Last year, an upperclassman I looked up to went crazy because he overloaded himself. He registered for 20 credits of classes and many clubs. He socialized too much till late at night. He pressured himself to make money, so he worked as a consultant. He started to drink energy drinks and coffee tremendously. He did not sleep for a couple consecutive days. He talked badly with people around him in high school group chat. He livestreams on Instagram, talking nonsense. His grades and his life crashed. As a freshman idolizing him, I am afraid. I ask myself every day every time I encounter opportunities:

 

 “Will this overwhelm my future self?”

 

There are advantages and disadvantages to questioning this. On the bright side, I will know how much I can handle, cut out what’s unnecessary, focus on what is important, and hopefully have a well-balanced life because opportunity comes with responsibility. If one has too much responsibility, one cannot be responsible. To gain experience in a research lab, I must commit at least 10 hours of my week. To participate in club activities, I must commit at least 3 hours of my week. To practice leadership skills as a student representative, I must commit at least 4 hours of my week. The list goes on. My sleep time, my exercise time, and my study time can be diminished. By now, you might think it is a good idea to answer that big question. Why not?  

 

Let’s take me as a counter-example: I worry so much that I have missed many opportunities. I said no to positions, clubs, and events that concerned me. I fear I won’t be able to do my best with each of what I have chosen. I fear becoming like the upperclassman, but I am also scared of missing out on opportunities. I conclude that it is better to answer the question, but I better answer it accurately.

 

So, what information do I need to answer this complicated question? I would say it is like when you want to order a second plate during lunch; I need to know how much space you have left in your stomach and how large the dish is. In this case, the big question can be divided into two: how much more can you handle? And how difficult or time-consuming the work is. If I can answer them accurately, my life will be productive and well-balanced. But if I overestimate or underestimate one of them, I can be either overwhelmed or unproductive. Unfortunately, my ability to handle work and workload is not that easy to answer. 

 

First, let’s consider my limitations. In my opinion, there are three of them: physical, mental, and time limits. We cannot just lift the whole building. We cannot perform as decently as it should be if we don’t want to do it. And of course, we don’t have more than 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Physical limits may be a significant factor for athletes, but I am not, so this does not contribute much. Mental limit is the factor that most people, including myself, overlook. Projects we wanted to do for a long time, but after a month, we don’t want to do it anymore. Sometimes, we join a year-long commitment organization or committee and find out later that their work is different from what we want to do, but we cannot stop because dropping out of work can affect our relationship and reputation; then, we have enough responsibility to do the work but not enough passion to do it more than OK. One solution is to know yourself. This leads to more questions. What do you want to do? What is your ultimate goal? And what are you passionate about? By knowing yourself, you can scope down opportunities you are interested in. Lastly and most importantly, time limit. I agree that we all have the same 24 hours. But I argue that we have different productive hours. This varies depending on time management skills. To know my time limit, the method I used was to open a blank page and list down everything going on in my life, including classes, homework, sleep, exercise, socializing, etc., no matter how nonsense it was. Don’t forget to add extra time for unexpected things. Then, I note how many hours a day or a week I spend on each activity. And see how many hours I have left. This way, I can see my rough estimation of how I spend my time and how many free hours are gone. Now, we know how much space we have left in our stomachs. Let’s see how big the dish is.

 

We need good questions about the activity to check whether it fits our limit. Physical limits can be something like, how does this activity affect our health? How tired will I be after the session? For mental limits, I encourage myself to ask for detailed insight into people doing that activity to ensure this is what I want to do; ask them what their passion is. Why are they doing this? For the time limit, ask for time commitment, what they are expecting from participants, and how many hours past participants use to succeed in this activity. Sometimes, I have no one to ask these questions. In that case, I better investigate and estimate by ourselves.

 

Sadly, even though I do everything, the future is still unpredictable. For example, class is becoming more challenging than expected, and more study time is needed, or teammates do not cooperate, so I have to work harder to compensate. 

 

Because every factor I discussed is uncertain and disorganized, I will never be sure I fit everything perfectly. The best I can do is to make sure I spend my time wisely on what I prioritize. The question is difficult: one question leads to many, and the answer changes all the time. But it cannot hurt to ask, “Will this overwhelm my future self?”