The scent as I walked into the Great Hall was overpoweringly herbal. Soothing flute music played on a CD player as scented candles burned in the Great Hall fireplace.
A variety of stations set up around the hall offered students their stress remedies of choice. One table held an assortment of lemony and herb tea packets and plenty of hot water. Another table was a coloring book station. Students sat around it coloring in scenes of life on campus, from the islands to broomball.
But undoubtedly the star of the show was the four massage chairs at the back of the hall. I watched as students lay face-down on the chairs to get their necks and backs rubbed by students from Sister Rosalind's School of Massage, which Carleton imported for the event. Sister Rosalind's is a religious-affiliated massage school with four branches in Minnesota and one in North Dakota (you can even sign up for classes and get massage certified yourself).
I discovered the source of the herbal scent, too. An aromatherapy station was laid out with bottles of essential oils uncapped and ready for sniffing. Some were familiar, like peppermint, lemon, and grapefruit; others, like bergamot, bay, and Ylang Ylang were not. Bay is a little too strong for my taste, but Ylang Ylang, made from the oil of a flower, is very nice. Bergamot smells like a cross between lemon and mint. These scents are all supposed to calm and clear the mind.
The event also offered free pamphlets on managing stress, and computer terminals logged in to the mystudentbody.com site on stress. Here are some stress-reducing tips gleaned from the site to help you get through crunch week:
- Get enough sleep. You'll be better able to do everything you need to do in the day.
- Study a little bit all term long. It may be a bit late for this now, but there's always next term.
- Have a positive attitude. If you convince yourself you can't answer the questions on the test, guess what?
- Eat right. Sugar highs and sugar lows will just make you more stressed out.
If all else fails, you could always try bergamot and Ylang Ylang.
