Finals are a lot like physicals. They are a necessary, but unwanted and stressful evaluation that makes you question all the choices you made over the last few months. You missed all those blackboard quiz deadlines because they were due on Thursdays at midnight and now you have to make a 108% on the final to get an A. There are two common approaches usually taken to finals week.
The first method involves a lot of caffeine and no sleep. Did we learn nothing from the Saved by the Bell episode where Jessie Spano popped caffeine pills and had a mental breakdown?
The second method can be summed up in with three words, “let it go.” This approach consists of no studying, no caring, and lots of regret. Grades never bothered you anyway.
This semester the goal is to find a happy medium between saying screw it all and staying up all night making flashcards.Here are simple steps to surviving finals, without needing a week to mentally and physically recover.
SIMPLIFLY: Don’t freak yourself out looking at the big picture. Sure, you have four exams this week and you haven’t been reading the chapters, but you can do it. Make a list and set up a loose schedule of when you will study for each exam. Focus on your first final and block out the rest. When you are done studying for that final, move onto the next. Staring at all your textbooks will not help you learn and it is too late in the semester to drop your class on ISIS, so stay calm and hit the books.
FOCUS: Everything else seems urgent when you need to be studying. That episode of GIRLS you missed three weeks ago is a life or death situation, your nails need to be painted, and you really should clean your room or wash your sheets. It is a downward spiral of procrastination. Before you start studying, try to eliminate distractions. The best way to keep from Netflix binging, nail painting, or dusting your whole house, is to get those things done the weekend before. If all else fails, get out of your room and go to the library. At the library people will judge you for watching Netflix or creeping on social media and this will keep you on task.
MOVE: You get into the zone, study for a couple hours, then you hit a wall. You can feel your brain shut down and you think you might actually be unlearning things, if that is possible. You aren’t even sure if you can read words at this point because you have been staring at the same book for hours. The best way to break out of this is to change your location. Think of all the places other than Mullins you could go to get your study on. The union has great tables and plenty of spots to nap. The public library is a magical place with outlets and great views of Fayetteville. The one drawback of the public library has got to be hiding your red bull in your backpack due to their no drink policy. Night bird Books, Common Grounds, Mama Carmen’s, and Starbucks are a few other spots you can go to for a change of scenery.
EAT: Nothing can break your focus quite like hunger. If you know you are going to study through lunch, bring food with you. Make sure it isn’t a noisy food. Don’t be that girl chomping on kettle chips in the library, this will make everybody studying around you cringe. You need all the good karma you can get this week.
SLEEP: This is probably where we screw up the most during finals. I know we have all thought about the incredible amount of studying we could accomplish if we simply gave up sleep. Having eight extra hours of uninterrupted learning sounds like something out of a fairytale. Maybe we should have given up sleep years ago! With all that extra study time we probably would have graduated in three semesters and be on the road to becoming C.E.O. of our own company, right? Think again. We are useless without sleep. We might as well show up to our finals drunk because that is as effective as showing up having not slept in two days. Waking up at 5 AM to study with 4 hours of sleep under your belt is a million times better than having not slept at all.
BREATHE: Relax and trust yourself. Use the time you have sitting in class waiting for the exam to clear your head and calm down. Enjoy this prime people watching opportunity. Few things are as entertaining as watching your classmates frantically shuffling flashcards and chugging energy shots. If you go into the exam hyped up you may overlook a detail in the prompt or miss simple directions. At the end of the day… it is just one test. Whether you bomb the exam or ace it, you are DONE with that class. What could be better than that?