{"id":388,"date":"2013-11-21T00:16:15","date_gmt":"2013-11-21T00:16:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/reslife\/?p=388"},"modified":"2014-01-27T18:29:18","modified_gmt":"2014-01-27T18:29:18","slug":"embrace-the-breath-marks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/reslife\/2013\/11\/21\/embrace-the-breath-marks\/","title":{"rendered":"Embrace the Breath Marks"},"content":{"rendered":"

Written by James Spaan<\/a>, Resident Director<\/em><\/p>\n

A few days ago, I was talking with my friend who helped start an online company a few years ago.\u00a0 During our conversation, we talked about how he and his co-founder both work essentially 19 hours a day, 7 days a week.\u00a0 I mean if you do the math, they both work more or less 80% of their lives.\u00a0 I asked him what I thought was a normal question, \u201cWhen is your next vacation?\u201d\u00a0 His response startled me a little; \u201cWhat would I do!?\u201d<\/p>\n

After a little discussion around the topic I came to realize that he really hadn\u2019t stopped to relax since he graduated from college.\u00a0 Even in college he was a part of numerous clubs, was double majoring in computer science and business, worked 20 hours a week in his school\u2019s technology services department and somehow managed to travel abroad his junior year.\u00a0 As I was listening to his story, I couldn\u2019t help but admire his dedication, work ethic and accomplishments, while simultaneously I felt tired for him and wondered if he truly had a chance to appreciate his efforts.<\/p>\n

I see this same passion and drive in the students here at Puget Sound.\u00a0 I work with a student who is a student leader, a member of a fraternity, sits on a few committees, is an official for student government, all while working on their academics that are grueling and demanding.\u00a0 I work with another student who is an athlete, taking three sciences courses with labs, sings and works on campus 8-10 hours a week, who hopes to graduate a semester early so they can get an internship that will hopefully translate into a full time position.\u00a0 I could list the profiles of almost every student I have come in contact with here at Puget Sound and they would all be similar; driven, multi-faceted, accomplished.<\/p>\n

However, in my conversations with these students I have also found a common couple of themes.\u00a0 They are tired, feel like they don\u2019t have enough time in the schedule to fit everything and often sacrifice taking care of themselves in order to fit everything in.\u00a0 When I ask these students how they relax I often get a similar response to my friend, \u201cI don\u2019t have time to relax\u201d or \u201cI don\u2019t really know how to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reflecting back on my experiences in life, I started to think about music.\u00a0 As we live our lives out, the moments and experiences that make our existence are the notes that are played.\u00a0 Every time a student goes to practice, class, or work, they are adding another note to their score.\u00a0 However, the most important thing I learned when I was learning to play musical instruments was to embrace the breath marks, don\u2019t rush the moments of silence.\u00a0 They are what make music.<\/i><\/p>\n

In our day to day lives breath marks are moments of rest and they are critical to the beauty and success of our journey, not just because they prevent burn out, but because they make the moments in our lives where we are \u201cdoing\u201d that much more important.\u00a0 Taking the time to care for the self is more than preventing burn out.\u00a0 It gives us time to sit and reflect upon what has been accomplished and where we are headed.<\/p>\n

This week I would encourage you to embrace the breath marks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Written by James Spaan, Resident Director A few days ago, I was talking with my friend who helped start an online company a few years ago.\u00a0 During our conversation, we talked about how he and his co-founder both work essentially … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":254,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,9],"tags":[19],"class_list":["post-388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-5","category-staff","tag-james"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/reslife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/reslife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/reslife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/reslife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/254"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/reslife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=388"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/reslife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":444,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/reslife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388\/revisions\/444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/reslife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/reslife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/reslife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}