Four OH Moments in Writing: Lessons Learned That Literally Made Me Say “OH”

Approaching writing was once like trying to approach the bunnies that roam the grounds of Cal Poly Pomona: I’m not at all sure how I should go about it. I always think I am so close, SO close, to petting a little bun. I approach it carefully and quietly. I try to look as unintimidating as possible, temporarily removing my MAC “Rebel” lipstick and nose piercing. Nevertheless, it scurries away every time. I’ve accepted that I will never pet the bunnies that live on campus.

With writing, I was never quite sure how to get started writing on my own. I read, but I wasn’t reading the right things, and I wrote, but my writing wasn’t getting any better. I thought I was close, but I was way off; comparing new work to old work shattered those beliefs. I almost wrote myself off as someone who just couldn’t write.

Here are four OH lessons that helped me realize that just about anyone who tries can:

1 Good writing begins with good reading habits

Reading will undoubtedly enhance your writing abilities. Stephen D. Krashen, author of The Power of Reading: Insights from the Research, has examined that avid readers become better thinkers. His research shows that those who read more frequently have less “ ‘writing apprehension’ because of their superior command of the written language” (36). One aspect of his theory stunned me: writing more frequently will not result in better writing. He explains, “Writing style does not come from actual writing experience, but from reading… Actual writing can help us solve problems” (132). OH. So that means that if I read cheesy teen romance novels, whose style I hate but story line I love, I’ll probably write like that too? Yes. Read the books of authors you aspire to write like. Krashen mentions that writing helps us solve problems. Case in point: I didn’t realize these lessons had influenced me so heavily until I started writing about them.

 2 Always keep your audience in mind

I recently attended a lecture entitled “Why We Write, and Where,” by Dr. Sarah Mesle, part time English professor at UCLA, Senior Humanities Editor for the Los Angeles Review of Books, and co-editor for Avidly.org. She also emphasized the importance of reading, her reason for doing so a little different from Krashen’s. She advised us to read to be interesting in order to keep our readers interested. Aside from that, she told attendees to ask themselves why their readers cared about what they were writing and who their readers were. I had never thought about my readers because I had never bothered to share my work, which brings me to my next point…

3 Feedback is essential

This blog is the first time I ever let anyone other than a teacher read my writing. And the saying “you are your own worst critic” is very true in my case. I was always afraid of the negative feedback I would receive from others. The Internet is a brutal place. However, the positive feedback and constructive criticism I have received from other bloggers has really improved my self-esteem and my writing. Don’t be afraid of negative commentary; if it is not constructive advice then feel free to disregard it. There are plenty of people out there that will be happy to comment something useful!

4 Break free of the formatting

Take it from a girl who wrote Jane Schaffer paragraphs daily for four years in high school; break free because it feels great. Not all writing will fit the mold. If you are a good writer trying to be a great writer, then preassembled essay structures will be restricting. Write in a way that exhibits your style and your ideas effectively. If that happens to be in ten paragraphs, each composed of four sentences, or four paragraphs, each composed of ten sentences, or even a mix of both long and short paragraphs, then so be it. Nothing is set in stone when it comes to style.

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Works Cited

Krashen, Stephen D. The Power of Reading: Insights from the Research. 2nd Edition. Portsmouth: Heinemann, 2004.

 

The Death of a Pseudonym

“ ‘What if?’ is always the key question,” says the unremitting author Stephen King when asked where his ideas come from.¹ “What if?” was likely the driving factor when he decided to publish seven novels under the pen name Richard Bachman. These novels include Rage (1977), The Long Walk (1979), Roadwork (1981), The Running Man (1982), Thinner (1984), The Regulators (1996), and Blaze (2007). Only the first four, however, are considered the Bachman books. After Thinner was released, a bookstore clerk named Steve Brown caught on.

According to Brown, he was “no more than two pages into [Thinner] when [he] said [to himself], ‘This is either Stephen King or the world’s best imitator’.” ² Relying on nothing but a hunch, he headed over to the Library of Congress. All but one of the Bachman books were copyrighted under King’s agent at the time, Kirby McCauley. Brown took his research further and found that Rage, the first of the books, was under King’s name. Out of respect and admiration for King, Brown wrote him a letter, including copies of all his research, explaining that he wanted to write an article on the subject, but also promising to keep quiet if that is what King wished. King went along willingly, enthusiastically even, when he was discovered. Within two weeks, King located the bookstore where Brown worked and phoned him there. King suggested an interview and promised Brown that his would be the only extensive interview regarding the matter. Brown shared that he believed King “knew that the truth was going to come out anyway, and he liked the idea of this nobody book clerk in Washington getting the story instead of the New York Times or something.” ²

