After being at home for months after the world was thrown upside down due to Covid 19, I can honestly say that this has been some of the best and worst few months I have ever had. The first semester was a journey of adjusting, finding motivation & fighting constant procrastination & anxiety.

When the national lock-down was announced, I took 2 weeks off even though I knew it was a bad idea. I wanted to focus on my family & wanted to change my mindset around the idea of being at home for so long without seeing my friends and family or doing the things that I love.

I have never been one of those students who can spend hours at varsity, I am an introvert and I need my personal space & I find the atmosphere at university very tense. I thought the lock-down would be good for my studies because I love working in the comfort of my own home, but I can honestly say it was much more challenging than I thought.

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I struggled finding motivation to start projects or pick up where I left off. I struggled to sleep at night & would sleep till 10 AM in the mornings. This went on for about 3 weeks until I realized that this downhill spiral is going to be the end of me & something drastically had to change.

These last few months has not only been a struggle for my studies but for my businesses as well. My photography business has been really quite & I had many cancellations but my art business surprisingly starting growing. And the growth of a business is incredible but balancing between doing assignments & doing art commissions to pay my bills has been a really big struggle for me. Prioritizing is key, but prioritizing is a skill I have yet to master & I have so much more respect for people that work & study at the same time.

Then I started practicing a new routine.

I made sure my desk was clean at night before I went to bed, I made up my bed before I started my day instead of leaving it for later because I noticed that it made me feel productive & then sparked productivity for the rest of the day. I made sure my working space was filled with things that inspire me, I gathered some of my plants, art pieces, good music & I surrounded my working space with it. I always had a bad habit of waking up & immediately thinking of what I had to do & then I would immediately feel defeated but now I try and motivate myself and start my day with coffee & some good thoughts.

I have to say it really helped my mental health to do these things, before I implemented these things I felt tired, unproductive & moody. My time at home has been very challenging but also helped me grow the necessary tools I need to turn this bad situation into something good.

Happiness inspires productivity – Shawn Achor

Bren