Rituals & Routines
By: Mary Greco
It’s month four post-graduation. I’ve got a beautiful house, a meaningful job, and good friends. Life after graduation has run quite smoothly so far (seniors, don’t stress, you’ve got a lot to look forward to). Yet, despite the relative peace I’ve experienced, the daily toils of life have taught me a few things about the importance of maintaining good habits and routines. I want to share a few that have especially helped me.
Be sure to read good literature after graduation. Since you are no longer in class and are focusing on work, it is easy to get carried away with life’s daily needs and to push reading to the back recesses of your mind. But not reading anything nourishing to the soul is detrimental to our spiritual and mental well-being. Read devotionals and novels. Reading good literature, especially, expands our imaginations, thrusting us into the lives of characters who see life differently than we do. It provides us with fresh perspectives or gives us forlorn warnings. But make no mistake, engaged and serious reading pushes us to learn and implement what we learn into our lives. Remember one of Hillsdale’s mottos: we are lifelong learners. Build reading into your daily life. Whether it’s on the metro to work or right before you close your eyes to sleep, make reading a habit.
Learn how to cook. On campus, though there are healthy-ish options, cooking for yourself is always the healthiest. There are not many options to learn how to cook while at school unless you live off campus. And even then, it feels difficult to cook consistently, because schoolwork takes up most of your time. Cooking for yourself allows you to see everything you put into your body. And as young women, we ought to care for our bodies. We ought to take care of our physical and mental health and our appearance. Not to meet anyone’s expectations, but to show the world we respect ourselves. It’s not vain, it’s vital. We women sometimes feel that our bodies are so hard to figure out. Well, learning the right nutrition and exercise will help you understand your body. In addition, there is truly something so relaxing yet rewarding about making your own food.
Continue nurturing your passions. At school, we are so busy in this club and in that, talking with this group of friends and that, running for some position in some organization. Life after graduation will not feel as fulfilling if all you do is go to work and come home afterward. Get involved in your community, and continue nurturing your faith. I struggled a little bit with this when I first moved. It felt hard to make time for prayer, exercise, my Russian studies, and my love for music. I had to come up with a plan to pursue my passions further. During the mornings, for example, I decided I would focus on my Russian studies because my brain feels drained at the end of the day and I know my brain feels the most alive in the AM. At night, before I make dinner (unless, of course, I am out with friends, etc.), I work out. I also joined the choir at my local parish to express my love of music before God and man. I have loved music all my life and it feels so rewarding to give back to my community in that capacity. I have also met many people, young and old, through the choir and it feels good knowing my network is expanding through these faithful circles.
Once you implement good rituals and routines, you will feel more grounded. And you will feel more yourself. A lot of changes occur in the first few months after graduation- moving somewhere new, starting a new job, finding new friends, and starting new routines. There are of course so many more things you can do that will help you during life after graduation, but these few things have helped make the transition most peaceful.
Mary Greco graduated from Hillsdale College with a degree in International Relations and now serves the College as the Undergraduate Program Coordinator at the DC campus. While a student at Hillsdale, she was a part of the Chi Omega Fraternity and involved with various other clubs. Mary is the eldest of six kids, is from New York, and loves all things coffee and chocolate!
