It’s that time of the school year.

Classes have been going on for six weeks and many professors are beginning to give out their first exams and in some cases, midterms. We are all starting to welcome late night study sessions and sleep deprivation with open arms. The library and trips to Bookends Cafe are becoming a consistent thing.

With multiple tests and projects due each week, we often forget that we need to take a few minutes to just veg out. Relaxing is a vital component of our mental health, and having strong mental health can help prevent many mental illnesses.

Now a little stress can be motivational and give us the drive to sit down and crank through that week’s assignments. In small amounts, stress isn’t bad. But, like all things, too much can be unhealthy.

Not only does being stressed affect us mentally, but it can also make us physically ill. An overload of stress can lead to depression, anxiety, and headaches.

To help us relieve some of this stress we often turn to watching television, sleeping, or reading a book. These all can help take our minds off the stress for a short time, but they don’t exactly reduce the stress we are feeling.

Think back to your early elementary school days. It was always an exciting time when you were handed a blank sheet of paper and a box of crayons. It was an opportunity for us to show off our artistic abilities. And who didn’t like hanging their new masterpiece on the refrigerator? There was something soothing about doodling for those precious 20 minutes.

It turns out that our teachers weren’t having us draw to improve our art skills but to get us to relax.

When coloring a picture, your brain spends its energy on staying inside of the lines. Think of coloring as a way to take all of the stressed emotions that are being bottled up and release them onto the page.

Your brain is being distracted from the negative, stressful thoughts threatening to overwhelm you. The more intricate the picture, the less attention is given to the mentally taxing thoughts you are experiencing. Therefore, you feel less stressed.

It is probably safe to say that not all college students are able to go back to their dorm or apartment and pull out their favorite childhood coloring book. However, doodling serves the same stress relieving purposes.

Drawing can also be used to express what is going on in our life without using words. It can help channel the bad emotions in a healthy way. Getting out what is bothering us can do much good to our overall attitude.

The goal of coloring and drawing is to try and divert our energy onto something other than our coursework for a few minutes. Not only does it keep our mind off stressful ideas, it frees up our thoughts to think about important things going on in our lives. It can be anything from figuring out plans for the weekend to personal problems we haven’t yet had time to ponder.

Often after a traumatic event, elementary schools will have their students color or draw. This is a way to help cope with the emotions of the tragedy.

During my high school Spanish class, my teacher would randomly reserve days to simply draw and color. These days would usually pop up around stressful times throughout the school year. It was a way to escape the hectic schedule and focus energy into something else.

After these relaxing classes, I would feel much more at ease and ready to face the rest of my week. It was a fun way to take my mind off the strenuous events to come.

These practices are not designed to eliminate all sources of stress in your life but to aid you in coping with it. We all know it’s important to make sure we are physically healthy, but we often forget that we need to take care of our mental health as well.

So next time those late night study sessions turn into more than you can handle, try pulling out a blank sheet of paper and just doodling – let your mind and drawing hand run free.

Your brain and your health with thank you.