By Lawrence Nalls III | Morehouse College Student-Athlete
Being a college student-athlete has taught me that preparation is everything.
Between football, classes, meetings, treatment, traveling, games, work and everything else that comes with college, most of my days are planned almost down to the minute.
But one experience during my junior year taught me something else:
You can prepare for almost everything and still be affected by something completely outside of your control.
My Day Starts at 4:45 A.M.
A typical day for me starts before the sun comes up.
My alarm goes off at 4:45 a.m. I get ready and leave my dorm around 5:05 a.m. to head to the stadium.
Once I arrive, one of my first stops is to see our athletic trainers to get my ankles and wrists taped before practice. Getting taped gives me extra support in areas that take a lot of stress during football. After that, I grab a quick snack, get dressed and prepare for practice.
We practice from around 6:05 to 8:45 a.m.
And when practice ends, my day is really just getting started.
I grab breakfast and head into classes. I’m a psychology major at Morehouse College, and on my busiest days I can have four classes in one day.
That means I can go from studying human behavior in the classroom to studying defensive fronts and football schemes just a few hours later.
During my first real break of the day, I finally get a chance to shower and grab a quick lunch before heading back for our 12:15 p.m. lift.
After lifting, it’s right back to class for the afternoon.
Depending on the day, I may have a position meeting with my coach around 4 or 5 p.m. During our position meetings, we first go over what happened at practice—what we did well, what needs to be corrected and where we can improve. Then we shift our attention toward our upcoming opponent and study what we’re going to see from them on game day.
After that, I grab dinner at the caf and usually head back to see our athletic trainers for treatment.
Treatment is a major part of keeping my body ready for the next practice or game. Depending on what I need that day, the trainers may stretch me out or give me a massage. I also use recovery methods like the cold tub and cupping.
By the time all of that is finished, I’m finally back inside for the night.
Then I wake up and do it all over again.
Balancing Football and College Life
College football takes up 20+ hours of my week between practices, weightlifting, meetings, traveling and games.
Then you add being a full-time college student on top of it.
That schedule has forced me to become more intentional about managing my time, responsibilities and stress.
When your alarm is going off at 4:45 in the morning and you know you still have practice, lifting, four classes, meetings and treatment ahead of you, preparation isn’t optional.
I’ve learned that I can’t control everything that happens throughout my day, but I can control how prepared I am for it.
That lesson became very real during my junior year.
The Day I Saw My Dorm in Flames
During my junior year, I lived in an apartment-style suite on campus. Unlike a traditional dorm room, our suite has a kitchen and living room area, so we have many of the same responsibilities that come with living in an apartment.
One day, my roommate accidentally left the stove on with plasticware and plates sitting on top of it.
What started as a simple mistake quickly became something much more serious.
I saw my dorm filling with smoke and flames right in front of me.
Suddenly, football, classes and whatever else I had planned that day didn’t matter.
This was a real emergency.
The fire department was called, and three fire trucks responded. Our RAs became involved, and the dorm had to be evacuated while the situation was handled.
Afterward, I had to give a statement to campus authorities explaining what I had seen and what happened.
Standing outside of the place where I lived while firefighters responded put everything into perspective.
My laptop was in there.
My clothes and shoes were in there.
My school supplies were in there.
Almost everything I needed for my everyday life as a college student was inside that building.
I hadn’t left the stove on, but my belongings were still at risk.
That’s what stayed with me.
When you share a living space, someone else’s mistake can become your emergency too.
Why Renters Insurance Became Real to Me
Before that experience, renters insurance wasn’t something I thought about very often.
After seeing three fire trucks outside my dorm and having to evacuate because of a fire inside the place I called home, I understood it differently.
As college students, we bring a lot more value into our dorms and apartments than we sometimes realize.
Think about everything in your room right now: your laptop, phone, clothes, shoes, headphones, school supplies and other things you’ve collected over the years.
Replacing all of that at once could become a serious financial burden for a college student.
And when you live with roommates, being responsible yourself doesn’t mean you can control everything happening around you.
Your roommate could make a mistake.
Something could happen while you’re in class.
And for me, something could happen while I’m at practice, traveling for a game or sitting in a team meeting.
That’s why renters insurance became more than just another college expense in my mind.
It became another part of being prepared.
Why Working With GradGuard Fits My Story
That’s also one reason working with GradGuard has connected so naturally with my own college experience.
I don’t have to talk about the importance of preparation based only on a hypothetical situation.
I’ve lived it.
I’ve experienced firsthand how quickly something unexpected can happen in a college living space.
Working with GradGuard has also given me an opportunity that fits into an already demanding lifestyle. When more than 20 hours of my week can already be dedicated to football before even considering classes and studying, having work that connects to my actual college experience is valuable to me.
It’s another responsibility that I’ve learned to balance alongside being a student and an athlete.
Preparation Goes Beyond the Football Field
Football has taught me to prepare for my opponent.
College has taught me to prepare for exams, assignments and deadlines.
Life has taught me to prepare for the things I can’t predict.
If there is one thing my college experience has shown me, it’s that being prepared doesn’t mean you’re expecting something bad to happen.
It means you’re ready to respond when life doesn’t go according to plan.
I prepare for practice.
I prepare for class.
I prepare for games.
And after watching my dorm fill with smoke and flames, evacuating the building and seeing three fire trucks arrive outside, I learned that protecting the place I call home—and the things I’ve worked for—is another part of being prepared.
