Studying? What is that? What is that?

To those inquiring minds, yes, I still subscribe to Rolling Stone magazine if you catch my drift.

You know what sucks about seminary so far? Well, I guess it isn't seminary per se, but life in seminary? I don't know how to study.

It all started when I was a young lad in elementary school. I got A's easy enough that I didn't think homework was necessary. So then I started failing because I wasn't doing my homework. My mom took exception to this philosophy and came up with a grand solution.

1. She taped a checklist of things I was supposed to do everyday, including writing down assignments and getting the teacher to initial said assignments, as well as checking my homework over, right onto my desk.
2. She bought me a day planner to write down all assignments in and have teachers initial.

Sounds like a good plan. After one week I had figured out how to forge my teachers initials and suddenly I went from having 3 or 4 assignments every night to having zero. Being in fourth grade, I doubted my mom's ability to catch on. I also doubted her ability to read her mail since every three assignments I didn't turn in, a demerit was issued and sent home to my parents. I got 7 demerits that year.

So I finally decided that doing my homework was probably the better route to take instead of failing school and repeating fourth grade. What I discovered was that in the 5 minutes before work was due, I could do it sufficiently enough to get a C. I was ok with this. My parents were not, but I tried to ignore their anger over my poor grades.

As my school career continued, I fell into a pattern of doing last minute work, not studying for tests, and being entirely satisfied just to pass. This continued through High School.

When I started college at Eastern, I quickly found more work was required than I was willing to do. I skipped most of my math classes and somehow managed a D. The only class I did well in was Composition. I transfered back to Frontier. What did I find? Classes were much easier than at EIU. The A's started rolling in. During one summer term, I took 19 hours and got all A's. Did I study? Nope.

Bethel came and went along the same lines. Classes weren't so much hard as they were just labor intensive. I learned that homework wasn't graded so much on content as it was on whether it was done or not. Seriously, the further I have gotten from my Bethel education, the more worthless it seems.

This brings me to my present situation. I am at Asbury Seminary, and the work required of me is more than anything I have ever experienced. I know how to read the assigned reading and do so and can retain the knowledge. I know how to write a paper and do well. What I don't know how to do it study for tests. Tests at Bethel were jokes compared to tests here. Throughout my entire academic career, I always loved tests because I could normally ace them without much effort. Here I am lucky to get an 80% with alot of studying. I don't know how to study. I don't know how to look at our material and point out what points I should focus on more for the tests than others. I don't know how to manage my time between reading and reviewing.

So there is a big lesson I need to learn while I am here. How to study. I personally think tests are stupid anyways because in real life, if am counseling someone or pastoring a church or whatever, I will have references available. But maybe I think so because I don't know how to study, and also, hate to study. I love to read, but I hate to study.

I also need to not be content with getting C, if it is not by best effort. I still struggle with the desire to quit studying and jump on the computer or dive into a personal book, rather than one for school, and simply be ok with getting a C. A C is fine if I do my best and that's the outcome, but I have to learnt o do my best. Laziness is definitly a struggle for me.

That's my rant for now.

peace out,
hersch