Let’s look at your end-of-term preparation with a POV we could never imagine – a POV of PHYSICS!
Don’t close the tab yet, please, I’ll try to make it fun.
Let’s establish what free fall is first, ‘cause (obviously, I knew it), you didn’t.
According to Wikipedia, “free fall is any motion of a body where gravity is the only force acting upon it. A freely falling object may not necessarily be falling in the vertical direction. If the common definition of the word “fall” is used, an object moving upwards is not considered to be falling; by scientific definitions, if it is subject only to the force of gravity, it is said to be in free fall. The Moon is thus in free fall around the Earth, though its orbital speed keeps it at a very great distance from the Earth’s surface.”
Now that I’ve established what free fall is, let’s think about it. Free fall is not always a straight drop. In most real situations, especially when there is some sideways motion, it becomes less of a fall and more of a spiral. Slow at first, almost unnoticeable, and then suddenly very real.
So the smarties would understand I’m talking about the SPIRALLING IN EXAMS.
Spiralling is very common as the end terms approach. The pile of PDFs (ok, books if you ACTUALLY use them, why though?) just get to you. Tabs open, files downloaded, nothing absorbed. With the constant fear of what you would do, you suddenly jump from “I’ll start today” to imagining the next 25 years of your life going horribly wrong because you didn’t study for a simple 2.5-credit course end term tomorrow.
That right there is the beginning of your spiral. Don’t panic yet — it’s just pressure.
So you pick up your book, your notebook (still new and smells like the fresh books we get), and get to it. You sit with full intention. You underline, you read, you even nod as you understand. You feel like things are under control.
And you keep going at it, from 1 to 1:15 AM.
And then you realise there’s nothing you can do now.
Not because there is nothing to study. But because suddenly everything feels like too much. Too fast. Too late.
So you close it and just wait for the college to catch fire, or the professor to forget to make the question paper, or something despicable, just to be delulu.
For a few moments, this feels like a valid plan.
And then you come back to your senses and realise it won’t work. Unfortunately. So you just study.
But here’s what happens now. The spiral tightens.
You’re not studying because you’re calm anymore. You’re studying because you’re being pulled. By deadlines, by fear, by the thought of consequences. You jump between topics, you half understand things, you convince yourself you “kind of know it.”
In physics, when something spirals, it doesn’t just fall. It speeds up. The motion becomes tighter, faster, harder to control. It still moves, but it no longer decides the direction.
That’s exactly what this phase feels like.
Less sleep, more panic, faster scrolling, random confidence in things you read once. Everything feels urgent; nothing feels clear.
But spirals always end.
In space, they end with impact. And so will yours.
The spiralling would end, and your thoughts would reach ground, and then you would actually be like “hey, might as well go with it, see where it takes me.”
And with whatever is left of the reality, hopes, and preparation (with a little content written in your palms, just to nudge your answers in the right direction), you write the paper. Not perfectly. Not completely. But you write.
And somehow… It’s actually not bad.
Not great. Not amazing. But not the disaster you imagined at 1:15 AM.
And you pat yourself on the back as if you dusted yourself off and moved on to the next trimester, head on.
The spiral comes back, though, every time.
But that’s the point.
Because the spiral doesn’t begin in the exam hall, it doesn’t even begin in the end-of-term week. It begins much earlier, when control quietly slips but motion continues. One skipped lecture, one postponed task, one “I’ll do it later.”
So the takeaway isn’t “don’t spiral.” That’s unrealistic.
The takeaway is simpler.
Catch it early, when it’s slow and wide. When you still have control.
And if you don’t?
Then assume g as 10.
Fall faster. Hit reality sooner. Get back up quicker.
Because the spiral will come again.
You just get better at handling it each time.