Zen Habits

I spent my first year at the ITAT practically burying myself in my studies and my second year in Korea basically doing nothing at all, except for studying the Korean language and Korean culture. Restarting my studies in Graz right now made me realize that both ways of these ways of living my life are far from optimal. Of course I am expected to be prepared for my exams, to do my homework diligently, to read through the links my teachers post and to spend at least part of my free time revising my homework and written tests. At the same time though, some of our teachers recommend us to not only live our lives trying to cram all sorts of information into our heads, but to go outside from time to time and enjoy life. I took these words to heart and stopped myself from getting stressed out all the time.

These days, when I can’t concentrate on my homework any longer I get my bike and go for a ride or take a walk. Whenever I don’t even have the slightest inspiration for writing just another paragraph or preparing a speech I start talking to my flat mates or go out to meet some friends. In the past I thought of these interruptions of my work as wasting time, but recently I realized that whenever I feel calm and relaxed I finish my work in half the time that I used to take. I also took up sports again, though I only chose one USI course for now – Capoiera.

Honestly, capoiera is so much more difficult and exhausting than it looks, but it feels good being totally worn out after one and half an hour of training. I can only share one important thing that I learned with all of you, reading this blog. Stressing yourself over your studies won’t help you at all, quite the opposite; it will prevent you from working well. I used to feel stressed about university matters all the time, but now that I learned to relax studying is fun, interesting and something I like to do even in my holidays. In the end, I just needed to find some balance between my personal and university life.