I had an epiphany today:
I was sitting in bed, looking out my window and staring at the blue sky while the sun reflected off the roof of the building beside me.
There's so much beauty in just living.
Just sitting there, enjoying the view, and feeling the cold breeze blowing through my window. The soft blanket on my skin, and then warmth of my heart.
Everything else seems so unimportant.
Life is for appreciating, not for stressing out and worrying.
I should have been studying for my hydraulics test. I should have been finishing my homework assignments.
But there are so many things in life worth more than those homework assignments and that midterm.
If I fail them both, so what? Does the world become any less beautiful? Do my options suddenly diminish? Not really. If I get a B- in a class, do my chances if becoming an engineer decrease? Not really. If I don't do well, I'm still going to be able to see the beauty in the crunching leaves under my feet. I'm still going to get to learn to scuba dive. I'm still going to laugh at babies smiling.
The world doesn't suddenly change if you get a bad grade or if you decide to relax and breathe instead of worrying. The world is the same either way, it's what you make of your situation that changes.
So I'm going to take a step back. I'm going to stop stressing out about exams or homework assignments, because either way, I know life is going to be okay. I'm going to go for ice cream instead of studying, I'm going to go to yoga and leave that homework assignment for later, I'm going to blow off going to class if I want to take a nap. School ISN'T the most important thing in the whole wide world. If I die tomorrow, I would rather have enjoyed that TV show than have studied that extra 30 minutes. I would rather have sat in bed and looked out my window with music blasting than finished that homework assignment that I couldn't figure out.
I mean, there's a line that has to be drawn between caring and not caring about school work, but I think I've finally realized that balance isn't just in timing things properly, it's about the mindset in which you do things. The worry isn't worth the wrinkles, or the feeling of desperation.