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By Jillian Sarver
With the world crushing in on you from all sides, when do you stop to take a breath? Perhaps it comes with being an upper classman, but for some reason, I have found myself faced with an immense lack of motivation in almost every aspect of my life. As I have gotten further in my college career, I have taken on more responsibility, responsibility that never seemed too daunting in the past. However, I cannot seem to find a way to perfectly balance all the responsibility I have accumulated. With school, McConnell, ROTC, work, and my personal life, I feel as if I am a disappointment in every single facet. When I finally catch up for the week, all that is waiting for me is another week of assignments, 6:30 AM workouts, seminars, work, and another hangout I have to miss or reschedule because something in my schedule came up. I can’t help but feel like I am drowning in an ocean that I filled up, that I prayed and worked so hard for.
All that being said, I somehow still don’t think it is enough, that I should still be doing more. Unfortunately, it seems this is the norm for every single one of my friends that I talk to about it. So am I just the world’s most annoying complainer or is there a serious problem amongst high-driven individuals to drive themselves to the brink of insanity in the name of ambition? There never seems to be a break, never seems to be a chance to slow down and take time to actually take care of myself. The funny thing, though, is that I am not even that sure I would want the slow life I speak of if given the opportunity. I thrive off being busy, getting the most done when I am so sure the world is going to end if I don’t succeed on that one specific task. Or, is that actually true or have I just conditioned myself to think and behave like that?
The problem with all of this is that I truly do not know the answer to anything. However,
I do think that is normal. It is so easy to look around at everyone else and feel like you are the
only one drowning, the only one who is suffering in a world full of perfect people. On the
contrary, I have personally found that most everyone is experiencing the same phenomena that I
am, which is entirely upsetting. Why is an entire generation of people so weighed down by
everything in their life? Is there a direct answer or solution to the problem at hand, or is that just
the way life is? Do I even have grounds to be overwhelmed about my life when there are so
many worse problems I could be having? To be honest, I don’t know. All I know is that living a
life where you are constantly catching your breath is not actually living; it’s surviving.
Jillian Sarver is a McConnell Scholar at the University of Louisville in the Class of 2027. She is studying English and Psychology with a minor in political science.