Walking into Flying Treehouse rehearsal on a chilly autumn evening, I greeted everyone, saying hi to friends and team members, like usual. This time, I landed on one conversation with an upperclassmen that I hadn’t gotten to know as well.

I casually mentioned to her that I was only about to make it to rehearsal on time thanks to the speed of my bike, and then asked how her commute was. She replied that the walk was really good.

Wait. Double-take. The “walk”? After walking the first month of autumn quarter as a freshman, I was thrilled to hop on a bike and travel at what felt like Mach 10. How could an upperclassmen, so much wiser and older than me, still be stuck on their two feet?

I probed this question, and the reply is one I will always remember. 

“Yeah, well, I check on my bike about once a quarter. It’s parked somewhere outside of EVGR. Haven’t touched it since freshman year. I just kind of realized that I was traveling on ‘bike time’ – only leaving the slightest breaks and jam-packing my schedule so that my own two feet couldn’t carry me.”

Whoa. It hit: Am I on “bike time”?

Coming from small town Virginia, Stanford was a whole different world for me. So many different people, things, places, opportunities — so many different ways to spend your time. I think, like many freshmen, I was a little bit overwhelmed, very excited, but not afraid to take advantage of everything.

In around week two of autumn quarter, I ran into a friend at Wilbur dining hall. After a quick chat, we said that we should grab dinner (as students often say at Stanford). Pulling out our phones and looking at our schedules, it was an unannounced competition. 

Looking at each other’s Google Calendars, we were seeing who was the busiest. He won. But, at Stanford, busyness is a status symbol. The more busy you are, the less time you have for people, the more impressive that makes you.

That’s why anytime I walk into a lecture hall, no matter whether it is with world famous Economist John Taylor or DoorDash cofounder Stanley Tang, plenty of students are staring down at their laptops and phones to text, write emails, and do p-sets. 

Busyness is a status symbol, and I’ve fallen for the trap. I’m riding from A to B to C to D without a care for the moment. I’m trying to check everything off my list, and cram more than is humanly possible into one day.

And, it’s about to fall apart.

A few days ago during a coffee chat with a professor, I was asked why it was so hard to get Stanford students to show up to events. Two thoughts came to mind. 

First, optimization. As my RUF campus ministry leader says, “Optimization is Stanford students’ favorite word.” I constantly worry about whether I’m making the right choice, weighing the proper opportunity choice, optimizing my schedule. Oftentimes, simply put, I view going to some events as not worthy of my time.

The second reason is a result of the first: optimization is taxing. It’s tough — really tough. When I go to events and look around, roughly half of my peers are in my class. I seldom see a stronger contingent of sophomores, juniors, or seniors than freshmen at events. I think that the burn-out is about to set in.

Going at Mach 10, break-neck speed is about to literally break my neck. I can’t keep up the pace, the busyness, the stress. Nor do I really want to.

I think our older peers are really onto something. College is a gift, a special time for only four years of our life, that I don’t want to fly through. I want to live in the moment, enjoy the flowers, the sun, my peers, the interesting classes, the fountain hopping, the crazy sports games, and everything Stanford has to offer. 

But I don’t want to check it off a list. I don’t want to fly through it, forgetting what I am doing and why I am doing it. I don’t want to be on “bike time.” I want to slow down. I want to walk to class.