Mindset/Psychology | Page 8 of 11 | Make This Your Last Time

August 15, 2020May 23, 2021 - 2 Comments

Bar Preparation Is Emotional Preparation: How to Turn Your Emotions into Something USEFUL

The bar exam might be the dryest subject on the planet, but it’s also full of emotions.

Joy when you pass. Sorrow when you fail. Frustration, hopelessness, anxiety, and overwhelm in between.

Naturally, this can be a new and unique life challenge!

The thing is, these feelings are all temporary.

When you pass, you’ll celebrate for a day or two. You’ll probably forget how much you struggled and despaired. You’ll start to worry about other first-world problems like how to get sworn in, or finding and keeping a job, keeping clients happy, and so on, as life goes on.

You might even excitedly thank me and say that you’ll do anything to repay me, that you’ll give me feedback, that you’ll donate essays… then never respond again when I ask for a simple writeup. The high will wear off very quickly.

That doesn’t mean these powerful emotions you’re feeling now are useless while they’re happening. How do we leverage them (especially in the times of corona)?

July 18, 2020August 28, 2020 - No Comments

Feeling Stuck and Burned Out with Bar Prep

It seems like time is continuing to expand along with the universe—agony stretching as bar examiners keep pushing exam dates back like a girl who isn’t really into you.

Isn’t more time good, though?

What do you do when you’re frustrated with your progress?

Are you even acknowledging the frustration, or are you actually dismissing it?

I was having a conversation with a coaching client for the California Bar Exam. Here’s an excerpt:

**For non-CA takers, each CA essay is scored out of 100 raw points. 65 is considered on track to pass the exam and a target benchmark. 70 is solid. An 85 is rarely obtained.**

To summarize, here are his issues:

Practicing essays takes too long
He feels he wastes time by overwriting the analysis
He wants to write in his own way and limit the analysis

What would be your feedback here? Think about it before I share my suggestions on getting clearer on an approach you may be taking as well.

May 22, 2020July 11, 2020 - 2 Comments

How to Focus on Bar Studies While Stuck at Home in Quarantine

It’s hard enough to focus when there isn’t a cloud of coronavirus covering the planet. Or all the hubbub about what the exam will be like. Or wondering when it’s even going to be.

The stress of adjusting to “the new reality.” Dealing with uncertainty about the bar exam. Running out of yeast for your new bread machine.

You’re at the brink of feeling burned out before the exam is even happening.

First of all, if we’re quarantining, we should be thankful to have a place to stay and a refuge from everything going on outside (even if we’re forced to coexist with our housemates).

But it may be frustrating to not have a quiet place to focus if your go-to study place is suddenly gone. We’re stuck at home. Libraries are closed. Daycares are closed. Coffee shops don’t let you linger around.

Being productive in your bar preparation has become more challenging than it’s ever been.

How do you get into that flow if where you live is the only place left to study?

The two biggest killers of focus and concentration are external distractions and your energy.

Address each by designing your environment and optimizing your sleep as follows:

April 22, 2020April 22, 2020 - No Comments

Should the bar exam be designed more like the real world?

“Get rid of the MBE.”

“The MBE is objectively graded. The essays are subjective. The essays should be eliminated.”

“They don’t use multiple choice in the real world.”

With so many shifts already happening in the world, will the bar exam have to be redesigned?

We’re already seeing some states reschedule their bar exams to September, at least for 2020. Is this the impetus needed to finally bring reform to the bar exam in “the new normal”?

It’s a complicated issue.

Here are my personal thoughts on this. No substantive bar strategies or techniques in this post.

April 10, 2020May 15, 2020 - No Comments

Bar Exam Success Rules that Buck Tradition: Keeping Yourself Mentally Sane During Bar Prep

I’m excited to share this guest article by Jennifer Duclair, Esq., a Bar Exam Mentor who specializes in mindset mentoring for powerful bar exam results, and offers regular five-day challenges to set up your own study plan. Today, you’ll learn how to work with your mind, rather than have your mind work against you on your way to bar exam success.

Bar takers could do with less suffering and more enjoyment in this rite of passage to becoming an Esquire.

However, most bar prep rules were developed ages ago and haven’t been updated much since then. Here’s what to do to get away get from those methods that are so 1998, and do what really works today.