I recently came across an article that told a story about the Rolling Stones and their secret to playing together for more than 50 years. Yeah, I know, it’s hard to imagine any band staying together for 50 years! But they’re still at it.
It turns out that the band spends an incredible amount of energy staying connected and practicing together. So much so that they’re sometimes described as having a sixth sense of each other’s rhythms.
When heading into college, one of the most commonly overlooked preparations is building your band – or to put it another way – setting up the people around you. You may be the one going to school, but it impacts everyone around you.
- Going to school will change the way you spend time with your current friends, how often you’ll see them and the sorts of things you’ll do together.
- Going to school will introduce you to new people who share your interests in new ways that will lead you to doing new things together.
- Going to school will change your finances and the way you and your family think of who is working, how many hours, and how much money you need to pay bills.
- Going to school will change you and your family’s routines and rhythms. Who makes dinner, who gets the kids to activities, how you do vacations, and what your evenings and weekends look like.
- Going to school will change the sorts of stresses you and your family face and will challenge you to find new ways to face these together.
Sound daunting? The Rolling Stones could have made the same sort of list before they started up their band 50 years ago. But they discovered that there is another way to think about building a band. Building a band – like getting your people together as you head to school – can also be a transformative moment for everyone.
It is an opportunity to bring your team together around a common goal, learn how to be flexible, find new ways to listen to each other, and discover that your group chemistry makes you more than the sum of each person’s parts. The key to making this transformative turn is intentionally figuring it out together. There are six steps to doing this…
- Make a list of those who are most likely to be impacted by your heading to school. This may include your closest friends, parents, partner, kids, and others around you that pop to mind. I suspect you’ve already done a bit of this as you’ve begun making plans to go to school.
- Make an intentional point of sitting down with these folks and talk about how your heading off to school is going to change your routines and possibly your relationship with them. A lot of this will probably not come as a surprise to them since you’ve probably done a bit of this as you were deciding to go back to school.
- What to talk about? Of course this is going to be very different depending on who you’re talking with. You don’t have the same relationship with your high school friends or parents in the same way you’re part of the lives of your kids or your boss at work. Remember too that this is a two-way street. There are some things you’re going to need (e.g. time to read in the evenings). There are also some things that they are going to need (e.g. making sure the kids still get to school in the morning). Here’s a quick list to get you started:
- What are the chores around your house that you’ll need to rearrange or share in new ways?
- How will you need to reorganize your budget to adapt to these changes?
- Do you need to talk with your employer about changing your hours?
- Are there changes in your daily or weekly schedule that will impact your family’s routine?
- Create some understandings – as your conversations begin to reveal some changes in routines or responsibilities, write these out. No need to get this notarized or put it into a spreadsheet (unless you’re into that sort of thing)…but it is a great idea to at least jot down the changes you are planning. Doing this forces you to come up with specifics to put down on paper (like who’s going to take out the trash and do the dishes). It’s also a good reminder about what you agreed to.
Need some additional ideas? Here is a great template from the Univ. of Florida for roommates in a dorm. And a little different format for folks sharing an apartment.
- Be responsible – in other words…do you part. If you agreed to something, make sure to do it. Yes you’re going to school and have new responsibilities there. But you are also part of a bigger band. They need you to do your part and you need them to do theirs.
- Revisit & revise – finally, make sure to set up some time to revisit and revise these understandings. Sometimes that might happen spontaneously when a change in your life somewhere requires you all to do some rearranging. You might also make a point of looking at these plans at the end of a term or semester when your class schedule changes or, if you have kids, when their school schedule changes. These transitions can often cause ripples through everyone’s routines.
You may be the one going to school, but it impacts everyone around you.
Heading back to school is both an invigorating and challenging move. Making a point of including the people around you, being honest about what you need from them, listening carefully about what they need from you, and committing to building a band rather than a solo career might create lessons that last even longer than 50 years of the Stones.
Dr. Matt Friesen received his PhD in Sociology from the University of Oregon and has spent most of life as a student, professor, researcher and advisor. Check out www.gutsycollege.com for the free Workbook for Reading in College and Note Taking Template. Watch for his upcoming book Dr. Matt’s Gutsy Guide to Reading in College coming in spring 2024.
Noah Friesen’s artwork is featured in these blog posts. Noah has been drawing since 2003 and specializes in caricature and comic art. Connect with Noah, check out his gallery or commission him for your project at www.ko-fi.com/idekdraws.
