There is a feeling that many students get at least once, usually during exam season. It’s the kind of feeling where you just don’t care anymore. Not the lash out, give up kind of don’t care, but more like you close your eyes for a second, hoping to slip into a void, only to open your eyes and be on the ground. But you don’t move. You can’t move because if you move that means you have to go back to work, so you let yourself slip.

It’s kind of like climbing a mountain. It’s pretty easy at first, but the slope keeps getting steeper and your body keeps getting more exhausted that you lose yourself in the haze and step too close to the cliff. Some people land on their feet or find a few tools at the bottom of the chasm. Some people find themselves landed in quicksand, dragging them deeper until eventually, they suffocate.

It chokes you in the night. Through your heavy lids, it keeps you awake, thinking, waiting, planning. You wonder how you can make it all ok again. you wonder how no one else feels like this. You wonder what it felt like again. That’s when it gets you. People say, “Just smile”, “Just work harder”, “Just try.” Do it. Do it. DO IT.     You can’t. 

Many arrive on that day, some don’t make it that far. You look, you stare at that paper with the dry eyes. And you do it. And you feel the release immediately. You leave, calm, collected. Happy? It’ll be ok. You found a rope. You can pull yourself out now.

It’ll be ok.