As we were of­ten told the week­end pri­or to the be­gin­ning of the Christ­mas term, “free pa­per bun.” No more wak­ing up late whether you were on va­ca­tion or sim­ply steal­ing an ex­tra half hour since there would be min­i­mal traf­fic or stay­ing up late (not for so­cial ac­tiv­i­ties any­way).That’s it folks, JA­Va (Ju­ly-Au­gust Va­ca­tion) has of­fi­cial­ly come to an end and with it sprouts the dawn of a new sea­son.

Mem­o­ries don’t leave like peo­ple do

It’s okay to rem­i­nisce a bit, even if you prac­tice be­ing present. A lil JA­Va means re­liv­ing those mem­o­ries - am I right? Whether it was the care­free days or the event­ful nights, re­call­ing these mem­o­ries help to val­i­date our lives. They al­low us to re­mem­ber peo­ple and things im­por­tant to us and add val­ue to self. This on­ly be­comes an is­sue though, if you re­alise that all you are do­ing is wish­ing it was still Ju­ly or Au­gust in­stead of cel­e­brat­ing what Sep­tem­ber has to of­fer. Af­ter­all, there will nev­er be an­oth­er Sep­tem­ber 2019 so get out of your head and in­to this day.

Set small dai­ly/week­ly in­ten­tions

It’s easy to get caught up in the big­ger pic­ture some­times, not re­al­is­ing the pow­er that lies in crush­ing lit­tle goals each day. It is these tiny things that make up the big ones af­ter all. Per­haps one task com­plet­ed to­day can get you clos­er to ac­com­plish­ing a ma­jor goal on your vi­sion board. For in­stance, wake up five min­utes ear­li­er every day for a week to com­plete a plank chal­lenge. Be­fore you know it a week turns in­to four and just like that you’ve im­proved your fit­ness lev­el.

Use your Sun­day wise­ly

Re­claim­ing your time is cru­cial to giv­ing and liv­ing your best life. The same way in which run­ning apps de­plete our phone bat­ter­ies, the same way all the tabs of your life ex­pend your en­er­gy. It is ide­al to take at least an hour for your­self each day, to do some­thing that ben­e­fits on­ly you. Whether it be star­ing at the ceil­ing or star gaz­ing, read­ing or any form of move­ment - it doesn’t mat­ter what it looks like to oth­ers, once you feel ful­filled and recharged. Sun­day is a day to put that same ac­ton in­to over­drive. Af­ter a long week at work, af­ter all the chores and er­rands on Sat­ur­day, Sun­day should be used to un­wind and al­so to men­tal­ly pre­pare for the up­com­ing week. It is a day that should be bal­anced with re­flec­tion of what is past and a hope­ful look to­ward what is yet to come.

The way I see it, JA­Va is even more fun be­cause of the fol­low­ing months that jux­ta­pose it. We must be able to let loose then re­group. The fi­nal third of the year is some­what like a home­stretch to ac­com­plish goals sought out for the year. There are new things to ex­pe­ri­ence at this time and if all else fails, you can al­ways look for­ward to Christ­mas.