Stress

Its amazing how in one day, you can go from feeling so relaxed, to feeling like the weight of the world is on your shoulders. Yeah, i know its a cliche metaphore, but that's how it feels. You know. The nagging feeling that makes you sit not quite as straight as you normally would, your head look not quite as high as it normally would, your feet not make it off the floor as you walk. Its that feeling that we truely are vanquishable. Its that little voice in the back of our heads reminding us that we can't do everything we ever wanted. Its the thing that makes us sick and depressed.

School is a major cause of stress. Much like the workplace, it adds on massive amounts of truely unneeded pressure. Teachers can teach all they want, but why must we take tests, do homework and that type of thing. I mean, I can understand the need to teach information, but must we know to spit it back out at the drop of a hat? For years the human race survived off of just remembering the things your mind remembered on its own. So why must it be that we all know the same exact thing? Our knowledge should be what makes us individuals. By the time we graduate from college, we've forgotten everything anyway and instead are filled with the knowlege of our jobs and our personal lives. If you gave any adult an SAT, I can garuntee they won't get above a 1000.

Then on top of the whole school business, there's friends. Our peers, the people we have to spend all day with. the three thousand teenagers we have to share the same rooms, classes, and bathrooms with. We have to listen to all of their gossip, whether we want to or not, and its not like we can ever really get away from them if we don't like them. At least at a job you could escape and hide from someone you don't like. Or in an office you might be lucky enough to have your own personal cubical. A space that you can call your own that you can control. But in school, you get a single square foot of locker space that's barely big enough to hold your books, let alone anything extra you might want to bring with you. The furthest you can get away from someone in your class that you don't like would be the opposite end of the room, but not when there are assigned seats. Oh yeah, you don't even get to choose where you sit for the entire year sometimes. Its that bad!

Then there's work. All the stuff you actually kind of choose to do. Our parents may have forced us to work, or we chose to work to help pay for all of those wonderful car payments and  lovely tanks of gas, but we usually get to choose the workplace in which we are in. Even then, work is never fun. Aside from the actual "work" part, you still have to deal with people, crazy bosses, the creepy guy at register 4, the woman who calls you seventeen times a day to set up a schedule with you, even though you've done your best to settle it all out with her and she doesn't seem to realize that you might actually have a life other than working for her. Its all apart of the working biz, but that doesn't mean its not a pain in the ass.

Then there's parents on top of it all. They tell you to quit being so stressed out, do this, and do that, and while their intentions may be good, they're honestly just making everything worse. You know the conversation. You say you have a ton of homework, but coach kept you at practice till 8 instead of 7 and you had to help Jimmy with his Physics homework. Then mom chimes in with the, well maybe you shouldn't play football, and why didn't you tell Jimmy that you just don't have time to help him today and come strait home? Then when you finally get everything settled out and you find a minute to do nothing, they call you lazy and you should be taking on more responsibilities. Really?

Its all so much, and thats just when hit you on monday. Imagine what the rest of the week holds.