With the constant hustle and bustle of life, it’s easy to forget to take some time for yourself, but this is a reminder that you deserve to take some personal time for yourself. Midterm season has officially come and gone, and if you were anything like me, it felt like a weight was taken off your shoulders. If you haven’t already done so, please give yourself a pat on the back. I’m proud of you for pushing through! You did amazing. And if you’re reading this and aren’t in school right now, I’m proud of you too. Life gets rough, and each day is a new day, and that is always something to be celebrated.

Sometimes we try to juggle too much at once in our lives, and it is important to remember that we are only human and need time to relax too. In my mind, life is like a nice, big pie. You can slice it up to serve and share. Even having different-sized slices. But make sure not to slice off one too many slices where there ends up being no slices left for yourself in the end.

Recently, with the stress of midterms, school, and all the chaos that naturally comes with life, I found myself with no slices for myself. At that moment when I realized I was empty-handed, I knew I had to make some changes. While I wish I could keep making infinite pies to share as many slices as possible, I knew it was not realistic. So I baked a new pie, looked at my life, and shared the slices with aspects of my life that matter the most to me: Family, friends, my mental health and overall health, my studies and my passions. This time around I said goodbye to certain aspects that once used to get very large slices. That big slice is mine now, and mine alone.

I’m sure this sounds so silly. Is life really like a pie? Well, I challenge you to view your life as a pie for a moment. We only have so much time in a day to accomplish what we hope to. So who or what gets a slice of your pie? At the end of the day, however, you decide to slice it is up to you. But I want to remind you that you deserve a slice of the pie for yourself too. You deserve to be a priority in your own life. You deserve time to take a break from the stress of life, sit down, watch an episode of your favorite show or some TikTok’s (or whatever it is that you enjoy), and enjoy a nice, big slice of pie.

Ferris Bueller said it best, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”