Its 1.30 am, I've just barely survived (wait a minute...I think I did! :O) a 4 hour torture session, my Criminal Law professor calls an exam...if you like to call having your ass kicked and handed back to you on a platter an exam, then he's right. Oh and let's not forget to mention the 30+ hour light preparation, for a 4 hour "exam". Obviously, my brain must be this mushy grey mess, that can't process anything right now, and my eyes look more like a ruby than what they really are. It just has to be easier from here on...right? WRONG! But only this time.
Ass-kicking and brain damage aside, the funny thing is you actually get used to getting all beaten up and the curious thing is that you strangely not only learn how to cope with it but...I must say what other dare not say, at the cost of my life, you also learn to not only like it but love it and accept it as part of your life. You see, the really interesting side to this Darwinian survival of the fittest is that it actually teaches you three of the most important lessons you just can't learn in the classroom: how to bond together with your classmates, to fight like a brave for your grades, and never lose your faith in God. If you haven't already noticed (it took me about 15 minutes to come to this next point, so don't beat yourself up if you didn't anticipate it), these are three important skills for human development. The first one teaches you how to help others survive and help them help you survive; the second one is really basic when it comes to knowing how to set goals for yourself and kick ass until you achieve them; the third skill is the most important one of them all, because faith in God is what gives the hope necessary to have enough strength to make it to the end of the day and helps you to never doubt those abilities that He has bestowed upon you.
Call me crazy, call me a genius, call me whatever you want (except a communist, I don't like those guys), but it is because of those three skills, which make you a better person that you find yourself slowly falling in love, like a sucker, with not sleeping, working 20 hour days and being stressed out and pissed off almost every day, because going through all of that makes you feel better. And it should, each time you survive this hell you become 1/4 of a better person, more than what you can say for most people. SPOILER ALERT! all of this suffering just fails to teach you how to be organized, at least in a nice way, with each sleepless night and zombie-like existence during class, you eventually find that you get angry at yourself for being disorganized and working under a Just In Time system that really is making you live like a vampire: being really active at night and really asleep during the day. All of this makes you change your strategy and actually begin to plan your time ahead, which is not a nice way to improve yourself, but hey, lessons learned in the flesh are never forgotten.
Now, some of you guys must be either flipping me off, cursing at me, or just wishing you could send me an e-mail punch, (ha ha ha! let me see you try!), but the thing is you can't deny that each time you pull off and all nighter or get a 10 on an exam, you actually feel like you've become just a tad better. A proof of God's mastery, is that he designed us with this uncanny desire to make a difference, do something better for once and this propels us to go just a little past the extra mile. Effort, and all of its ugly consequences, leads to success, but the trick is to never get complacent and always feel the need to keep up the effort. A smart guy once said that crisis brings out the best in all of us, because it forces us to persevere, that guy must've been seriously wasted when he said that, because he kind of failed to mention that crisis also causes hair to fall off and stomachs to churn. But, you gotta give him some credit, when there's a carrot dangling in front of us and a stick spanking our butt, when the pressure is way too much than what you're used to, your whole body transforms into this efficient exam writing, paper finishing machine, fueled by your own desire to survive and maybe even do a great job at it. So yeah, crisis helps you do your best, ironic isn't it?
A friend of mine once shared with me the following list of choices:
1. Sleep well
2. Get good grades
3. Get a good social life
Pick 2 of the 3 choices.
WELCOME TO COLLEGE!
I can honestly tell you that the choices you pick will ultimately determine who you get along with, how good you do at school, how important college is for you, how much you actually enjoy going to college, how hard you'll work. I personally picked the last 2 choices (it's kinda obvious that I sent choice 1 right to hell right?), because I wasn't going to risk graduating as a no one and I sure don't want to be graduating eight years after beginning college. You might think you have to make this choice only when you begin your first day of college, but let me tell you one teeny tiny secret...you can actually make your choices as you go. I was dumb enough to pick choices 1 and 3, at the beginning, the result? I failed Math II and got a really sucky final CUM for my first year, so sucky I'm not gonna embarrass by dignifying it with some publicity. So where was I? Oh yeah, human beings tend to be erratical creatures, we constantly change some things about us to suit our needs. My advice to you would be that one of the choices you pick is absolutely permanent, so that you only change one of them. Why? You must have an ultimate goal that always motivates you to keep going on, no matter what, so that you have some stability in you future plans, but some moveable priorities so you also have some spontaneity: that my friends is perfect balance, exactly what you need to avoid a lot of unnecessary stress and avoid monotony. This also guarantees a stable and sure character and personality.
Ever heard that life, especially college, is like a pyramid? That it becomes harder the further up the ladder you go? Seems logical, right? Let me tell you that some of the things college does is that it defies the laws of physics, of life and it can seem to be acting somewhat illegally sometimes, as well as defying common logic. So last trimester can be probably harder than this one? In my beloved prison (ESEN), that seems to be case. Hell, sometimes even the last day was harder than the current day. Seems like chaos, but it might give you some hope to know that tomorrow might be a much more relaxing and exciting day. It might be that the next day you won't have to wake up early or that you don't have any exams or papers due in that day, in short, it can possibly be much better than today. It's nice to know that there's a LOT of hope amidst the chaos of college life, and hope is what keeps us alive.
The bottom line is that you should thank God and be grateful for all the sacrifices you have to endure. I know it's a tough pill to swallow, but look at the light at the end of the tunnel, and you'll see your goals, probably a glimpse of your dreams, and a mirror image showing the new better you, which will what you'll turn into after kicking some ass. And that's what we need, just a hint of what awaits us at the other side, to keep us fighting. An old song talked about always believing and holding on to our motivations, and the songwriter couldn't have been righter. College is a tough journey, but by being gutsy, never losing faith, never giving up, learning to take some shots and always keeping hope alive, you'll make it through, in a surprisingly successful way. It doesn't matter if you happen to fail, on one or more occasions, along the way, humans are prone to failing because we are not perfect, just learn from your mistakes, but don't let them hold you back, as mistakes are made to help know which is the way to greatness, not take you away from it.
I think I had something to do...oh yeah...I think it was reviewing a paper due to be emailed tomorrow...mmm not really sure...whatever!
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