Uni­ver­si­ty stress — Do mind­ful­ness and med­i­ta­tion help? A self-experiment

I’m stressed. That’s prob­a­bly what many stu­dents say about them­selves, but when, after four online lec­tures, I still have a 40-page text for the next day’s sem­i­nar and the prepa­ra­tion of a pre­sen­ta­tion wait­ing for me, it some­times feels like I’m the only one who’s in over my head. What does­n’t help at all against stress is that I don’t real­ly know any of my fel­low stu­dents per­son­al­ly and there­fore I can hard­ly talk about work­load, over­load and tasks. So for the past eight months, I’ve been sit­ting alone at my desk, ask­ing myself ques­tions in my stu­dent home office like: Should I under­stand this? Does it have to take this long? Can I still man­age this? Why is every­one else so much more pro­duc­tive than me? Sleep­ing or read­ing on? The days blur into one anoth­er and I feel like I just keep going and going with­out real­iz­ing how I’m real­ly doing.

For some years now, there has been a kind of mind­ful­ness boom in the media. Peo­ple swear by med­i­ta­tion, yoga and jour­nal­ing, and say that morn­ing rit­u­als help against every­day blues. But what is mind­ful­ness, real­ly? Accord­ing to the Ger­man Cen­ter of Excel­lence for Mind­ful­ness (DFME) is a spe­cial form of atten­tion, a clear state of con­scious­ness that allows one to reg­is­ter present stim­uli with­out judg­ment. For me, mind­ful­ness has a lot to do with lis­ten­ing to myself, my body, my thoughts and sen­sa­tions, reg­is­ter­ing my emo­tion­al as well as exter­nal expe­ri­ences. This hope­ful­ly leads to clar­i­ty about how I feel, my cur­rent sit­u­a­tion, and how I want to behave towards myself and oth­ers on a dai­ly basis.

When I type the term into my favorite source of inspi­ra­tion — Pin­ter­est — it does­n’t take long for mind­ful­ness to pop up in con­nec­tion with stress reduc­tion. Maybe mind­ful­ness can help me with my uni stress too? How do I man­age to go through my life more mind­ful­ly? After some research, it’s clear to me: you don’t become mind­ful just like that. You need exer­cis­es, which are for­tu­nate­ly avail­able on the Inter­net. On YouTube, I find yoga exer­cis­es designed to bring me into har­mo­ny with my body, Insta­gram is full of users doc­u­ment­ing their jour­ney to more mind­ful­ness, and even on Tik­Tok I find videos show­ing how peo­ple expe­ri­ence a glow-up because they prac­tice mind­ful­ness. Med­i­ta­tion is always a big theme, but breath­ing exer­cis­es and active self-reflec­tion also seem to play a role. Since I’ve been doing vinyasa yoga for a few years, I know med­i­ta­tion from the final relax­ation. How­ev­er, I have nev­er dealt with it in more detail. Here comes the Med­i­ta­tion and Mind­ful­ness Online Course the Tech­niker Krankenkasse (TK) comes into play. The ten-part coach­ing pro­gram, which is free of charge, aims to devel­op the par­tic­i­pants’ mind­ful­ness skills bit by bit until they become a nat­ur­al part of their every­day lives. Actu­al­ly, you’re sup­posed to take a week for each sec­tion. For the pur­pose of this arti­cle, I’m try­ing to test the course a lit­tle more quick­ly. In doing so, I’m look­ing at how what I’m learn­ing is affect­ing my life and espe­cial­ly my stress in the con­text of college.

You want to know how the self-test turns out? Then read the com­plete article:

Learn­ing out­doors — how to be pro­duc­tive in the sun

Sum­mer is here — and instead of sit­ting in your stuffy shared room, you’re drawn to the coun­try­side? Learn­ing out­side in the fresh air and sun­shine is def­i­nite­ly pos­si­ble. How­ev­er, there are a few things you should keep in mind to be real­ly pro­duc­tive there. Here are five tips for study­ing in the sun.

Find a shady place
Although it may seem tempt­ing to soak up as many of the sun’s rays as pos­si­ble, don’t sit in the blaz­ing sun. Instead, find a place in par­tial shade. Espe­cial­ly if you have your lap­top or tablet with you, you won’t be annoyed by the con­stant reflec­tions. Still, don’t for­get to put on sun­screen before study­ing so you don’t get sun­burned, and pack a pair of sunglasses.

Take the appro­pri­ate task with you
Not all col­lege assign­ments are so easy to take out­side. If you need eight dif­fer­ent books to write your essay, you don’t nec­es­sar­i­ly want to lug them all to the park. If you have your own gar­den or bal­cony, that might be dif­fer­ent. Read­ing assign­ments, sum­maries, or writ­ing index cards, for exam­ple, are espe­cial­ly good for work­ing in the sun.

Keep a to-do list
Since you may not be able or will­ing to take all your doc­u­ments or lap­top with you, you should def­i­nite­ly keep a to-do list while study­ing out­doors. That way, you won’t for­get to catch up on the miss­ing steps lat­er. You can also jot down new ideas or ques­tions imme­di­ate­ly and research them lat­er at your desk.

