Having a healthy life balance can be very difficult as a college athlete.  Here are some ways to help manage your social life, family life, academics, and athletics during your college career.

Social Life

College is not only a place to play sports and set yourself up for the future, but it is a place to build friendships and expand your social skills as well.  That said,  college athletics are very time consuming and it can be easy to lose sight of your social life during college. Social life can also be challenging to maintain because there is no obligation unlike academics, family life, and athletics. If you want to be more social as a college athlete, it can be helpful to make time each day for social activity, whether it's hanging out with friends or just a simple conversation with someone. 

Related: 5 Ways to Maintain a Social Life as a College Athlete

Family Life

With college athletics being somewhat like a full time job, time spent with your family will be limited. A good piece of advice to balance out family life is to not invest one hundred percent of your time and energy into your team; the healthiest relationships are when you have quality time away from each other. It is pivotal to an athlete's success to bind a healthy workload and family/loved ones. Setting a little time aside each day to check in on your family can go a long way.

Academics

Academics is a mandatory component of your schedule as an athlete. Being an NCAA athlete, you have a mandatory eight hours of monitored study time and not meeting this requirement can result in ineligibility for following games or events that week. Coaches will make academics a top priority outside of athletics. You are given lots of tools and resources as an athlete to help you succeed not only as an athlete but as a scholar as well.

Athletics

Balancing athletics as a college athlete isn't really much of a balancing act–your sport is your life. If you aren't playing the sport, you are thinking about it, if you are thinking about it, you are studying it, and if you're not doing any of those, you're doing school work so that you can play that sport. Athletics will take the most time out of your schedule and is without a doubt the biggest commitment you can make as a college student. 

As you can see, being a college athlete brings many responsibilities. It is important to balance and manage your time wisely during your college career to make the most of the four years. Balancing your life will not only help you throughout college, but it will set you up for a lifetime of success.

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* Originally published on April 26, 2022, by Finn Rice