So why did King do it? What was the purpose did pseudonym serve? Originally, the alias was a means of avoiding “over publishing the market.” ³ However, in the first version of his introduction to The Bachman Books, “Why I Was Bachman,” Stephen King shared with his readers that he simply wanted to know if he could do it again, “if Bachman could do it again.” ³ He wanted to know if he was good enough a writer to be a best selling author twice in one lifetime. He had always wondered if it had been luck that had gotten him his lot in life:

“You try to make sense of your life… Everyone does it, but perhaps people who have extraordinarily lucky or unlucky lives do it a little more… there’s [a] part that suggests it’s all a lottery… it is for some reason depressing to think it was all – or even mostly – an accident. So maybe you try to find out if you could do it again.” ³

Just before the answer to his question could be revealed, King was undeniably uncovered. Bachman had never been given much of a chance. King made sure that Bachman kept a low profile, essentially starting from the very bottom with little to no publicity, his books lining the shelves of drug stores and bus stations. Nevertheless, he had begun to acquire a bit of a following. Soon after the release of Thinner, Bachman was intended to publish a novel that King believed would take him to the best sellers lists. Unfortunately, “the cancer of pseudonym” ³ took him too soon.

In the second introduction to The Bachman Books, “The Importance of Being Bachman,” King admitted
that he was not as approving of his outing as he originally seemed, that Bachman was “supposed to be there for the long haul.” ⁴ He mentioned in the first version that he had been receiving letters asking if he was Richard Bachman beginning with the release of the first book and confessed that he lied repeatedly, trying to drag out the existence of Richard Bachman for as long as he possibly could. Bachman was to King, at first, “a sheltered place where [he] could a few early books he felt his readers might like,” but then Bachman grew to be his own person: a man with a family, a home, a history, and even a face.⁴

Bachman became the man that finished what King started and could not complete as himself. King began Rage, originally titled Getting It On, in 1966 as a senior in high school. He finished the novel in 1971. According to Goodreads, the novel entails “a disturbed high-school student with authority problems [who] kills one of his teachers and takes the rest of his class hostage. [He then,] over the course of one long, tense and unbearable hot afternoon… explains what led him to this drastic sequence of events, while at the same time deconstructing the personalities of his classmates, forcing each one to justify his or her existence.” ⁵ The novel has always been a disconcerting one for King. He eventually decided to remove the novel from the market after two separate teenage boys, each responsible for similar incidents, were discovered with it hidden away in their lockers.⁶ King writes that Rage was written before Bachman existed, “but in a Bachman state of mind: low rage and simmering despair.” ⁴ Bachman was the only one who could finish the job. In essence, Bachman is the part of King that he doesn’t want to be, his darker half. Stephen King, being the man brimming with ideas that he is, eventually wrote a book on the subject and titled it The Dark Half. The novel was about a writer whose pen name came to life.

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Sources

1 “Frequently Asked Questions” http://stephenking.com/faq.html

2 “Bachman Exposed” by Steve Brown http://www.liljas-library.com/bachman_exposed.php/

3 “Why I Was Bachman” by Stephen King http://www.amazon.com/Bachman-Books-Richard/dp/0340952253 

4 “The Importance of Being Bachman” by Stephen King http://www.liljas-library.com/bachman_king.php

5 https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/66370.Rage?from_search=true

6 The Story of Bachman: A Pseudonymous Chapter in Stephen King’s History http://charnelhouse.tripod.com/essays/bachmanhistory.html

 

 

Wild Thing: A Rhetorical Analysis

In the poem, “Wild Thing,”  Sapphire depicts the thoughts of a thirteen-year old boy named Leroy. Sapphire is also known as Ramona Lofton and author of the book Push, upon which the groundbreaking film Precious was based. Much of her work comes with a stomach churning realness. According to glbtq.com, Sapphire’s piece “was inspired by the rape of a white female jogger in Central Park by a group of African-American youths, who later admitted that they were out ‘wilding’ (i.e., looking for trouble).”

You can read the poem or listen to it read by the poet here.

This poem is quite possibly the most unconventional piece I have ever come across. I stumbled across it when I picked up The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry at Barnes and Noble. I left the store and did not buy the book, but I could not get the poem out of my head. The feeling that it gave me in the pit of my stomach is still fixed there. Sapphire’s brutally raw writing asserts that it is the ignorance and miseducation of our youth that causes tragedies, such as the rape of this woman, to occur. In the poem, “Wild Thing,” Sapphire takes on the persona of a thirteen-year old African American boy named Leroy. Leroy’s pent up anger and distorted view of the world leads him to commit a brutal crime against a young woman.

