Finals are upon us again, and with finals comes more stress and responsibilities and less time and energy. During these last few weeks of the semester, it is good to remind ourselves of the importance of self-care.

Sometimes self-care means taking a personal day and sleeping in or sitting on your best friend’s floor eating donuts for dinner.

But sometimes taking care of ourselves looks more like tough love, because self-care and self-indulgence are not the same thing.

Sometimes taking care of yourself means getting up a little early to get some extra studying in, doing laundry because you’ve been wearing the same sweater for three days and going to the grocery store so you can make yourself real food for dinner.

A pamphlet by the University of Kentucky defines self-care as, “any intentional actions you take to care for you physical, mental and emotional healthbr.”https://www.uky.edu/StudentAffairs/VIPCenter/downloads/self care defined.pdf

Self-care isn’t always easy to do; things like exercising and eating balanced meals take extra time and planning. But making time for those things is especially important during finals, when our minds and bodies need all the support we can give them.

The American Psychological Association has done numerous studies on the effect of exercise on mood. Their findings suggest that light to moderate exercise improves mood and energy levels, and can even have long-term effects on things like depression and anxiety. So even if it may sound beneficial to chill out for the evening, 30 minutes of exercise may be even more relaxing and healthy for your bodybr.http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/stress/2013/exercise.aspx

Ultimately, the goal of taking care of ourselves is to be happy, healthy and productive adults, even when that means doing things we’d rather avoid.

Our mental and emotional health is a part of self-care that can be easily overlooked. But learning to set boundaries and say “no” to commitments that we don’t have the time for is important for maintaining mental and emotional stability. Caring for our mental well-being can help with things like test anxiety and difficulties studying.

Sometimes the best thing we can do for our minds is to read our favorite book or watch a movie, but that shouldn’t be the only thing we do.

Professors at Florida State University studied the importance of taking breaks to improve productivity. Their research found that the people who were the most productive tended to work for several uninterrupted 90-minute sessions, with breaks in between sessionsbr.

So caring for ourselves may mean taking some time to read or watch TV, but that should be something we do in between sessions of working or studying. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/opinion/sunday/relax-youll-be-more-productive.html

Self-care sometimes needs to happen over a longer period of time, like practicing good time management and organizational habits to minimize stress during particularly taxing times, like finals week.

Thankfully, on our campus there are multiple ways to learn about and minimize stress.

The Undergraduate Library Blog provides resources to help students during finals week, and keeps you up to date on stress management events (like therapy dogs!).

McKinley also offers services to students to help control stress and care for themselves throughout the year. You can make an individual appointment to speak with a stress-management coordinator, or if you’re pressed for time you can download relaxation exercises from their website. During finals week you can also stop by the center for a stress relief pack, which includes snacks, coupons and tips for managing stress.

Taking advantage of the resources available on campus can be very helpful for reducing stress, but taking care of ourselves can also be as simple as spending some extra time cleaning our apartments or getting a head start on homework or studying.

Between exams, papers and all of our other responsibilities it can be easy to forget to take care of ourselves. This finals week, be sure to make time for self-care, even if you’re tempted to just call it a day and have a donut for dinner.

??Mollie is a graduate student in Art and Design.?

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