What makes college life so difficult is that many major issues must be faced and handled constantly. These include anxiety, depression, homesickness, and low self-esteem. Collectively, such issues could be perceived into one: emotional problem.
For this discussion, let’s have a focus on the loneliness that male college students feel, and how they could transcend into health problems. Emotional downturns are among the most common factors that make even the smartest men or women fail, reason that it should be dealt with… with utmost seriousness.
Gender biases and discrimination
This is one contributing factor to the common emotional problems among college students. Although gender sensitivity is addressed in the curriculum of most universities, problems surrounding the issues still exist. Take for instance the findings of a certain study in a school at San Jose California.
In a set of nearly 30 semesters, 19 more student were female leaders and 10 were male. Of course, such a statistics took place in just one school, but such a trend is also evident in other educational institutions.
Many teachers believed female students to be more organized and more trustworthy than their male counterparts. This speaks about females being more aggressive in taking leadership positions than men.
Although men can be great leaders as what’s proven by US politics in which males were more likely to win than females, the fact that most college clubs were ruled by women really poses some serious issues within the gender problem domain.
In effect, this could lead to hesitations on the part of young men in taking charge, or when they are assigned to lead groupings whether big or small. They might think that since most of them are taken as a social class that can’t be as good as female leaders, they could be shaped into thinking that college professors and faculty members would not totally trust them the way they would trust those women college students.
A study about college life states that when students move to universities, sometimes abroad, they are not only separated from close relationships, but also from established social networks and support systems. They are physically far from their parents and siblings, and they could be in danger of falling down to a pit of intense loneliness and depression.
The friendship-gaining problem
There is also the issue of gaining new friends. Since a student entering a university is often one that’s immersed in culture that’s totally alien to him, finding the right pal, buddy, or whatever term is applicable could be very hard to conduct.
It is estimated that approximately 41% of school friendships become more distant during the first semester of university life. Although excitement is one of the most noticeable reactions of anyone going to college, such a feeling could be easily killed once a student sees that his kind is not really welcome into a certain social group.
In effect, that student could end up a loner, aloof from people, distant to the real joys of collegehood. As such, loneliness is still a serious problem that needs to be handled.
Nightlife and partying temptations
The temptations that lurk around every corner of college institutions also contribute to the already difficult life of a student. Instead of focusing on studying and working on academic paperworks, a student may end up spending time with friends uselessly.
Partying and nightlife invitations can be enough to ruin a good student’s focus. And because this leads to situations in which the student will have difficulties in keeping up with school work, more problems emerge: lack of sleep, unhappiness, depression, and poor physical health.
Dealing with the problem
The simplicity of the solutions to his problems is almost a no-brainer – it can be done by anyone without much of a great expense. In order for any young man to overcome the ill-effects of emotional downturns, he may just:
Establish new friendships wisely – College institutions are replete with interesting characters. New lifelong companions could just be sitting nearby. Sure, racist people are certainly existent to marginalize those who are easy to look down into, but there are also lots of genuine people out there – the kind who don’t really care where you come from, or where your cultural upbringing springs from.
A wise student knows how to pick his friends well. On this regard, he must take into account a quote from the Bible, “Bad company corrupts good character.” By absorbing this, we must then make it a move to choose our friends carefully. If you classify yourself as mentally slow, then pick a friend who is fast and swift with that.
Once you learn to adapt their studying habits, you can be somehow as smart as them. Speaking of adapting...
Adapt to the moment – A new situation is at hand and needs to faced. A student must choose to face it courageously or he may lose terribly. College is tough, but it can only get tougher if one doesn’t choose to adapt strategically.
What’s the latest study patterns used by the successful students? What are the activities participated by the dean’s listers? You should highly ponder upon those questions. Once you already did that, you will just automatically find out that you are already on the path of winning the difficult game of career-establishing.
Get physical – A good health is a young man’s strongest weapon. To maintain it, he must involve himself in sports or any other activities that nurture his physiology. If you’re not too tall to make it to the basketball team, how about joining the baseball team?
Or how about getting into wrestling or martial arts? There’s got to be a club about it somewhere in campus. Or if you’re just not lucky enough to get into those, why not conduct your own set of physical tasks every other day or so? Jogging, swimming or hiking, would be good choices to work on.
Of course, the above-mentioned remedies are easier said than done. But in the tough undertakings of college life, survival is way too important. It is up to the young man to tap into the simple solutions, or choose to ignore them and face unbearable consequences. College life is not always a walk in the park.
Challenges and hardships seem to be a default attachment to a student’s shadow the moment he decides to embark on the final stage of his education.
Becoming a successful career person has a steep price, and the difficulties of college life is a huge portion of that pricey payment.
