Should You “Trust the Process”? You’re the Dean of Your Own Bar Exam Studies

Here’s something that people who pass the bar exam never say:

“All I had to do was listen to all the bar course lectures and take a lot of notes. Just complete the course and you’ll pass!”

Sometimes we think “doing whatever it takes” to pass the bar exam means exhausting yourself and throwing 1000 hours and even more dollars into a black hole. (But it doesn’t have to be expensive.)

Or following some unsustainable cookie-cutter schedule that doesn’t care if you have a job or a family. Good luck if you fall behind by one day.

Or letting a perfectly fine morning slip through by religiously sitting through 4 hours of droning lectures. Worse, pausing lectures to fill in all the notes.

Then not even remembering 99% of it.

Rewinding the video for the 5th time because you can’t stop thinking about the Roman Empire

I remember those days. All of those things above are things I stopped doing on my second attempt at preparing for the bar exam.

“Trust the process,” they say.

One passer said: “Every moment I’m asking, ‘Am I doing something that helps me prepare?’”

A conscious approach indeed.

Ultimately, bar prep is a self-study endeavor. Courses and supplements are simply there to support your self-study. What matters is your own training.

Of course, bar preparation can be overwhelming. You might have other responsibilities (like a full-time job or family) that make it hard to make bar prep your priority. Bar takers often get analysis paralysis when they’re starting out or overwhelmed with options. It’s natural to seek help.

The thing is, it doesn’t have to be that way. It’s only overwhelming because you’re forcing yourself to do things that are wrong for you.

Successful students apply the advice they get to their situation, instead of waiting for the perfect advice or resource. Pick a few resources you trust, and use them to their fullest. Be concerned about how YOU can be the best student.

At the same time, you’re the dean of your own studies.

Not Barbri, not your law school, not me, not anyone.

This is your exam. You’ll be responsible for your own success. No one cares about you as much as you. Only you can prevent forest fires.

The system they assign you might work for you. It might not. Or maybe somewhere in between.

Rather than blindly “trusting the process,”

• Ask “Which process?”
• Ask “What is the process?”
• Consider “trusting yourself” and tailoring the process to your needs and style. The right process for you is one that helps you understand and retain the material and answer questions correctly.

I’ve been saying this for years:

Make the executive decisions and develop the curriculum as the dean so you can be the best student.

That’s how you take control of your studies.

Below are 4 common traps that hold you back from being an effective dean.

Are you telling yourself any of these things below? If you are, I invite you as the dean to shift the way you approach your bar preparation curriculum.

Trap 1: The default

Typical thinking: “I need to take a course. They’ve been throwing themselves at me since I started law school. Oh, maybe I’ll get the cheapest (or costliest) course. I need to memorize everything first. I need to check off all the boxes. Feels like progress!”

Conscious thinking: “Hmm, this cookie-cutter curriculum can be useful in some ways, but how can I tailor the materials to my own situation? How can I use them as a tool to learn what is required of me to pass the bar? How can I use it to learn how to apply the rules, not just “know” them conceptually?”

Brian’s comment: If you’re not able to do what you’ll be doing on the exam—answering questions correctly—consider routes other than the default path.

Successful students are conscious about what they do. They get enough information and tailor it to their situation. They try NOT to go through the motions, chase after meaningless metrics, or wait for the perfectly tailored advice.

Trap 2: Extreme tactics

Typical thinking: “I’ll just power through 15-hour days! 100 MBE questions every day! Who needs sleep?!”

Conscious thinking: “Hard work is a given. I’ll do my best to have no regrets, but extreme tactics are unrealistic and unsustainable. What are the important things that I should focus more on (so that I can be prepared for the bar exam even if I don’t have a lot of time)?”

Brian’s comment: Energy and focus limit you more than time. Save your mental bandwidth by cutting out unnecessary, low-value activities.

I go more in depth about the key to sustainable productivity in my Mental Engines mini-course on mental management and emotional organization. (If you’re in it already, look at Module 2 Lesson 2.)

Trap 3: Driving around for the lowest gas price (obsessive hunting)

Typical thinking: “I’ll just snoop around the Internet for weeks and manually cobble together resources until my collection is complete. I’ll have the perfect collection. THEN I’ll FINALLY be ready to go. Look at these notes from 2019 that I retyped!!!”

Conscious thinking: “Wait a minute. Resourcefulness has its place, but there’s no need to reinvent the wheel (as long as the tools are right for me). Even a 1% greater chance to make this my last time is worth it in the long term.

I know I can make back whatever I invest now within hours, or even minutes.”

Brian’s comment: Are you distracting yourself because you don’t want to do what you know you need to do? Try looking for issues in an essay question if you’re looking for something to hunt.

If you truly value your time (which we say we do), then it’s a no-brainer to use resources that someone has already spent 1000s of hours putting together so that you can gain even a 1% edge. 

Trap 4: Using too many resources at once

Typical thinking: “I’ll jump between a bunch of shiny objects until I find the silver bullet that plugs me into the Matrix and automatically teaches me everything I need to know for the bar exam.”

Conscious thinking: “Nothing’s going to be perfect. The resources out there can all be useful in their own ways depending on how I use them. They are tools that serve my needs, not the other way around. Where can I get some key supplements and resources that will help me do the work I need to do? They are tools that serve my needs, not the other way around.”

Brian’s comment: Pick a few tools you’ll actually use. Having too many moving parts only complicates your life. Keep it simple.

Check out the supplement stacks I’ve curated so you don’t get lost in supplement hell with a bunch of stuff you won’t use. They’re shortlists of resources that many bar takers have passed with. Just grab and go.

What being an effective dean of your own studies looks like

If life gave you lemons, you weren’t looking for the oranges.

If you don’t proactively and consciously think about what’s possible, you get the default. Your life decides for you instead.

What do you notice about the shifts above? They boil down to trusting yourself and doing what makes sense to you. It’s your call.

“Trust myself? I did that and still got fucked on the bar exam”

I’m not telling you to write essays the way they worked back in law school, read tea leaves to predict subjects, or rely on your future self to wing the test.

I’m talking about having control over your approach to preparation.

Courses and other resources can give you structure, but the judgment calls (what to prioritize, when to shift gears, how to spend your time) are yours to make.

It’s scary to be the boss, but also freeing.

Counterintuitively, you’ll have MORE confidence and control over your preparation and your fate. Learn to listen to yourself, even if it means straying from a one-size-fits-all structure.

That could mean:

• Saying NO to the fear that seduces you to jump to the shallow end of the pool rather than doing the mental exertion that moves the needle
• Making independent decisions despite the different opinions you’re going to hear
• Building a schedule around your personal situation (e.g., job, family, hours, strengths, weaknesses)
• Skipping or fast forwarding lectures on topics you’re confident with to make more room for practice questions or other topics (and attending lectures if you didn’t take that subject in law school)

When you train intentionally, you can trust that your legs will keep you pushing forward during bar week.

(Did you know that the muscles pro golfers work on are actually their legs? Stable foundations keep their aim true and far. No wonder they wear baggy pants.)

In the end, you’re the one taking the exam, whether you use a prep course, whether you get a tutor, whether you study on your own.

You’re the dean. You set the curriculum. You make the executive decisions.

The passers who surprise everyone aren’t the ones who followed their program most religiously but those who made decisions that fit them like a tailored glove and didn’t tell anyone about it.