From Stressing to Destressing: The Importance of Including Self Care into Your Busy Routine
By Brenda Perez
Fall 2025
It’s another day in the life of a college student. You're moving from class to class, working on so many different assignments, and poof! the day is gone. If you’re feeling overwhelmed by all the responsibilities, know that you’re not alone. College is an exciting new chapter, but it brings lifestyle changes and responsibilities that hit you out of nowhere, making it difficult to even take care of yourself. But, it’s super important that students don’t neglect their self care.
This guide will show you how to include self care into your busy routine and emphasize why it shouldn’t be put on the back burner during our college experience. For me, self care has been a journey. Social media tips, like buying yourself treats or having a day for yourself, weren’t realistic and didn’t help me in the long run. Prioritizing self care was incredibly difficult for me, especially since I’m so focused on doing well in school at the cost of everything else. So, this guide will also help in how to include small self care habits into your life.
What is Self Care?
So what exactly is self care? According to the World Health Organization, self care is “the ability of individuals, families, and communities to promote health, prevent disease, maintain health, and cope with illness and disability with or without the support of a health worker.” This is a broad definition, and according to Christina Graffagna, a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor at Grow Wellness Group in Naperville, self care essentially comes down to taking care of yourself and meeting your basic needs such as
● Good sleep hygiene
● Eating 3 meals a day
● Exercising
● Social interaction
“All of those different aspects of life, that is what self care is” she says, “what is your day to day routine that creates the foundation of wellness.” Additionally, Graffagna says that we have to be able to know that this is different from coping skills because that is doing activities that make us feel good in the moment. Whereas self care focuses on the day to day activities we do to take care of ourselves. This makes self care a sustainable practice that will help us in the long run with consistent habits.
Why Should Students Care About Self Care?
As college students, we need to understand that self care is incredibly important to learn and prioritize. An important reason for doing this is because in college, we are met with many new challenges such as managing
● New responsibilities
● Extracurriculars, sports, jobs
● Heavier and harder workloads
● Relationships
All of this can be super overwhelming to handle, and we can end up spiraling from having to deal with everything in our life. If we’re spiraling, it becomes harder to function and at the end of the day, prevents us from enjoying our college experience.
The reality is that these challenges and more will follow us as we enter our post grad life. According to Dr. Rose Vassell, a counseling psychologist and licensed mental health counselor and professor and Director of Counseling and Wellness at Palm Beach Atlantic University in Florida, says, “You have to take care of yourself. Nobody else is going to do it for you.” She further explains how the world can’t stop for us so learning to care for yourself must be a priority in order to keep up. So, building self care habits now will help us have a strong foundation of beneficial habits that will help us manage everything now and in our futures.
The Benefits of Self Care
Now that we’re aware that we don’t want to just crash and burn and dreadfully go through our college experience, what are some benefits from practicing self care? Here are some ways you can take care of yourself and the benefits of doing so:
Social Connection Reduces Health factors
In a study done by Julianne Holt-Lunstad in Brigham Young University in Utah, having social connection protects us from the effects of loneliness and other physical and mental health conditions. It can protect us from heart attacks, depression, and anxiety. Not having social connection can actually be worse than physical inactivity and obesity.
Getting Enough Sleep has Health Benefits
According to the CDC, getting enough sleep helps with reduced sickness and stress and improves mood, attention, and memory. As college students, we should aim for at least 7 hours or more of sleep at night.
Physical Activity Improves our Health
According to the CDC, regular exercise is good for our health, but it’s even good for our brain health. It helps with our memory, sleep, thinking and problem solving skills, and reduces anxiety and depression along with cognitive decline.
Including self care into your routine is especially important for those reasons. There’s so many benefits to taking care of yourself and it will even end up helping us perform better in our classes. Taking care of ourselves through these ways will help us function through our college routine.
There’s so many benefits to taking care of yourself and it will even end up helping us perform better in our classes. Taking care of ourselves through these ways will help us function through our college routine.
Why Don’t Students Practice Self Care?
Since self care does have a variety of benefits for us, why do we struggle to actually do it? Here are some common reasons as to why students struggle with self care.
