I don’t know if you’re a full-time student. Maybe you’re a working college girl like I was, where you’re working two jobs while going to school full time. Whatever your situation is, what I know is that you’re probably telling yourself the biggest lie college students tell.
The lie is, I don’t have enough time.
My mission today is to debunk your lie and prove to you that you absolutely have enough time every week no matter how busy you may claim you are.
I’m also going to share with you how you can work a part-time or even a full-time job, go to college full time and still have enough time to relax and unwind on the weekends.
DEBUNKING THE I DON’T HAVE ENOUGH TIME MYTH
I’m pretty sure if you’re reading this you live on planet earth. Which means you and all your classmates were given 168 hours in a week to work with. That is a lot of freaking hours, so let’s take a look at how a student might be spending their time.
For this scenario we are going to assume a few things about you:
- You’re a full-time college student taking 4 classes and 1 lab
- You work a 20-hour position
- You live off campus in your own apartment so you commute
- You get 8hrs of sleep every night
- You are a super-achieving college student who actually spends 2 hours studying for every hour you spend in lecture
So let’s do the math shall we?
(168 hours per week total) – (16 hours of class) – (32 hours of studying) – (56 hours of sleeping) – (20 hours working) – (10 hours eating) – (10 hours getting dressed) – (7 hours commuting) = 17 hours left over to do whatever you want.
That’s a full weekend and in this calculation, I’m assuming that you’re spending 32 hours a week studying. We both know you aren’t spending even close to those amount of hours studying. And I personally believe you don’t ever have to spend that much time studying but that’s a subject for another blog post.
So girlfriend, where is all your time going? Why is it that you keep saying you don’t have enough time?
You might be thinking, well I work full time. Bullshit because let’s see what the math looks like on that one.
(168 hours per week total) – (16 hours of class) – (40 hours of work) – (56 hours of sleeping) – (10 hours eating) – (10 hours getting dressed) – (7 hours commuting) = 29 hours left over to split between school work and free time. Or 14.5 hours/week for school work and 14.5 hours per week for whatever you wanted.
The issue that you’re having isn’t that you don’t have enough time, it’s that you’re choosing to not spend your time wisely.
Frankly, I’m tired of sugar coating time management and study skills.
YOU are making a choice to spend the time you do have on things that are not moving you towards your goals. You’re spending your time binge watching Netflix, watching other people live their lives on Youtube via vlogs, chilling out, napping and mindlessly scrolling through your phone.
Listen, I’m no judging you for that. I get caught up in that some days too. But, what I need you to understand is that what you focus on, what you spend your time on, will grow and yield certain results. So based on where you’re currently spending your time, what kind of results do you think you will yield?
If you’re getting C’s and D’s on your exam, you can’t be upset because what you chose to spend your time on weren’t the activities that were going to get you A’s and B’s.
A student who get’s A’s and B’s has a very different set of priorities than a student who gets C’s and D’s.
And priorities is really what it comes down to. What are your top 5 priorities? What’s important enough to get your time?
If your current schedule doesn’t reflect what’s important to you and what your 5 priorities are, you’re going to feel really out of alignment. You’re going to feel stressed, you’re going to feel like you’re being pulled in a million different directions because you don’t even know what should be getting your time.
The other thing you need to understand is that no one else is to blame for your lack of time, your situation is not to blame for your lack of time, you are responsible for your lack of time.
You’re the person that is making all of the choices. If your life doesn’t look like how you want it to look like in college, guess whose to blame? You are, friend.
I want you to stop saying, “I don’t have enough time.” and instead change it to, “I choose not to spend time on that.”
- I’m choosing not to start my paper 4 weeks before it’s due and instead write it all the night before it’s due.
- I’m choosing not to study for my exam in advance and instead I’m going to cram 2 hours before I have to take it.
- I’m choosing to hang out with my friends instead of going to that study group I should be at because I’m failing chemistry.
Do you see the difference? It’s not about you not having the time because I literally debunked that lie above.
You’re just not managing your time properly. You’re letting your time be sucked up into things that won’t change or enhance your life in any way.
HOW TO BEGIN MAKING A CHANGE:
- The first thing you need to do is take ownership of your schedule. Grow up and realize that everything that is taking up your time is doing so because you let it. You decided that it could.
- The second thing you need to do is get a handle on where your time is going. Where are you spending your hours? The easiest way to get a sense of this is by keeping a time log for a week. Write down what you’re doing every hour. You can do this by hand or use an app like Toggl.
- The third thing you need to do is define your 5 priorities. These 5 priorities are the things that will make it into your schedule. These are the things you have to intentionally create time for from the 168 hours you get each week. Everything else that doesn’t fit into those 168 hours has to go because you’re only going to get 168 hours and that is not enough time to do it all. So what are the things that you actually want to dedicate time to?
What do you think about this perspective? Did this set off a light bulb in your head? Did this make you want to take more responsibility for your life and schedule? Let me know in the comments below.