University students need to stop romanticizing hustle culture and academic burnout.
It’s no surprise that burnout’s common among university students, with 89 per cent feeling overwhelmed with their current responsibilities, and 75 per cent of students report struggling with their mental health, according to Universities Canada. What’s even more cause for concern, is that the increased mental load associated with burnout is negatively affecting academic performance, basically rendering the “hustle culture” mindset useless and redundant.
Hustle culture’s a mindset where over-working and neglecting to take care of your mental and physical health is seen as an admirable that should be strived for. It’s the belief that rest is a sign of weakness and working long, tireless hours is essential for seeing success.
Not only is hustle culture damaging to students physical well-being, but it masks underlying issues and worsens overall mental health across campus.
Despite increasing mental health concerns, the proportion of students that still aren’t reaching out for help remains high, with only 40 per cent of struggling students seeking mental health support. Campus mental health organizations continue to report that overwhelming stress and exhaustion are a universal trends among university students—one that doesn’t seem to be going anywhere anytime soon.
A major driver of the normalization of burnout is hustle culture, and its prevalence on social media platforms such as Instagram and TikTok. While the intrinsic motivation behind hustle culture could be considered positive, that being increasing productivity in order to achieve greater academic results, hustle culture itself promotes a toxic and unhealthy lifestyle. It promotes working relentlessly, equating academic success and productivity to self-worth, ignoring personal time and leisure activities, and even not taking care of personal needs. It turns burnout and visible exhaustion into a marker of commitment rather than a red flag.
From pulling all-nighters to skipping meals and bragging about sleep deprivation like it’s an accomplishment, as well as constantly looking drained and tired are normalized and even praised. Unhealthy and unsustainable behaviours are praised as discipline and dedication to academia, instead of being seen for what they are. Being visibly exhausted is seen as something that’s expected if students want to be taken seriously.
Hustle culture disguises harm as motivation. This can mask issues such as unrealistic workloads, with roughly 80 per cent of university students feeling they have an unrealistic academic workload, competitive academic environments and reframing burnout as an achievement.
Instead of seeking help, hustle culture encourages students to push through without objection. It promotes an unhealthy diet and increasing caffeine consumption, which can turn harmful fast as it worsens sleep and promotes panic attacks and further stress.
Hustle culture has also created an undeniable guilt around rest. Students neglect their own needs to instead finish tasks and increase their productivity, like a robot. When students try to take a break and rest, it can elicit a feeling of guilt, and of being “behind”.
Academic burnout isn’t a sign of dedication; it’s a sign that there’s something deeply wrong with how we approach success in university. If universities truly care about their students, there must be a change of mindset. Productivity and academic success shouldn’t come at the cost of mental and physical health. Students deserve learning environments that are supportive as well as sustainable and balanced, so that nobody needs to be constantly burnt out and exhausted to achieve academic excellence.
Margaret is a third-year Biology Student and The Journal’s Postscript Editor
Tags
Academics, Hustle culture, Student life
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