Do not for­get the pro­vi­sions
Since you won’t be a short dis­tance from the fridge as usu­al, you should plan ahead: Be sure to take enough water with you and remem­ber a snack. You can then for­ti­fy your­self dur­ing your well-deserved break.

Keep an eye on the time
If it gets too cozy on the pic­nic blan­ket, it’s easy to for­get that you actu­al­ly went out­side to work. Always keep an eye on the time and divide the learn­ing steps. You can also set your­self a spe­cif­ic dead­line like “when I fin­ish read­ing chap­ter XY, I’ll close the book and can relax”. This way you won’t lose sight of your learn­ing goals and can enjoy the good weath­er with­out a guilty conscience.

Why we need sleep

We sleep through about a third of our lives. But why do we sleep at all? It’s sim­ple: Many phys­i­cal process­es only take place dur­ing sleep. For exam­ple, the body has a stronger immune defense at night.

“It is clear that sleep, as we sub­jec­tive­ly expe­ri­ence it, serves the pur­pose of recov­ery,” says sleep researcher Prof. Dr. Dieter Rie­mann. This is pos­si­bly relat­ed above all to the amount of deep sleep an organ­ism gets dur­ing the night.

Refu­el the immune sys­tem while you sleep

Metab­o­lism and cir­cu­la­tion behave dif­fer­ent­ly dur­ing sleep than when awake. This is impor­tant for health, because the body has a stronger defense against viral and bac­te­r­i­al infec­tions dur­ing sleep. Con­verse­ly, if the deep sleep phase is sup­pressed, this can sig­nif­i­cant­ly impair the immune system’s abil­i­ty to func­tion. “Find­ings from exper­i­men­tal research show that it is pre­cise­ly dur­ing the deep sleep phase that impor­tant process­es take place that reg­u­late the immune sys­tem,” says Prof. Dr. Riemann.

The phas­es of sleep

Sleep is not a steady state. After falling asleep, sleep becomes increas­ing­ly deep­er: from the wak­ing state, one slips into so-called NONREM sleep. This is divid­ed into four stages depend­ing on the depth of sleep.

From the light, super­fi­cial sleep of stages 1 and 2, one glides swift­ly into the deep sleep of stages 3 and 4. This deep sleep is impor­tant for the regen­er­a­tion of the entire body, espe­cial­ly the brain.

After a while, sleep becomes lighter, and after about 90 min­utes, the fifth sleep phase, known as the rapid eye move­ment (REM) phase, sets in. As the name sug­gests, in this phase the eyes move very quick­ly and the brain is just as active as when awake. In the REM phase, peo­ple dream par­tic­u­lar­ly vivid­ly and process the impres­sions of the day in these dreams. The REM phase thus serves more for men­tal recovery.

Need tips on how to sleep prop­er­ly or want to learn more about sleep stages and sleep cycles? Then read the full article:

Why sleep­ing is bet­ter than going through

Learn­ing while sleeping

To sleep suf­fi­cient­ly and wake up well rest­ed — that is the ide­al case. Some­times that does­n’t work. But in exam phas­es or when you’ve real­ly learned and read a lot, you should def­i­nite­ly make sure you get a good night’s sleep. Because: Dur­ing sleep, your brain process­es what you have expe­ri­enced and learned dur­ing the day. This helps you to con­sol­i­date your knowl­edge overnight. If you don’t even get into a deep sleep phase, your mem­o­ry and your per­for­mance suf­fer. You are exhaust­ed, irri­ta­ble — and you get sick more often. You also find it dif­fi­cult to con­cen­trate. Your abil­i­ty to react also decreas­es if your brain can­not recov­er suf­fi­cient­ly dur­ing the night. Lack of sleep can even lead to high blood pres­sure, anx­i­ety dis­or­ders and an increased risk of diabetes.

The worst disruptors

There are, of course, var­i­ous rea­sons why we some­times don’t sleep well. The most impor­tant four sleep rob­bers are these:

  • Num­ber 1: Your cell phone
    The uni­ver­si­ty day is tur­bu­lent and you always try to be up to date. Nev­er­the­less, you should stop look­ing at your cell phone before going to bed. The blue light from the screen pre­vents the pro­duc­tion of the sleep hor­mone mela­tonin, which makes us tired. In gen­er­al, it’s a good idea to ban the cell phone from the bedroom.
  • Num­ber 2: Pres­sure to per­form
    Oha, tomor­row is already my paper? Then put on some cof­fee and pull an all-nighter at your desk. Not a good idea — you’ll learn bet­ter and think more clear­ly if you’re not con­stant­ly dri­ving on the rim. And you often feel the after­shocks of an all-nighter days lat­er. So bet­ter get a few hours of sleep and then go on with a fresh head.
  • Num­ber 3: The thought carousel
    New sur­round­ings, new peo­ple, new life. No won­der you feel a lit­tle queasy and wor­ry if you can han­dle every­thing. And all of these thoughts keep you from sheep­ing. But you can learn to switch off inter­nal­ly: auto­genic train­ing or med­i­ta­tions to fall asleep help.
  • Num­ber 4: The alco­hol
    Par­ty­ing is to study­ing as ton­ic is to gin. How­ev­er, you should avoid alco­hol, cig­a­rettes and cof­fee before going to bed. They affect and short­en REM sleep, the phase in which you dream. Less REM sleep in turn leads to dif­fi­cul­ties with con­cen­tra­tion, mem­o­ry and motor skills.

