Another week of isolation, another week of going through the motions. At least, that is what it can feel like for some of us. Ever since my freshman year at Drexel, I have always been one of those students that prefers being at home to being in the city. While that preference gradually shifted as time went on, I still very much enjoy being at home.
One of the major pros that has come out of this situation is the increase in time to do things. While everyone’s situation is different, I would imagine that the majority of us Drexel students spent a lot of our time on campus going to and from classes, going out for food, going for a coffee run and doing other small things that took up our time. And for those of us who lived off-campus, the commute time was rather significant, and it could really start to feel a bit tedious at times if you were having to do it every day of the week.
For me, being at home cuts all of those things out of my daily schedule. While that is a very good thing to a degree, it also means that I now have an enormous amount of time that I need to find a use for. If you’re like me, you probably find the idea of having a lot of free time to be very attractive. But just as with all things, too much of it can be a negative. Unfortunately, that’s kind of where we are today. Being away from Drexel has done away with many of the small things we did day in and day out, and when added up, all those things took up a pretty good portion of our time outside of classes. Depending on your perspective, that can be a benefit or a detriment.
There are many time gaps that need to be filled now, and that isn’t an easy task if you were fully immersed in the Drexel lifestyle. My best piece of advice is to find something that you have a vested interest in and are willing to commit to. Now, commitment can be scary sometimes, but at a time like this, I think it is important to get into at least one routine that can take your mind off the whole pandemic situation entirely. It’s difficult to escape, as nearly every time we interact with any form of media we are greeted with news about the pandemic. And rightfully so given the circumstances, but it doesn’t make it any less unhealthy.
Being that I am an avid reader, the obvious choice for me was to start reading for various amounts of time every day with the goal of finishing a book every week or two. It was an easy enough thing to commit to doing, especially since I haven’t been able to read for pleasure a whole lot during my time at Drexel as an English major studying all kinds of literature for classes.
One friend of mine has committed a portion of his time to trying out new cooking and baking recipes every week. This is a pretty popular thing to be doing at the moment, but that is of little significance. If you have an interest in doing something then you should just do it. Its level of popularity should be one of the last things that you are concerned about at a time like this.
Something that I do want to emphasize is not to overly commit yourself to whatever hobby you decide to explore. You don’t want to turn it into something like the pandemic where you are engaging with it every single day of the week. That it would kind of defeat the purpose. This hobby is something that you should be trying to do for a moderate amount of time each week. What a moderate amount of time is for you is not for me to decide, but you should limit how much time you spend indulging in your hobby to the point where you will be able to do it for a while without getting bored.
Know that you will get bored eventually — it’s just something that happens. I’ve loved reading for as long as I can remember, but there are some days, and even some weeks, where I’m just not feeling it for a variety of reasons. If it’s something that you have genuine love, appreciation or interest for, then the period of boredom will pass in time.
I realize that submerging yourself in a hobby is only one way to deal with our current living situations and probably won’t work for everyone. However, I am a firm believer in the idea that every person has a hobby that can have unlimited potential in terms of how much time can be spent with it. And at this point, I think we can all agree that anything we can be doing to get our minds off the COVID-19 virus is a good thing. It is something that people should no doubt be focusing on, but it is important to take regular steps back from it. That way we can return to it with a fresh set of eyes and a rejuvenated mind to continue working toward ridding ourselves of the virus.