Doing Nothing This Gap Year Has Been Life-Changing
How the Key to Everything Can Be Nothing
“So what are you currently up to during your gap year?”
“Aren’t you, like, ever bored?”
“Ok, but what do you actually do?”
“Wow really? I’d honestly be bored out of my mind.”
People often uttered these borderline patronizing questions upon hearing about my gap year. Of course, curiosity is a part of human nature, and to be frank, I’d probably have asked even more questions had I been in their position. Gap years were hard for me to grasp, let alone understand. Growing up in an environment where external achievements were prided over internal happiness, a year ago, the idea of compromising my health to get closer to another milestone in my achievements was a no-brainer. More importantly, I’d be shocked if you’d tell me that a year later I’d end up here: taking a gap year and spending my time doing absolutely nothing.
The idea of purely existing without the incessant search for productive resume-building activities seems unthinkable in today’s fast-paced digital world. It’s as if you were wasting precious time, letting others get ahead in life. But to let others get ahead in what, exactly? In acquiring internships at top firms, earning a research position at a prestigious university, or being the youngest so and so to graduate with a Ph.D.?
Sure, these are all valid aspirations, and with the financial privilege that I have, it would be tone-deaf for me to say that everyone has all the time in the world and that there is no obligation to set important accomplishments. Because I do acknowledge that for those living paycheck to paycheck, constant hustling to make ends meet is inevitable. And though I cannot speak for those people, I can say that the stressors in their lives are incomparable to the stresses in our lives of ceaselessly building our resumes to be the most highly desirable to top employers at firms in booming markets. This is not to say that our stresses don’t matter though I think that those living paycheck to paycheck wouldn’t have the same mindset of having to “get ahead in life” by mindless working and perpetual guilt of “I'm not doing enough.”
I’d be lying if I told you that I’ve grown out of the toxic productivity loop. But what I can say is that through a series of mental hardships, I’ve learned the crucial importance of simply “being” after a life of “doing.” Before I knew what college admissions were, my first introduction to productivity was from my father and his habit of asking not “how are you today?”, but rather “what knowledge have you pursued today?” Of course, as a parental figure, he probably just wanted to see that I was spending my time valuably and not wasting every minute by mindlessly scrolling through YouTube or whatever a 6-year-old in the late 2000s was doing. But time valuably spent, in my father’s definition, was academic-related, particularly STEM, a field he desperately wanted me to pursue that with great fear, I now have greatly worked to avoid.
As life progressed and school workload increased, alongside the pressure of college admissions, “productivity” took on a different meaning. When countless deadlines were chasing closely behind, every minute felt priceless, as every second was optimized to maximize the number of tasks completed. It was also no longer just academic knowledge but trying to always “do something” that could potentially appeal to admission officers such as community service or some grandiose “passion project” driven not by the passion of the project, but the passion to impress college institutions. Towards my junior year, just a year before applying to college, the guilt of not doing something productive accumulated to the extent that any self-worth I had built would be entirely fruitless had I not landed a place in a prestigious institution. Simply put, a growing fear perpetuated within me the mindset that without the constant guilt that propelled me to engage in productive activities, I would not have enough willpower to achieve anything in life.
With the onset of the pandemic, I graduated early, bypassing exams, and was already granted admission into college. The overworking that ensued was never perceived to be so damaging to my physical or mental health by me, as I’d convinced myself I couldn’t have possibly been overworked had I just achieved a GPA short of a 4.0. Therefore, I was willing to compromise my health little by little just so I can work on something for a little longer or stress about work for a little more. After all, I was doing fine, I wasn’t crippled with very bad anxiety or underslept until health issues arose. The damaging effects of overworking and the toxic productivity attitudes never caught up to me, possibly due to an early end to school that curbed my burnout, delaying it to my first semester of college.
What could only be described as a crippling pain of anxiety and depression during the first two months of college could be attributed to my toxic attitudes and behaviors toward school and learning. Never had I allowed myself to spend time with others, believing a minute not working was a future wasted. Never have I given myself permission to indulge in the joy of learning, hyper-fixating on finishing assignments as fast as humanly possible. And never have I granted myself the freedom to rest or relax due to the rigid expectations I’d bestowed on myself.
My dichotomous mindset led to an inability to find flexibility in my anxiety-ridden routines led to the inevitable breakdown and my return home shortly after. Never would I imagine the consequences of my toxic working patterns would have caught up to me, to a life-changing extent at that. I perceived myself as too weak, ignoring the fact that I’d been treating myself like an industrial machine where any slight deviations from perfection were considered an error that needed to be corrected. When in reality, I am human. And these perceived “errors” or imperfections are simply nuances in human nature that allow us to obtain a deeper understanding of ourselves and our lives.
Having no plans for this unprecedented gap year and no vision for my unpredictable future, I’ve had the time to reflect upon my crippling mental health that led to my decision to return home. Unpacking the trauma of overburdening myself with work, I’ve realized that toxic work habits eventually catch up to you. It is not possible to lead a lifestyle of non-stop running on a hamster wheel, and even if it is, the unhealthy repercussions of a no-rest, fast-paced lifestyle may get you ahead but can become a larger setback in the future. It doesn’t take pushing yourself to the edge of the cliff to realize it, as I did.
Simply by reflecting on your well-being and your life you start to realize the significant costs to the short-term benefits you may reap. The sleepless nights, anxiety-ridden routines, or a joy-deprived lifestyle can all be signs of a quality of life that’s depreciating. But oftentimes, in our overstimulating modern lifestyle, these red flags dissolve into rose-colored lenses that conceal these warning signs with the facade of a high achieving, materialistic success.
By spending my time doing nothing, I’ve realized that nothing really matters at the end of the day without a functioning mental state of mind. What felt like drowning in the deepest pits of depression may have taught me how to swim again. By taking time to acquire a stable mental state of mind, by taking a month-long, year-long, or even several years-long breaks, you will start to realize your true needs for a fulfilling life for yourself. Everyone has unique individual lifestyles but a slow and steady process will inevitably outcompete fast but burned-out haste.
In the end, it’s your call to find what’s best for yourself. Everyone is different as we maintain different lifestyles suited and optimized to our personal preferences, such that some may enjoy working longer hours whilst others may enjoy shorter breaks. But regardless of the differences in our living experiences, one thing that rings true is that growth can be achieved by reflecting upon our unique experiences. By taking time to reflect on past experiences and feelings, anyone can acquire deeper insight and understanding of their life, and can thus forge a clearer and more mature vision of the future moving forward.
We often talk about seeking balance in life. But we struggle to find realistic ways of implementing that balance, claiming we don’t have “enough time,” when in actuality, it may not be the time we fear losing but the progress we believe is at stake with the time that is lost. Resting may seem senselessly easy and often deemed a wasteful use of time with all the other things we could be doing. However, it may take more courage to withstand societal pressures from academic or career obligations and focus on what really matters. And for most of us, to begin to find what matters.
So to answer the questions proposed from the beginning, this gap year, I have finally been living.
Have you had experiences that go against your cultural norm and you would like to share? Let us know in the comments!
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