LIFESTYLE
AN ENDLESS DREAM OR RECURRING NIGHTMARE? Five unconventional ways to stop feeling stuck in time Written by Kate Reuscher, Contributing Writer Graphic by Quinn Ruzicka, Contributing Illustrator and Designer
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t’s 9:00 p.m. and the growing to-do list you wrote is the only thing you’ve actually written today. Your bed is now a trap, and while you can’t say you’ve written your essay, you can say how the entire new season of “The Bachelor” ends. You know in the morning your alarm will be a scary reminder of another day with another task, and you wonder if you’ll actually start to see your to-do list disappear— just like your motivation did.
Walk until you don’t recognize where you are.
Waiting for life to happen while we watch it pass by sucks. We’ve all likely felt ourselves in a funk before, but maybe this time it is harder to shake. If you are in an unshakable funk now, here’s a few ways that might help you pull yourself out of it.
However you choose to pull yourself out of the funk and take on the world again doesn’t matter; whether it’s transporting to your past or future self, opening old messages from your friends or getting lost while you browse the perfect towns of Switzerland, the only person who can pull you out of a funk is yourself. Treat yourself to a new scenery other than the pile of blankets you’re tucked under, redefine your mindset and find ways that your responsibilities can become refreshing and enjoyable again. ■
Text your friends back. Pick up your phone for actual human interaction! Sure, maybe you have been on it for hours already, watching every TikTok possible, but that’s not helping pull you out of the funk like friends will. If there’s one thing friends will respond to, it’s a proposal for food and genuine conversation, so it’s a double win for you in that case.
Imagine your watching you.
ten-year-old
self
It may sound like a weird strategy to get out of bed, but sometimes the thought of your tiny face looking up at you is just unnerving enough to motivate you. I know a ten-yearold me, with dreams to be a doctor or singer by now, would hate knowing if I was a student with five missing assignments. For her sake, I will still study.
Imagine your seventy-year-old self watching you. Bear with me, I know it’s a lot of imagination. At seventy, you have experienced the most you think you could have in all your decades of life… or have you? If you don’t pull yourself out of the funk now, consider that older you who might be disappointed in the time wasted during your most freeing years.
Make a Pinterest travel board. Your bed always seems comfy until you’re suddenly looking at gorgeous lounge chairs poolside in Bali. Planning a perfect escape from the monotony of your current life is motivation in itself, and it will help you get out of bed—that vacation won’t pay for itself!
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Now this may sound scary, but you may never realize that you barely leave a one mile radius until you discover somewhere new on foot. You may find a new study spot or a fresh perspective on your walk, and the freedom you find while walking is just as liberating.