Fight The Hypo

Last night was one of those nights for me. If you’re a law student - or have ever been one - you know what I’m talking about…

a paper due in a week that you have no idea how to write (or research)…

50 pages of case reading staring you down…

just received below average grades (in your estimation) in two classes (thankfully, just mid-terms, but still)…

It seems like there’s no time. If you’re not careful, it’s easy to back yourself into thinking it can’t humanly be done - or, more dangerously, that YOU can’t get it done. At least that’s what I can feel like - nearly arriving at your wit’s end, wanting to throw in the towel.

And then it kind of dawns on you (even if you don’t want to believe it): somehow you’re going to make this happen and you’re going to get through it. To get to this epiphany though you need patience. Sometimes the supply of that precious commodity is more plentiful than others. Incidentally, I’m not suggesting law school is unique in this way or perhaps even worth this kind of heartburn.

What do you do when you just never get to that point, though?

“Just grit your way through it,” is what my high school baseball coach would have told me after my 20th lap.

But seriously, I’m really asking. My approach to date has been to sit down and triage my tasks, take one at a time and try to plow through as much as I can until I fall over. I can’t think of another way to do it. It gets me on task, helps me see the bigger picture, and, most importantly, gets me beyond my current feelngs.

Though I will say last night, I added one more - screaming. I have the great fortune of having a 20 minute ride home from class each night. It’s actually a nice little break. So, the only thing I could do last night was scream. Felt like a good release and it was. It wasn’t angry or sad or stressed, really. Just felt like I needed to do something to release it and running around the block wasn’t an option at that point. [Update: I should add, for those concerned class mates who asked how I was doing tonight, that I'm doing just fine. I was just feeling a bit overwhelmed last night.]

After I was done screaming I returned to my regular scheduled program - prioritized the reading I needed to have done for this week and turned to longer-term tasks. I sat down, read and briefed for Thursday’s Torts class (my last reading for the week) and outlined my approach to my paper. I literally fell asleep as I typed Age Discrimmmmmm… (of course, that’s the ADEA the subject for my paper due next week).

In the grand scheme of things, I really didn’t get very far last night (or today, since I have that pesky - and rewarding - job thing), but I got enough done enough to realize that the workload is manageable if still a bit overwhelming.

However, I’m still soliciting ideas for how to manage time, how to increase your energy (no drugs, Dr. Bombay), and how to get things done.

Discuss…