How To Have A Social Life while Balancing School

[deleted421268]

For you college guys, how do you make time for friends and socializing with all the work you are given in college??? When do you usually make time to hang with friends or go out at night??? How effective have u been in balancing a social life with academics in college??

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[SnowyRox]

Make a list of everything you need to do that day before you can go hang out with friends. The evening is the most popular time to go out, so spending the day in the library beforehand will let you go out guilt-free. You can even do this on Friday nights during busy weeks. Parties won't start until 9 pm or later, so knock out work asap.

Aka DON'T PROCRASTINATE. Then you'll be fine :-D

Don't drink so much that you're hungover the next day or do anything illegal.

 

[EvenStevens]

I guess it might have to do with when you have your classes, like having morning class would let you sleep more afterwards, wake up do homework study and then go out

 

[iforget2]

Use google calender. No really. When you plan out what you need to do hour by hour you'll feel like you will have alot of control over your time, which includes studying, sleep and social life. Studying actually doesn't take too much of your time so social life and studying isn't that big of a problem. As long as you don't waste time on facebook or youtube you should be fine

 

[Fluidity of Movement]

For you college guys, how do you make time for friends and socializing with all the work you are given in college??? When do you usually make time to hang with friends or go out at night??? How effective have u been in balancing a social life with academics in college??

Not trying to freak you out, but you may need to have an outlook change about what you really want with your life. When I decided to quit my job and start a health career it was very tumultuous when speaking with family members about it.

Depending on how well you can handle courseload, volunteer work, and any other responsibilities, you might have to cut time doing things you enjoy personally. It was very hard for me when I told my friends we could no longer go out weekly for drinks or have lunch a few times a week. I had to quit my sports team as well.

These are the types of sacrifices many people have to face to be able to get the grades and funding needed to pursue this career. Sometimes sacrifices have to be made, that is a very important life lesson. I feel being a doctor is more about community service than self gain. If you agree with that statement, then the sooner you start understanding that on a personal level you might have more ease with some of the decisions you might be making, and hopefully find some peace should you decide to devote extra time to your studies.

Of course having friends and family is extremely important. You have to schedule time and make appointments, or settle for phone calls or social websites.

Right now I'm seeing my friends about once a month 🙁 Texting has been a real life saver for my depression levels.

Trying to find a balance is good, but sometimes impossible. Resilience and strength are key to making it through the tough times when there is none.

 

[peNs]

You don't. If you have a well balanced school and social life, you're probably not spending enough time on school.

 

[BB8730]

I disagree with the "social life is not important" idea. I think having a social life is very important for staying a well-balanced person. Not only that, but I met the love of my life, my wife, because I had a social life. Finding her was a greater accomplishment than anything academic I've ever done. Believe it or not, there's more to life than pre-medicine.

That having been said, it's definitely possible to have a social life and still do well on your pre-med track. One of the biggest tips I have is to find activities where you can multitask and get several things done at once. I volunteer as an EMT for a small-town ambulance service. I work 12 or 24 hour shifts and we average about 2 calls per day. That leaves me with tons of time to do homework or study. Find places to volunteer (or work) where you can get some studying in. Another tip, as others have said, is to make time for your social life. Plan on getting all of your homework and studying done by a certain time in the day. I try to get all my stuff done by 6-7:00 PM, so I have a few hours to hang out with my wife or go grab a drink with friends. If you work hard and don't procrastinate, you should have plenty of time to get some ECs, get good grades, and still have a social life.

I racked up 11,000 hours of ECs in 5 years while getting moderate to perfect grades (perfect more recently) and still had a social life. Trust me, there's no need to sacrifice it.

 

[BigPizza]

No social life. No girls either.

You get used to it after a while.

No social life doesn't meant you should not have communication skills with patients.

 

[AntiHouseMD]

You need a social life. If you can't balance doing well in school and actually having a life in college, when will you ever have a life? In high school, I only worked and studied. I still regret it, because I really didn't have the full high school experience. You will probably need to study most of the time, but you'll burn out pretty quickly if you study all the time. Just make sure you take care of business in class. If you do that, you don't need to follow the pre-med stereotype of spending every hour in class, studying, or sleeping. You'll miss out on important things if you focus solely on academics. (Disclaimer: this is coming from a college freshman).

 

[PhilliesPhan]

I'm wondering how I'm going to balance the two when I graduate and go to college next year. All of the schools I want to go to (Penn State, UDel, UMD, Temple, UConn) are hard core party schools, and there's going to be a lot of parties happening while I might possibly be confined to a dorm or library studing 🙁 I want to party, but I want to keep my GPA around a 3.6. I guess I'm just going to have to learn how to prioritize things once I get to college or else no med school for me

 

[I'm No Superman]

You'd have more time to have a social life if you didn't waste it all adding those unnecessary punctuation marks.

 

[I'm No Superman]

There is no generalizable experience.

I do most of my socializing on the weekends and have plenty of time for it. A big difference is that on week nights, a lot of my friends are free to do this or that, while I am usually doing an activity or studying. Also, you become friends with the people you are in activities with.

Finally, I make time by not using 3 question marks.

Damn, you can do all of that while balancing presidency and death?

I'm impressed.