Difficulties in Adapting to College Life
Both Dr. Vassell and Graffagna say that many students have a hard time adjusting to the new expectations of college. Graffagna says, “With college students, especially college freshmen, that transition to independence is really difficult and really does require a lot of self care practice and routine that a lot of times it seems that young adults don’t expect fully.” As you’re trying to adjust to college life, self care ends up being put at the bottom of the priorities list. This was the case with Gisselle Palma, a Senior at North Central College. “If I have time, I’ll do it” she says, “it’s not a waste of time, but … it’s not my priority. Then I’m not gonna do it.”
Poor Time Management
One of the biggest challenges to overcome is time management, and it can easily be thrown out the window as students get more overwhelmed with classes. Dr. Vassell says, “[students] have to be rushing, rushing all the time to the neglect of self care.” She further explains that while students can realize self care is important, they don’t have time to actually do it. It makes sense that if your schedule is so packed and you’re struggling to keep up, the last thing you have time to think about is self care.
Procrastination
Procrastination is also huge with students. In the National College Health Assessment done by the American College Health Association, they found that 48.8% of students surveyed listed procrastination as a factor impacting their academic performance. Since students are not using their time to the fullest, students get even more backtracked on their work. This is a domino effect which leads to self care being put to the side.
Academic Stressors
Researchers from Rutgers New Jersey Medical School and The College of New Jersey find that students who have higher academic stress levels experience worse mental well being. Having so much on your plate academically is overwhelming, and self care gets put aside when we try to keep up with everything. But when we neglect self care, it makes our mental well-being worse. This cycle continues and it can be extremely exhausting.
The Stigma of Reaching Out for Help
In a study done by researchers from the University of London, they find that self stigma in asking for help was a significant factor in students not accessing support. This fear makes it harder for students to prioritize their self care needs. If there’s this belief that asking for help is shameful, then helping yourself is not taken seriously.
How to Overcome Your Obstacles to Self Care
It’s easy to put self care on the backburner, whether due to the stigma of asking for help or struggling to act on what is good for us. Even with myself, I know that I should do xyz to feel better, but I sometimes struggle to actually do it. Finding that initial push for self care is often easier said than done. But, we should do our best to challenge that thinking. Here are two helpful thoughts to keep in mind.
Don’t Fear what Others Might Think
While students might believe that people will look down on someone who has received mental health treatment, most students don’t believe this. According to The Healthy Minds Network 2023-2024 study, only 7% of students would think less of someone who has received mental health treatment. It can be hard to overcome the fear of what others think, but most students aren’t judging you for having professional support.
Proactivity Starts with You
Asking for help and practicing self care is challenging, but we’re the ones who have to take that step. Support exists, but we have to do the steps, no matter how small. “There are many ways and resources ... to take care of yourself,” Dr. Vassell explains, “and we must be proactive in ensuring that we are doing our best to seek out ways where we can manage ourselves better.” She compares it to driving a car: “I am the passenger, you’re the driver. You don’t turn the key and start the car and press the gas, then we’re going nowhere.” We have many tools, but we must be the ones to apply them. Palma keeps this mind and also thinks about her future self. “How is my future self going to feel if I don’t do this,” she says. Focusing on the long term outcomes can give us the motivation to be proactive.
Self Care Tips to Include in Your Busy Routine
We can understand the importance of self care, but it can still be challenging to fit in our busy schedule. So what can we do? Dr. Vassell explains that self care is personal, so many different activities can count depending on what supports your needs and makes you feel good about yourself. However, there are still helpful places to start, and so here are some tips from Dr. Vassell, Graffagna, Palma, and I.
Time Management
Both Graffagna and Dr. Vassell say that a great starting point to ensure that self care is taking place is figuring out how you spend your time each day. From there, timeblocking, which is setting aside doable chunks of time for specific tasks, helps you complete your responsibilities while also making room for self care. “One has to be intentional…when one’s engaging in self care…that it doesn’t infringe on all other things that you’re doing,” Dr. Vassell says. With effective time management, we’ll be balancing our responsibilities and well-being.
