When is Productive too Productive?

Success is predicated on how well we score, how many clubs we participate in or how much community service we do. In the bubble of high school, students work tirelessly to appear desirable to a college admission's officer or an employer. Most students lose sleep over a certain test score that might lower their GPA or fret over whether they are participating in enough extra-curricular activities. Most teen's lives revolve around getting into college or into the workforce. However, what happens when most of the activities students participate in every day is stripped away from them. As I write, most of the American population is quarantined within their homes and are unable to see those outside immediate family or participate in normal activities. Students are no different, they can't add to their resume's and for most their grades can only slightly be adjusted. For certain students, this is when the panic starts to set in. Questions like: "What if I didn't do well enough in school?" and "What if there are kids who have done more than I have?" and "I just don't feel like I am doing enough for others" thrash about in their heads and eat at their very being.

That's my situation, and even as I write those crippling insecurities run amuck in my psyche. When most students are faced with these questions, they make a commitment to themselves and recite the age old trope: "I am going to be productive." So they work, and they work and they work and they work until after a two week period all their schoolwork for the remainder of the year is completed. Then, for an unbearably short amount of time, they feel fulfilled and the insecurities crawl back to the place from whence they came. For me, this period lasted a measly five minutes. Then those same questions swirled back into place. (Note: this period may have been a bit more expedited for me, as I read an article on student activism which will ruin whatever self worth anyone has built up.) Then, I attempted to save the world in ten minutes. Needless to say, the world is not in fact saved. However I came up with multiple ways I could contribute and began working on those projects. (For those of you keeping score, yes, this is one of those projects.) The hunger to help those around me and desire to build my resume continued for about two weeks until one day I went on Instagram, the mother of all self esteem issues. I scrolled for a while and came across one of my friend's posts. He was FaceTiming his friends and playing poker. What struck me about the post wasn't the fact that my friend is atrocious at poker nor that I wasn't invited to said game, but that he seemed to be having fun. Fun, an idea that had seemed so foreign to me. I certainly have had fun over quarantine but not as much as he seemed to be having. I wondered how much of the post was contrived and whether or not he was in the same predicament I was. However, I realized why he looked like he was having more fun than I was. I realized that he didn't force himself to be productive, he balanced fun and work. He realized that it is important to work on schoolwork and those projects that you are passionate about however, there was no need to attempt to save the world as I previously thought. I realized that I too could find this balanced and for the first time during quarantine, I stopped working.

There are those of you who have read this and thought to yourself: "This kid is insane please never let me get to that level" and to that I say that you are absolutely right and I congratulate you on your ability to compartmentalize. However, some of you reading this have identified with the emotions felt or maybe even have dealt with some of the same issues yourself. To those readers I say that it is ok to take a break, to reward yourself, even to just procrastinate for a little. Although we may think that success is predicated on our resumes, our grades or on the amount of people that we help, success is truly predicated on whether or not you can look yourself in the mirror every night and know that you have given whatever task you've completed that day 100% of your effort. By doing this you allow yourself to not continuously stress out and to also allocate time to yourself. So as long as you are passionate about the work you're doing or passionate about your grades, you will get whatever work you have done. After that is finished you will have time to relax knowing that you have done the work you need to get done.

By: Jack Martinez