As a result of the poem, Sapphire was once confronted by a young African American woman who asked her “How is what you are writing different from what white people are writing about black men?” (Smith). Sapphire was disappointed that her words had been construed in such a negative way. The objective she had as she wrote “Wild Thing” was not to bash African American men, but rather to make her audience acutely aware of how someone, regardless of race, could succumb to such a deteriorated outlook on life. Leroy’s goals include having expensive sneakers and chains, “[being] a cop or the biggest dope dealer in Harlem”, and doing “the wild thing.” At one point in the poem, Leroy’s teacher asks him what he would do if he had only six months to live. He replies that he would “fuck her, sell dope, and do the wild thing.”

Sapphire makes the audience explicitly aware of the lack security and encouragement in Leroy’s life. The adults surrounding him have either lost faith in him, disappointed him, or abused him. His father left him and his mother claims him as mentally challenged in order to receive bigger welfare checks. At only six years old, he was sexually molested by a member of his church and was forced to keep it to himself. The poem is about the need to educate and protect our youth.

According to an article in the New York Times, Sapphire worked as a mediator between parents and children for the Children’s Aid Society. She described the experience as “profound [as it allowed] her to enter the private lives of white people and black”(Smith). She also taught reading to children, who she referred to as “preciouses,” in Harlem and the Bronx (Smith). After becoming aware of this part of her life, I understood why she chose to write a poem like “Wild Thing.” She had personal experiences with troubled children and families. She wanted to reach out to these people on a broader scale.

Sapphire’s writing style has been reproached as “affecting and manipulative all at the same time” (Kakutani). Regardless of what critics have said about her work, I don’t think that she means for her writing to be manipulative in this poem. And I don’t think she over exaggerates Leroy’s hostile voice. Her choice of words allows for readers to understand his aggression. The poem, however, did affect my emotions quite unlike anything else. I asked a number of peers to read this poem and share their thoughts. A typical reaction consisted of either a loss for words or misinterpretation.

Tropes and tactics Sapphire used to affect her reader’s emotions:

Metaphor

“My sweat is a river running
thru my liver 
green with hate…”

Simile

“And I´m running, 
running wild, 
running free, 
like soldiers down 
the beach, 
like someone 
just threw me the ball.”

Onomatopoeia

“BOP BOP 
the music
 pops thru me
like electric shocks…”

“I eat your fear
like a chimpanzee
ow ow
ow whee
ow!”

Imagery

“My thighs are locomotives
 hurling me thru the underbrush of Central Park, the jungle.”

Sapphire principally uses pathos to move her readers, and she does it in a way that stings. Her writing is electric, meaning it can be felt. The images that her language paints are colorful, so that they jump off the page and at you. I admire the candor in her style and the courage it took to share it with the world.

A Talk with Dr. Sarah Mesle

I recently attended a lecture by part time English professor at UCLA, Senior Humanities Editor for the Los Angeles Review of Books, and co-editor for Avidly.org, Dr. Sarah Mesle. Her talk, “Why We Write, and Where,” was both straightforward and enlightening. I left the room with a new perspective and a lot to think about. Here are a few of the points she made that really hit home:

Your writing does not have to be perfect. Dr. Mesle explained midway through her speech that “perfection is the opposite of getting things done and getting things done is what makes you a writer.” My fear of being imperfect has prevented me from showing my work to others for many years. Finishing a piece of writing from beginning to end and sharing it to get constructive criticism can be intimidating, but it was what makes you improve as a writer. Striving for perfect writing is striving for something impossible. As long as you keep reading, writing, and learning and as long as communication continues to evolve, your writing will never stop improving.

Keep readers interested by being interesting. How can you be interesting you ask? Be interested. Read more, watch more, and talk to people who know more than you. I connected this with something Joseph Harris wrote in the introduction of Rewriting: How To Do Things With Texts, “Effective use begins in generous understanding” (5). Having a firm grasp on a subject allows you to write about it in a way that engages and even excites your readers. Dr. Mesle also shared a very helpful tip: read to find out what other writers do wrong, and learn from their mistakes. As you read other pieces of writing, take notice of where you begin to lose interest and analyze why it happened. Avoid doing the same in your writing.

All registers of writing matter. This bit, which should have been obvious to me, surprised me the most.  Texts, tweets, statuses, notes, journaling, school assignments, etc. all contribute to making you a better writer. Dr. Mesle believes that if you can make your readers laugh in the one hundred and sixty characters that Twitter allows per tweet, you can easily get them to cry, think, and even change. And she’s right. A funny tweet is a difficult feat. You have to be daring, witty, and concise.

Dr. Sarah Mesle fashioned a solid paved road out of the once snaking dirt path that I thought I had to take to be a better writer. She laid out a set of doable tasks and said just do them, and you will get there.

