.
Having an internal sense of passion is really helpful in

(51:28):
just like getting through it. The next thing is going to be
meals. Make sure that you're actually
eating breakfast, lunch and dinner and not at like
ridiculous times. Are you eating nutritious food?
Are you getting protein? These are things again that are
no longer controlled for you. Dining hall has literally every
single good food ever. Pizza, bagels, waffles, all my
favorite things. I didn't have a kitchen my

(51:49):
freshman year, my dorm, but we had tons of snacks.
It can be really easy to be likeI'm not even properly fueling
myself or setting myself up for success in that respect.
Plan your meal a little bit more.
Be mindful. Just make sure that you are
again, fueling yourself for thisthing that's mentally really
challenging. Sleep is one of the biggest
things. And I think people notice this a
lot in college, like they're napping more.

(52:10):
They can't get up for classes. It's like night and day from
high school. So understand that your sleep is
a non negotiable. How many hours do you need a
night to be able to generally function well and feel rested?
Make sure that you're getting that most nights of the week and
if you can, avoid napping duringthe day because it's harder to
fall asleep. It's less consistent.

(52:30):
But understanding that your sleep is no longer decided for
you by your schedule. It's not dictated by having to
be at high school five days a week at 8:00 in the morning.
You're going to have to be the one that wakes up before your
3:00 PM class. That's the only thing on your
schedule for the day, right? So kind of understanding that
and setting yourself up for success with a consistent sleep
schedule because it really impacts your mental health

(52:51):
movement is really important. Half an hour of cardio every day
is as effective as antidepressants in treating
depression. Obviously there's some
populations where that's not true, but we know that physical
exercise, engaging physical activities, staying active helps
our mental health. It makes your sleep routine
easier. It helps with anxiety.
You get that burst of endorphins.

(53:12):
And for me, a lot of the time, the physical movement means
walks, like walking between classes, walking after classes,
walking in the treadmill. Like I'm not doing anything
crazy, but I'm getting that physical movement in.
And I find that really helps my general routine levels of energy
and mental health relationships are, again, it's really
challenging and you are buildinga new support system at the same

(53:33):
time, you don't have access to your old support system.
And you have to understand again, it takes a while to build
these close friendships. It's not immediately going to
feel as connected and synergistic as all the
relationships that you built through elementary school and
middle school and high school and these people you've known
for a long time. So give yourself grace there,
but also put yourself out there.Try to accumulate those hours,

(53:54):
put in the wraps, put in the time and build those
connections. And also, this is a great way to
stay accountable with these other areas.
So meet friends for lunch and dinner, have friends that you go
to the gym with or go on walks with, have friends that you take
classes with. They know when you're not there
and you're avoiding or you're sleeping or whatever it is, have
those be one of the commitments that you have to show up for
certain days of the week. And then you mentioned that the

(54:17):
work isn't like what's really challenging.
It's just you're mentally not doing great.
It's not fun, it's not a good experience.
Planning positive moments, planning activities that you're
looking forward to is really helpful in getting through a
semester, especially when it's like midterms and finals and you
have that paper coming up. Be aware of what's happening on
campus, what's happening in yourtown.
I'm in Philadelphia, so there's a lot of fun things going on.

(54:39):
Like last week was the Philadelphia Flower Show.
I didn't go, but I was excited about the potential opportunity
of going. So have things that you're
looking forward to outside of classes.
Have these positives that you accumulate on a day-to-day basis
that gives you that joy. Don't wait for them to
organically happen and expect tolike see your friend and
magically have a great day. Don't just rely on running into

(54:59):
your friend on the way to class and then oh, I'm feeling happy
and yay and blah, blah, blah. Like plan these things.
Set up time to see your friends.Pick a show that you're looking
forward to watching that comes out a certain night of the week.
Find fun activities that are happening on campus or in your
area. Commit to those.
Plan to go to those with your friends.
Think about breaks also. It's like, I can't wait to see
family. I can't wait to not be in school

(55:21):
and relax and have these things that you're looking forward to
help you get through the day today.
I hope that was helpful. I hope that you also again,
understand like a lot of people are in the same spot as you are.
A lot of people struggle with their mental health for the
first time in college and they're not only alone, like
physically they're in a different spot.
They feel so isolated, but they haven't established the skills

(55:44):
to cope with their mental healthand set their mental health up
for success because it was really done for them in high
school. So I think this is a really
common experience. You struggle for the first time
with your mental health in college.
It's tough, it's overwhelming. You don't have the skills and
you don't have your support system So so it's a tough spot
to be in, but there's a lot thatyou can do to counteract that
and work on your mental health. So I hope you guys enjoyed this

(56:05):
little Reddit reacts episode talked a lot, lots of yapping
happening over here. But if you guys enjoy,
definitely make sure to leave a review or share with friend or
family member comment. Let me know what you guys
thought if you disagree, if you agree, what advice would you
give these people? And yeah, I hope you guys are
doing well. If you're at college, I hope
these tips are helpful and maybeyou can implement them if you're

(56:27):
struggling with any of these things.
If you're not and you're still in high school, may be helpful
in the next couple of years. And if you are already out of
college, maybe you can be that mentor or point of contact for
someone who's currently going through it and potentially
struggling and beat the person that has a huge impact on their
outcomes for many years from nowbecause they feel seen and
supported and like they can go to you.
So I hope you guys enjoyed. And with that, I will see you

(56:50):
next week.

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