Generally, being an athlete requires dedication and a lot of extra hard work every day. Balancing your personal life with your strict training schedules may be overwhelming and exhausting. It takes a lot for students to balance their academic life and social life while maintaining optimum athletic performance. Playing professional sports is very rewarding and well-paying. However, before you can become a professional athlete, you will usually start as a student-athlete.
The competition among student-athletes is tough since thousands of students dream of being recruited into countable pro teams. Moreover, teams’ scouts have hundreds of excellent student-athletes to shortlist. The need to be the best and stand out while also maintaining good scores can be an arduous undertaking. Here are three common challenges that college students face.
1.Balancing student-athlete responsibilities and social life
Many people term college years as the best years of their lives, and this should be the same in your case as a student-athlete. However, balancing your social life with your responsibilities is not an easy feat. You won’t want to neglect your social life, but at the same time, you will not want to sacrifice your prospects as a professional athlete.
To make your career in sports a reality, you might need to sacrifice some of your social activities. For instance, as an athlete, you need to have a good diet eating the right proportions of macronutrients, and taking supplements such as beta-alanine. Therefore, you will need to give up social activities such as drinking parties. It is vital to spend time with friends and occasionally participate in college activities to avoid lagging in other areas of your life.
2. Balancing your academics and athletics responsibilities
Athletics and academics are two aspects that occupy most of your time. After all, it is essential to remember that you are as much an athlete as a student. The essence of being both is to excel both in sports and in academics. Balancing these two is hard, but with proper time management, you will accommodate both priorities.
Pre-allocate your activities in advance, and this will allow you to delegate adequate time to each task. That will prevent lagging in either your academics or sports. Moreover, you can talk to your professors and coaches to ensure that the timetable meets their schedules and expectations.
3.Safeguarding your mental health
Another challenge most students face is ensuring that they are emotionally stable even when balancing multiple fronts. It is often easy for your mental and emotional health to take a toll since the pressure to perform can get crippling.
Sometimes the stress may spiral into serious mental issues. An efficient way to handle the pressure is to condition your mind toward handling these pressures. This will, in turn, give you the ability and mental strength to work extra hard to achieve the goals that you have set.
Student-athletes experience many challenges, both physically and mentally, including anxiety, burnout, injuries, and losing focus. However, going through psychological training will help you deal with issues as they arise. It will help you focus on what is most important.