I’m sitting in the lecture hall, and my professor just explained a difficult concept. I try to quickly look over my notes to process the concept, but by the time I look up from my iPad, the professor has already explained three new ideas. I spend the rest of the lecture feeling stuck and overwhelmed.
This was a typical class experience for me during winter quarter. I always left the lecture hall feeling more confused than when I came in. So, in the middle of winter quarter, I decided to change things up: I decided not to go to lecture.
I still liked walking to campus, so I watched lecture recordings in libraries or coffee shops. This way, I could pause and look back at my notes whenever I was confused. Moreover, I didn’t have to feel the pressure of other students understanding the material while I stayed confused. This system felt very comfortable to me.
While my plan worked for the first few weeks, the comfort quickly turned into laziness. I put off watching lectures to prioritize my club commitments and social life. Even if I was watching a lecture, I could simply close the tab to relieve myself when the content got too difficult. Naturally, academics started feeling less important to me. I started losing passion for my classes and thus started putting them off even more.
Realizing that my grades were only heading downhill with this routine, I decided that I needed to change. The solution was simple: face my fear and go to class. I made small steps towards going back to class in person, attending more and more non-mandatory in-person classes every week.
Going back in-person was a challenge. Out of habit of closing tabs on difficult lecture recordings, I was very close to getting up and leaving the classroom many times. However, forcing myself to at least sit through the lecture despite being confused helped me learn the reality that feeling lost and frustrated is a necessary part of learning. You need to get through the confusing stage in order to learn. There is simply no shortcut. But the result will be very rewarding.
Now, you might have friends who just cram and get A’s on exams. But I assure you with 100% confidence that they spend as much time confused and stressed in their room as you. Whether or not they show it, we all go through this difficult stage.
In college, we have a lot of freedom of choice. Sure, you can choose to not go to class and binge-watch lectures the night before your exam. But you also have the choice to go to class, keep stress levels low and do better on your exams. I choose to make the latter choice.