You want to know how oth­ers sleep or how you can dream bet­ter? Then read the com­plete article:

How much sleep does a per­son need?

Peo­ple spend about a third of their lives “asleep. You notice how nec­es­sary sleep is when you lack it. You can hard­ly con­cen­trate because you’re so tired. But how much sleep do you need exact­ly?

The longer the sleep depri­va­tion lasts, the more extreme the con­se­quences. The brain per­ceives visions, shad­ows and sounds that do not exist. The indi­vid­ual need for sleep depends large­ly on hered­i­tary fac­tors. There are peo­ple who get by on five hours of sleep, while oth­ers need ten hours to feel well rested.

Sleep researchers have found that peo­ple in West­ern coun­tries sleep on aver­age about an hour less than they did 20 years ago. They were also able to show: Peo­ple who sleep too lit­tle per­form less dur­ing the day — and often don’t even notice it. Because you can get used to too lit­tle sleep. This leads to a para­dox­i­cal phe­nom­e­non: the more peo­ple work, the less they sleep. The longer the work­ing hours, the more fre­quent are sleep dis­or­ders, ana­lyzed the sci­en­tists of the Fed­er­al Insti­tute for Occu­pa­tion­al Safe­ty and Health. But only those who are well-rest­ed per­form at their best.1

Won­der­ing how to know your sleep needs and if miss­ing sleep can be made up? Then read the full article:

Sleep bet­ter when it’s hot

Of course we are hap­py about nice weath­er in sum­mer — just not at night, when the warm and stuffy air keeps us awake. Here’s what you can do to get a good night’s sleep even when tem­per­a­tures are high.

Too warm cli­mate in the bed­room is usu­al­ly the result of too much sun­light dur­ing the day. There­fore, the first rule is to keep the sun and warm air out­side. Air the bed­room with cool morn­ing air ear­ly in the morn­ing and keep the win­dows closed for the rest of the day.

Keep shut­ters and blinds down. Once the sun’s rays have found their way into the room through the win­dow, the clas­sic green­house effect kicks in — the heat radi­a­tion can­not escape the room through the glass. The result: the room heats up.
How­ev­er, those who live in the attic should leave a win­dow slight­ly open so that hot air can escape.

If it cools down to more pleas­ant tem­per­a­tures at night, open the win­dows. But be care­ful: pre­vent drafts, which can cause a stiff neck, for exam­ple.1

You want to know what else you should con­sid­er to sleep bet­ter on hot days? Then read the com­plete article:

How do I inte­grate 10,000 steps into my every­day life?

Han­na Kun­st has been study­ing cul­tur­al sci­ences in Lüneb­urg since 2020. For Point­er, Han­na writes about lifestyle top­ics and con­ducts inter­views as a reporter. She is curi­ous, young, moti­vat­ed and opti­mistic and wants to know if she can man­age to walk 10,000 steps every day. This num­ber reg­u­lar­ly pops up in her social media feeds as a goal for chal­lenges, which is why she goes by it.

A fit lifestyle with a bal­anced diet and plen­ty of exer­cise is con­sid­ered ide­al in our soci­ety. How­ev­er, active­ly man­ag­ing every­day life dur­ing the Coro­na pan­dem­ic is not that easy. As a stu­dent who works part-time from my home office, I spend about nine hours a day at my desk. Plus eight hours of sleep leaves me only sev­en hours a day for oth­er activ­i­ties. On top of that, I have my inner pig, which tells me how com­fort­able it is in my bed and how lit­tle I want to exert myself.

It does­n’t always have to be an intense work­out. Walk­ing is a good start to get the body going.

Walk­ing not only builds endurance, agili­ty and coor­di­na­tion. Walk­ing also improves heart health, low­ers blood pres­sure and reg­u­lates the pulse. The con­se­quences of lack of exer­cise, on the oth­er hand, can be fatal. Reg­u­lar exer­cise is espe­cial­ly impor­tant for the body and psy­che dur­ing the coro­na peri­od. A team of psy­chol­o­gists from Giessen and Rot­ter­dam came to this con­clu­sion in a study. In the first Lock­down the sci­en­tists deter­mined that an active orga­ni­za­tion of the day helps against stress and emo­tion­al exhaus­tion. Walks, for exam­ple, are a suit­able rem­e­dy.1

You want to know if and how Han­na man­aged to inte­grate 10,000 steps into her every­day life? Then read the com­plete article: