With the majority of my clients working in higher education, I have observed the specific challenges with a university schedule and culture that they need to work through. I hope to offer some tools that can be helpful in navigating your health while working at a university or college:

Action Over Knowledge

Recognize that while knowledge is helpful, our actions (and environment) are what have an impact on our health. For the most part, we already know the fundamentals of what will help us stay healthy and feel good in our bodies. Sure, there are heated arguments on social media about every single aspect of health, but the general consensus is very clear:

Eat lean sources of protein with lots of fruits and vegetables, drink water, move well and often, and get enough rest.

The pursuit of health and wellness is not about finding the next secret insight, or the perfect meal plan and training routine, rather, it's about engaging with what is doable and repeatable for you. Put the knowledge you have into practice with the opportunities, time, and tools you have available.

Our health does not exist in a vacuum or only at the level of our own bodies. Our communal, social, environmental factors and histories matter. Restriction of access, environmental racism, health disparities, discrimination and microaggressions, and other imbalances and abuse of power historically and presently take their toll on bodies. Colleges and universities must attend to these obstacles to health and organizing on campus may be necessary to push institutions to take up this responsibility.

Begin with Rest/Restoration

In focusing on what's doable and repeatable, I always encourage academics to start with rest and restoration. The strange nature of faculty work, which offers a lot of autonomy, often also comes with a sense of having endless responsibilities. The general shift toward a neoliberal style work environment (1), and the extra pressures faced by marginalized communities in academia (2), further increase the level of exhaustion that academics face. So we typically start with rest, through queries like:

How do you enjoy relaxing? How might you weave in even just a small bit of that to your day? What helps you take your mind off of work and how might you do more of that? How can you plan specific rest opportunities during and after the most hectic periods of each academic term?

And we have to make sure that we frame rest as being a part of who we are as humans, rather than just a resource to further our productivity. Tricia Hersey, who has written the manifesto on rest, notes:

“We are resting not to do more and to come back stronger and more productive for a capitalist system. Rest is not a luxury or a privilege… When we finally realize that a long checklist of to-do’s will not replace a deep understanding of our enough-ness, we will start the unlearning and unraveling process. You don’t have to always be creating, doing, and contributing to the world. Your birth grants you rest and leisure as well.” (3)

Then Movement Or Nutrition

It's helpful to add one area. Choose what you are more interested in or have more good energy for pursuing. The academic world is too full of expectations and what you should be doing, so let enjoyment guide your way. Identify one practice to begin with, something simple that is doable, repeatable, and enjoyable.

Take your time with it. Let the practice slowly expand and contract throughout your various responsibilities for the term. The flexibility of your practice will help it stick and feel more seamless with the rest of your life.

Photo by Senning Luk via unsplash.com

Not All or Nothing

When things inevitably get hectic, it's important to remember that your health and your practices supporting your health are not all or nothing. Even a small bit of intentional movement, eating, or rest is better than nothing. Not only do the little pieces add up, but they can also help us feel a touch better in the moment - it's that loosening of the back, that refreshing drink of water, that short walk and breath of fresh air, that moment of refresh helps us make it through. Additionally, doing even the smallest piece of a practice can make it so much easier to dial up a practice when time and energy allows. It keeps the practice fresh and reduces the effort needed to get back in the groove.

Here are some examples of small practices my clients do when things are more than busy:

• Non-Working Lunch - Blocking off 30 minutes for lunch everyday, and not spending that time at their desk/computer, has been a vital practice for many of my clients. While the lunch may be outside, with other people, with a good podcast/audio book, or even just in the office break room, doing something enjoyable and away from their computer and social media is powerfully refreshing.

• Bathroom in Another Building (weather permitting) - Choosing to use a bathroom farther away not only builds little walks into their day, it routinely gets them outside for a breath of fresh air.

• Leftovers for Lunch - By cooking/preparing an extra portion the night before, they bring an easy and tasty lunch that is cheaper and healthier than what they typically find on campus.

• Looking for the pigeons - After noticing a group of pigeons splashing around in a puddle on a particularly stressful day, one professor continues to keep an eye out for pigeons and all other goofy reminders of joy and beauty.

Know your Priority

With the overwhelming amount of looming responsibilities and endless small tasks, it's necessary to know what is your priority. Is this a season when you need to be focused on teaching and mentorship? What stage of research are you in? Do you need to focus on this? Or is it a lull between projects and/or waiting on submission results? How involved in committee work do you need to be during this term?

Of course, it's never one thing, but knowing what is most important can help you intentionally shape your time and energy and reveal opportunities for rest, movement, and good food.

Make it Easy/Easier

Start Small - When you begin to weave a new practice around rest, movement, food, etc. into your daily life, start with a small goal for your daily action. That is, start really small. I first heard this from Leo Babauta of Zen Habits, and it's quite powerful. So instead of trying to run 3 miles everyday, start with the intention of just taking a walk or run to the end of the block. If you do more than that, great. If you just make it to the end of your block, great. The practice remains fresh, active, and doable, rather than the ideal practice that you're only able to do now and then.

Again, focus on enjoyment. When it's fun, it can all feel seamless. There is less (or no) resistance that needs to be pushed through to engage in the practice.

Tangible cues in our environment are especially powerful supporting a practice. Running shoes left in an obvious (even annoying) spot is a great nudge for taking that short stroll down the street.

There is Always a Skill to Practice

My take is that forming healthy habits is actually less about the specific habits and more about the skills behind those habits. With my clients, I emphasize this skill development process. Yes, we build specific habits, but we work on how we can also attend to the underlying skills that are transferable beyond that one habit.

For example, "ReturnAbility" is a key skill - The ability to successfully pick up a practice again. Whenever something interrupts our routines, it gives us the opportunity to practice returning. This is a chance to review the practices of our routine to see how they can best support us, and it's a moment to build confidence in ourselves. That is, whether there is an intentional break in a practice or just something happens in our life to throw off our normal, we know that the skills we've practiced in the past are still there for us and that we can adapt them to be even more meaningful.

Wherever we're at, there are always skills we can practice within the context of our life. Pay attention to the opportunities that may be less obvious.

Academic life is often frantic and even chaotic. And these practices will not fix challenges at the organization and system levels, but hopefully, they can help carve out a bit more space for feeling at home in your body.

1. Troiani, Igea and Claudia Dutson. "The Neoliberal University as a Space to Learn/Think/Work in Higher Education." Architecture and Culture, 9:1 (2021): 5-23. DOI: 10.1080/20507828.2021.1898836

2. Matthew, Patricia A. Written/Unwritten: Diversity and the Hidden Truths of Tenure. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2016.

3. Hersey, Tricia. Rest is Resistance: A Manifesto. New York: Little, Brown Spark, 2022.