Today… wasn’t a great day.

It didn’t begin badly – I woke up a little late into the morning, ate a decent breakfast, and sat down with the intention of studying.

And then I saw the to-do lists: a wall of upcoming tests and assessments. Pages and pages of things that needed my attention, and all of them seemed equally urgent.

But I started with something in my control – Physics.
Within minutes, I was caught between two equally exhausting states: either spiralling over the sheer amount of syllabus or getting distracted by literally anything. My brain literally refused to cooperate. Still, with an intrinsic fear of being entirely unproductive, I waded through a chunk of it, like pulling my own weight through the mud.

And then the realisation hit – I still had five other subjects left to study, and my mind felt scattered, as if someone had shaken all the thoughts out of their neat boxes and strewn them across the floor.

So I decided to hit reset and take a hot shower with music in the background, the kind of shower where you wash your head slowly and let your mind sort itself out. Except it didn’t work.
Somewhere between the shampoo and the steam, this heavy, shapeless panic started building in my chest. An inexplicable feeling of melancholy that held me tightly within its grasp.

And I can’t quite explain what I felt next, but all of a sudden every sensation felt jarring – water too hot, music too loud, lights too bright. It was like my senses were turned up to maximum volume.
Feeling that unfamiliar panic continue to overtake me, I stumbled out, somehow feeling worse off than before.

Later, I got on a call with a few classmates to discuss a group project, but that underlying current of anxiety never left me – only amplifying by the time I was done, humming under my skin.

Here I am – 11:21 pm. The entire day has felt as if it was dissolved into nothing, like I spent hours fighting my own mind. The worst part? The week ahead looks like a mountain I’ve yet to climb. I hate this feeling of tiredness for the days that haven’t even come yet.

Got any valuable advice on how to stop feeling like I’m in quicksand and falling deeper with each second?

Yours truly,
Divi