Sometimes in high school, you can get swallowed up in all of the homework and tests. You feel like you do not have enough time to do the other stuff that you love. Like instead of going to the school basketball game, you have to stay at home and finish up your history project. It is easy to forgo the opportunity to participate in school sports because they are so time consuming. Time is a huge issue in high school, especially around finals.
Right now I'm on my school's dance team, which performs at a number of events including at halftime of basketball games. We only practice twice a week so it doesn't take up too much time. However, since basketball season takes place in the winter, most of our performances come around finals time. Then, there are those times when you have to make a tough decision about prioritization— choosing whether to skip practice one day to get in a few extra hours of studying before a chemistry quiz or practice with the dance team (obviously the more enjoyable option).
Colleges seem to expect students to do a ton of extracurricular activities while still maintaining a 4.0 GPA. This expectation is impossible for 99% of students in high school. It is important for me to find a balance between doing what I love to do and making sure I maintain my grades. I do not expect to participate in every single club or sport in school. There just isn't enough time in my lifetime to do that. I have started to learn how to organize my time effectively. However, sometimes I find myself begging for just a few more hours in the day. A 27-hour day would make my life so much easier. Since that will never happen, I have to make sacrifices.
High school is a time of learning who you are. If all I did all day was study, I would learn a lot about books but not very much about myself. That is why it is important for me to try out new activities and discover what I enjoy doing. As a freshman, I tried out for cross country. I had never run a day in my life. It was a lot of hard work and big investment of time, but I enjoyed being in the best shape of my life and meeting new people. I, however, was not a very talented runner, but, at least, I can say I tried it.
I want to make sure that I get the most out of my high school years. I do not want to look back and say that I wish I had played this sport or participated in this club. I want to participate in what I like doing without the stress of not finishing my chemistry lab. Even though I have not found the perfect balance yet, I am pretty certain that I will look back on high school without any regrets.