venting mocha

currently this seems like the best means of venting my frustrations for the day. working out is probably the more productive and superior alternative but meh. in the midst of finals week ive felt like ive lost control over my life once again. enrolled college student: check. independence from parents influence: check. future goals established: check. on the road to attaining goals: uncertain. nothing wrong with uncertainty in life, in fact spontaneity is what makes life more enjoyable. everyone has aspirations, short-term, long-term, whatever. from hooking up with the chick sitting in front of you, to working to make ends meet to pay for school, to keeping the high grades. my number one goal right now is to get the high GPA so i can find a good job after college and go to a good grad school. its really my parents' fault. i know there are bigger problems in the world but something like this is branded too deep in my head to shake it off. all im feeling is tremendous downward pressure. and the source is that im just not working to my full potential. this problems followed me for the longest time. i used to be one who believed in that certain things were inevitable, that change was impossible at times... a pessimist doomed to have to settle for mediocrity if you will. junior year of high school was the turning point. id become influenced by new friends, ones whod shared backgrounds similar to mine, whos parents had pushed them the exact same way. i began to put more faith into myself and the results were more than impressive. yet my parents knew that i could do better and were eager to acknowledge it. but by then it had been too late-- and i was destined for this college. ill admit that certain people just have a knack for doing certain things. i dont agree with those that believe that some people are smart, some are dumb, and if youre dumb you cant do anything about it. i seriously think most people underestimate the capability of human will. there are a lot of people here that deserve to go to a better school. maybe nearly everyone. i can tell from seeing the potential in others. the reason theyre here is the same as mine- they didnt work to the fullest ability and this is the end result. or maybe im just putting too much faith in myself, maybe there really isnt anything i can do to tap that potential, or maybe that potential just doesnt exist.

a fairly successful friend of mine has done something unique to influence my life. over the course of the past few years, through various experiences hes demonstrated that the world is full of patterns and systems. im probably stupid for recognizing this really late but hes pointed out that the faster you recognize the system and learn from mistakes, the quicker you can improve. thats really the key to success. and once you reach that desired level of success, its just a matter of continuing to do the same thing over and over. its not something that arises strictly from genetic predisposition. (and even if it is, surely i got something from my parents, since my sisters academically secure). it isnt something you find in the 7 habits of highly effective people. while the sheer simplicity eludes me, it continues to prove itself true time and time again. so going back to my original source of frustrations, it makes sense that in order to achieve good grades one simply needs to recognize the mistakes and make the appropriate adjustment to fix them. after 3 years here im baffled that i still manage to screw up.

in high school i earned my grades independently. i didnt attend study sessions right before every exam. and i seemed to do fine. this continued to work pretty well until hitting upper division classes. my grades seemed to have faltered slightly. so i experimented and tried something different this year: studying with a buddy. in at least 1 class every quarter, classmates would meet up with me to study right before exam time. the results: no improvement in grades. fall quarters negative results in fact made me say "thats it, im not studying with other people anymore, moutta here." winter quarter i changed things up a little bit, i intentionally chose not to study with a friend (i think to his opposition) and hey, no negative results, but no improvement either. in another class that quarter a friend and i did semi-study sessions. pretty much wed ask each other how to do certain problems that we were unsure of, if the TA wasnt conveniently around. none of this, hey lets go over every chapter dilly dally. result: slight improvement. spring quarter for some really odd reason i decided to give studying with a friend another chance, with possibility in two classes but i wanted to keep the experiment going. right now the results are uncertain, but after todays final im pretty sure in that class im going to end up with no improvement. overall, im not blaming anyone specifically for my lack of improvement by studying with them, its my own damn fault that i chose to study with them to begin with. but after 3 quarters why do i keep making the same stupid mistake. the econ department is structured so that only the top 10-20% of each class is awarded As. and i know im capable of reaching that threshold, i just need to change my study habits.

or maybe im not capable of reaching that threshold. instead of excellence im doomed to settle for mediocrity.

anyone else reading this probably feels that i put too much stress on grades, that maybe im too mechanical and that i need to enjoy life a little more. i think my problem is that im enjoying life too much and once again i need to resort to some serious thinking and priority reshuffling.