Self Care Apps
Researchers at Georgia State University find that using self care apps helps in improving self care habits. There are many self care apps out there for different needs, but I find that apps focused around timeblocking and having overall self care help works best. The app Focus Friend by Hank Green is my go to with timeblocking. Finch: Self Care Pet is helpful in keeping track of self care goals for the day. Both use cute characters and fun customization options that are given when you meet your goals. Palma uses the app Opal to block social media, allowing her to focus on her homework and use that time for a self care activity.
Exercise
As mentioned, physical activity gives us many benefits. Making sure that we at least get some movement throughout our day is important for us to do. I know with myself, it gets a bit hard to get in a solid workout during the harder weeks of school. Rather than just skipping a workout altogether, I aim for at least 10 minutes of exercise, whether that be going on a walk outside or pulling up a 10 minute YouTube exercise video. Getting in at least something each day is much better than nothing at all.
Getting Some Fresh Air
Researchers found that students experiencing nature spaces were able to decrease their negative moods and increase positive moods. This shows that being out in nature or even just finding a place to study with a natural environment can help in improving your mood. With Palma and I, getting that fresh air gives us clarity and helps in destressing. Even when it comes to studying, finding a place where I’m able to be in nature helps me calm down. Getting that dose of nature can be such a positive reset to your mood.
Connecting with Loved Ones
As mentioned from the previous study, social connection is an important way to take care of yourself. Surrounding yourself with loved ones can give you a support system. Palma says, “I think that’s a good point of self care too, being able to just step away from all the stress that you’re going through, life in general, and being with people that you love, and … reciprocate that good energy back to you too.” Having this support system helps us move forward.
What do I do if I Struggle with Maintaining Self Care?
In a perfect world, we would be able to follow through with self care and practice it everyday. Unfortunately, life happens and we are not machines. We won’t always be perfect in taking care of ourselves and that’s okay. If you find yourself struggling to be consistent with self care, here are 2 pieces of advice to keep in mind.
Have S.M.A.R.T. Goals
We can be really ambitious and want to immediately hit all our goals perfectly or do a complete 180 with our bad habits. But this is not realistic. So, both Graffagna and Dr. Vassell say it's important to set specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time bound goals. This will help us in keeping realistic goals. Graffagna also says that it’s important to have “that expectation that you are going to have to adjust.” Life is constantly changing so we have to adapt to it.
Have Self Compassion
It can be easy to be disappointed at how small our self care goals may be, but “acceptance of your own capacity” is important to recognize, says Graffagna. We can’t expect ourselves to be put together immediately. She also says, “Do the things that move you toward where you would like to be, even if that’s not perfection, it’s moving in the right direction.” We have to recognize that these small acts are a win and are getting us closer to the better version of ourselves. Sometimes 10-15 minute breaks during the day is all we can do, and that is okay. Even with Palma and I, this is enough for us to keep going. Graffagna does emphasize that if you find yourself struggling a lot on your own and more one-on-one help is needed, getting professional help should be the next step.
Final Self Care Remarks
Self care can still be a challenge, but I now recognize that self care means making sure that my basic needs are being met in order to have overall wellness. Even small acts, whether that be doing 10 minutes of exercise or connecting with my friends, is enough of a win for me. These small acts are important in order for us to be in a state where we’re able to function through our college life and beyond. It can be easier said than done to master self care or even get started with it, but there are many ways for us to intentionally fit self care into our busy schedules. We just have to learn to be kind to ourselves on our self care journey as we learn to juggle all our responsibilities. Here is a quote from Graffagna to remember: “It is always worth it to take the time to take care of yourself. Even if it’s small, even if it feels insignificant, it is always worth it.”
Brenda Perez is a Junior at North Central College majoring in Marketing with a minor in Graphic Design. She is a first-generation student and is learning to navigate the different responsibilities that college life requires. Because of this, she has realized how important self care is for her well-being, no matter how small or different it now is for her. Brenda hopes to combine her creativity and marketing knowledge in her future career and use her digital art and design skills to make meaningful work. In her free time, she loves to exercise and develop her artistic abilities with drawing and handmade crafts.