Art Cordova
Staff Writer
Monday, Oct. 21, the Household Commons hosted Dr. Joseph Pathakamuri, Rev. Vincent Yeager, TOR and a panel of seniors and graduate students for a needed discussion on “How to Chill Out.”
For about an hour students heard from those who made it through their first three years of university. They shared their knowledge and wisdom on how they learned to treat themselves well and how to live a balanced life of work and rest.
The first presenter was Yeager, who presented his insights on resting. He explained that Christian psychology professionals have defined seven kinds of necessary rest: physical, mental, sensory, creative, emotional, social and spiritual.
He emphasized that these types of rest reflected seven major needs necessary for balancing our lives. We need time to sleep, time to think, time to be away from our screens, time to enjoy nature and the arts, time to sort our emotions, time to be with friends and time to pray.
Yeager closed his thoughts with a final spiritual insight: “Recognize that the Sabbath is a moral obligation.” We as Christians must give ourselves time to simply enjoy God’s presence and He gives us the Sabbath to not only recharge spiritually, but rest in all other ways too.
Following Yeager was senior psychology major, Julia. Julia recalled her experience as a first-time college student and the mistakes she made “not knowing how to chill.” She thought she had to do it all alone and that she needed to be perfect.
Eventually she discovered, “It wasn’t something I could do long term.” Acknowledging that she is still working things out amid her final year, she noted, “You don’t have to do everything perfectly … rest in the security of pursuing what you’re pursuing for a reason.”
Then Emma, a senior biology major, took over the presentation. She first touched on the notion of reason and that university is hard. The balance between rest and work is difficult, but you can persevere by knowing your “why.”
“It’s not because I’m unmotivated because I have to get (good) grades … the Lord has given me my gifts and I want to give them back,” said Emma. God has to be at the forefront of what you do, otherwise, without that love, you will burn out. You have great gifts, and God delights in what you’ll do with them, and that’s a far better attitude to take than perfectionism
Emma concluded the main talk by reminding students to take their projects and goals one step at a time, that they are not alone and to lean on their friends and let their friends lean on you.
A short Q&A session followed where questions on perfectionism were put forward.
One panelist shared, “You’re going to be at different levels every day. My best is not always going to be at one-hundred percent, sometimes it’s twenty percent … I can’t do it by myself. I have to know that the Lord has put this path before me.”
Another panelist added, “It’s a wound of our society that links our value and our dignity to our productivity; that is not of God.”
After their responses, the audience was asked to reflect on how they would “chill out” and were invited back to the next lecture on Nov. 7 to discuss how to heal.
Recounting what he took away from the talk, freshman Michael Henderson said, “Your best is your best, and that’s it. Sometimes I look at the outcome to decide whether I did a good job … going through all of that (in the talk) was really good.”