Saturday, September 5, 2015

Obsessing Over Being Ahead

I like to be “ahead” in my online classes.

When I start an online class, my only goal and focus during the first week is to get as far ahead as I possibly can. During that first week of class (and after, depending on my course load), I dedicate my life to my schoolwork, working every day, all day in a valiant effort to finish as much homework as is humanly conceivable. I read textbooks into the early morning hours, I work on editing papers while watching TV, and I sacrifice sleep in favor of additional daytime work hours. However after all I do to get ahead on my homework, I do eventually crash on the couch, exhausted and overworked, wondering if there’s some other way I can get ahead without having to feel like a zombie.

Don’t get me wrong, though, getting ahead does have its advantages. For instance, I don’t have to worry quite as much about deadlines. I still have to worry about them until the class is over, but I have a much longer period of time to work with between the week that I’m actually on, and the one that I’ve completed my course-work up to. If I’ve gotten ahead in a class, and during the seventh week I get sick, I can go take a nap. I don’t have to worry about that 1500 word essay I have to write. It’s already done and submitted.

In the times that I’ve taken on a heavier load of online classes, I’ve often made plans to go week-by-week, assignment-by-assignment, instead of making desperate attempts to finish all of the coursework for all of my classes by the third week of the term. I do still really like to be ahead, however, and no matter what I talk myself into before my classes start, I turn into a homework maniac the first day of the semester.

Getting super-duper far ahead is a great idea, but I’ve found that it can end badly, either with a stress-induced cold, or the realization that I misread the instructions for an assignment, and got a lower grade because of it. Or just that I altogether forgot to submit an assignment that I had completed because I was so focused on my next task. Either way, there’s a good chance that at some point during the class I’ll wear out, and take things week-by-week anyways… 3 weeks ahead of where I should be.

Although I’d like to be chill enough to do online class assignments week-by-week, the truth is that I’m a bit high-strung. I do better, and I feel less stressed if I know that I have at least two weeks to write a paper instead of just one, or that I can take the time to bake cookies or go for a long jog. To obtain this extra smidgen of time without wearing myself out, I try to strike a balance between the two “extremes” of going week-by-week and getting halfway through the class in the first week.

There’s a part of me that would like to be ahead on all of my life’s endeavors like I am with my classes, but I know that I can’t, and in reality, it’s not even something that I would want. Sometimes, it’s nice to take things one step at a time, and not worry about what’s off in the distance. I notice things that I wouldn’t have otherwise noticed, like the ruins of an old house on a hill, or a book tossed carelessly on a coffee table that has the answer to a problem that’s haunted me for years. If I go with the flow, I may even run into a potentially important person in my life that I would have breezed right past in my hurry to get to the finish line.


Lydian Shipp

Webzine Team Member

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