Satisfaction through Enough Work

A Story by Daryl

Ramblings of a 17-year-old struggling college sophomore about firsts, work, and idleness...

Having shaking legs, severe midday headaches and not-in-the-right-time dizziness are just some of the signs of stress. I would describe mine as the type that really flushes my attention away from my Literature class, and makes me open my eyes at 4 am, close it, and open it again at 6 am, to note that my class is 7 am.

These things are happening to me because of the many things to accomplish. You see, I’m already in college, and all the rough times I’ve been through are only the “first ones”, the “intro”, or in simpler thought, I barely made it to the real starting point of the race. Just like what I stated in one of the writing activities we’ve had, for me, “high school and college are two different worlds”.

I’m only bearing in my mind the cliché, “’pag may tiyaga, may nilaga”. But I would rather restate it as “every sacrifice bears a fruit of success,” and everything else follows, including satisfaction. But unfortunately, that’s not always the case. There were times when you feel you’ve done everything but accomplished nothing. You have lots of things in your mind, but your brain is so tired to produce the blueprint of your activities, so as your body to work them out. It blocks success. It repels satisfaction.

That is exactly my problem. I don’t do enough work.

At first, I couldn’t imagine myself living away from the tender loving care of my parents, living in a boarding house, and missing the four calls of my mom every morning. But then, probably just because of the thrill and excitement, my body tells me that I’m ready, so as my mind. I’m ready to see myself in a not-so-strange room, where I only have my “own bed” and little space for my clothes and school materials. I’m ready to teach myself to budget my allowance, and to control my schedule for each day. Luckily, I’m doing these, roughly, for one year and four months already, and still trying to survive.

Staying in the university is not that hard at first, but it gets harder as time goes by. I passed all my exams, but what my conscience tells me is that I could have done better.

Maybe these are just simple explanations of man’s nature - lack of contentment. Of course, who wants to be just in the middle if one knows he could be on top? That is supposed to be out of my ideals.

I saw my boardmates doing their reports about population education. Some are burying their noses on Chemistry books and on photocopies of teaching strategies. One of them is worrying about what plant to bring as their project in Biology, for if they couldn’t bring one, they would automatically get a failed grade.

And here I am, lying on my bed, analyzing the specific place of a fly which landed on the ceiling (I just re-enacted the event before Rene Descartes’ discovery of the Cartesian Coordinate Plane), trying to cool down at least 50 percent of the steamy atmosphere of our room. But my freezing-to-death aura couldn’t out-balance the concentration of these people. I was thinking that if I’m going to ride along with them, I’m going to set the whole room into a conflagration! That was the most stupid idea that I ever thought.

I’m starting to live a literally, passive life. It is as if I’m comfortably sitting on the couch, watching TV, and my fingers are involuntarily switching the channels.

Actually, I have 2 practical exams to practice, PR campaign plan to formulate, four articles to pass together with more or less 6 pictures (in the university publication) and 2 comic strips (of course, not my own creation), a case study to start working on, a magazine to publish as a project, and 7 subjects to study for the final exams! Phew! I just keep on telling my self, “I can do it,” or else, I would be putting myself down.

Yes, of course, anybody can do all those things in no time. But as everybody would expect, since they’re done in a rushed manner, the results wouldn’t be that good. If I’m going to rush our scripts, our performance would surely be half-way below satisfactory. Rushing news articles would contribute to a bad newspaper, and when I rush my studies, it will surely give me low scores. Low scores gaining momentum would eventually lead to failed grades and, in my case, failed grades means saying bye-bye to college.

I would admit, I’m getting near to such situation. So before it happens, I wanted to express my heartfelt gratitude to the man with a golden heart who helped my parents send me to college.

These are probably the reasons why I’m having little problems with my health. I couldn’t think because I’m caught in the middle of these to-do things, and I’m on the cliff of deadlines, so I have to do things quick. It will lead to unsatisfactory results; yet, I’ll have to force m self to be contented.

Rushing won’t give you the satisfaction you’re looking for. Things should be taken and accomplished in an appropriate speed: slow enough for you to think clearly and to make your output almost perfect, and fast enough for you to do other things and have time for yourself. With God’s grace, you’ll see, the satisfaction and accomplishment is not that hard to achieve.

It is better late than never, but doing things ahead of time is the best. According to Lord Chesterfield, “Whatever is worth doing at all is worth doing well.” Don’t waste time.

I’m saying these to myself and to those who share with me the same situation. It’s the lesson that I’ve learned, to be lived-up for the rest of my life.

I have to get up now, and do my work.

P. S. This article was written sometime in March 2007, and then modified in October of the same year. :)