Apathy: Decision Overload
At the start of college, I promised myself to be deliberate with my actions, choices, even with mundane aspects of everyday life. New people, brilliant people, new places, new ideas, new foods - everything was so different than anything I had ever imagined. ‘I will appreciate every moment of it,’ I said to myself, ‘every tiny detail.’
This mindset has been incredibly rewarding. I made many new friends, participated in a wide range of student life activities, and took courses I would never otherwise have.
But recently, the need to be conscious about every little action every day, every week has begun to weigh on me. The code of cosmic balance of things is teaching me a lesson as overanalyzing the smallest choices is making me feel its weight. Getting up, brushing my teeth, putting the laptop away from my bed before sleep, one egg or two for breakfast, hanging out with a friend for 30 minutes or 35, doing 5 reps of dumbbells or 6, listening to 3 songs or 4 on my way to classes, to speak up once in a discussion with a long, detailed response or two short ones, to run a mile or a mile and a hundred feet, to get up at 8:30 or 8:40, to call a friend to talk about classes or talk about football (or both?), to read 20 pages or 22 every day outside of class - it all adds up.
Life shouldn’t be taken so seriously. The meticulousness is turning me into a person I would hate as a kid. This needs to stop.
At the start of college, I promised myself to be deliberate with my actions, choices, even with mundane aspects of everyday life. New people, brilliant people, new places, new ideas, new foods - everything was so different than anything I had ever imagined. ‘I will appreciate every moment of it,’ I said to myself, ‘every tiny detail.’
This mindset has been incredibly rewarding. I made many new friends, participated in a wide range of student life activities, and took courses I would never otherwise have.
But recently, the need to be conscious about every little action every day, every week has begun to weigh on me. The code of cosmic balance of things is teaching me a lesson as overanalyzing the smallest choices is making me feel its weight. Getting up, brushing my teeth, putting the laptop away from my bed before sleep, one egg or two for breakfast, hanging out with a friend for 30 minutes or 35, doing 5 reps of dumbbells or 6, listening to 3 songs or 4 on my way to classes, to speak up once in a discussion with a long, detailed response or two short ones, to run a mile or a mile and a hundred feet, to get up at 8:30 or 8:40, to call a friend to talk about classes or talk about football (or both?), to read 20 pages or 22 every day outside of class - it all adds up.
Life shouldn’t be taken so seriously. The meticulousness is turning me into a person I would hate as a kid. This needs to stop.