The Grand Budapest Hotel: A Review

Like many of Wes Anderson’s films, The Grand Budapest Hotel is an enchanting sight. Anderson, as always, pays meticulous attention to detail and has a particular eye for color. Brilliantly charming and teeming with vivacity, the film focuses on the blossoming relationship between a renowned concierge named Monsieur Gustave H. (Ralph Fiennes) and his lobby boy Zero Moustafa (Tony Revolori). The film is intricately set in four time periods. The first is not made known, but shows a young woman carrying the book The Grand Budapest Hotel as she visits a memorial site donning several hotel keys. Then it is 1985, where we meet the Author (Tom Wilkinson) who remains nameless throughout the film. He speaks to the audience directly and begins to tell us of how he came to write this book. In 1968, the Author (Jude Law) visits The Grand Budapest Hotel where he meets Zero Moustafa (F. Murray Abraham), owner of the once famous Grand Budapest Hotel. He tells the Author the story of how he came to own the hotel, transporting viewers to the year 1932.

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The charismatic Monsieur Gustave H. is revealed to attend to elderly blonde and rich women who visit the hotel in ways beyond the duties of a concierge. When he learns that Madame D. (Tilda Swinton) has passed away, he rushes to her, bringing his newly employed lobby boy, Zero, along. Monsieur Gustave defends Zero on the train ride there when the military police try to hassle him for insufficient documentation. Their relationship proves to be more than that of employer and employee, rather caring mentor and admiring mentee. Anderson seems to be repeating a pattern (considering that Zero happens to be an orphan) seen in many of his previous films including Rushmore, The Life Aquatic with Steven Zissou, and Moonrise Kingdom. When confronted about the repetition of this situation by critics, he revealed, “it’s just the opposite of what I really grew up with, and for me there’s something exotic about it…I’m drawn to those father-figure characters that are larger-than-life people, and I’ve sought out mentors who are like that, so I relate to them” (biography.com). “Larger than life” are precisely the words to accurately describe Monsieur Gustave, a man of impeccable taste, holder of high standards for his hotel, yet partaker in the most scandalous of exploits.

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Monsieur Gustave is left with Madame D’s most prized painting, “Boy with Apple,” and is consequently accused of murdering her by her other heirs. The remainder of the film consists of Monsieur Gustave working to prove his innocence, with help from the loyal Zero, while avoiding the malevolent antics of Madame D’s son and his henchman and fleeing the military police. Mr. Moustafa, when speaking of his mentor years later, expressed to the Author that “[he thought Monsieur Gustave’s] world had vanished long before he ever entered it – but…he certainly sustained the illusion with a marvelous grace.” He fondly remembered his most trusted guide as he related, “there [were] still faint glimmers of civilization left in [the] barbaric slaughterhouse that was once known as humanity… He was one of them.” In a time ridden with war and totalitarian brutes, Monsieur Gustave stood out in stark contrast. For instance, take the dull gray that adorns the uniforms of the military as opposed to the undiluted purple that embellishes Gustave’s.

This film is not for those with diminutive attention spans. Anderson, as always, exhibits fast paced wit and dialogue. The elaborate story telling and hurdles in time demand attentiveness. If you’re capable of such, this film is beyond worthy of one hundred minutes of your time.

Performing Prose Exercise – Awkward Elevator Experiences

The kettle on the stove began whistling just as I realized I only had ten minutes before class started. My current favorite, mojito mint green tea, made its way into my pink thermos. I grabbed my back pack and was out the door. I heard a door slam somewhere in the hall, but figured someone had just entered a room. I walked along until I decided to turn my head slightly to the left. I realized he had been walking behind me for who knows how long. He had been so quiet, picking up each foot with every step, carrying nothing but what was inside his pockets. I, on the other hand, warn people when I’m behind them, dragging my feet along with my backpack swinging from side to side, jumbling everything within it. I was so startled that my left hand went flailing along with my thermos as I jumped off to the right. I yelled at him unintentionally, “You scared the sh*t out of me!” Then we apologized profusely to one another as we walked toward the elevator.

He pressed the elevator button as I tried to find where my hot tea had sprung a leak from. The doors opened and we entered, standing on opposites sides and as far from each other as possible. I didn’t look at him as we descended, pretending to be preoccupied with my thermos, which was still leaking. Before the doors opened we both managed to look up at each other at the same time, and I couldn’t stop myself from apologizing once more and breaking the awkward silence. We exited the building going in opposite directions.

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Through the voice and footing of this incident, I tried to make the reader picture the scenario from my point of view. By beginning with an irrelevant matter, the kettle on the stove, the readers are as unsuspecting as I was when the awkward affair occurred. I refer to the young man as “he” because, although we live in the same building, we are complete strangers. I very precisely refer to my actions, so that the readers can put themselves in my place.

A Brief HERstory

When I was younger, I was an only child and a homebody due to overprotective parents. In the absence of cable, and therefore, good daytime television, I turned to books to escape the monotony of my home. Reading gave me the ability to lose myself within the lives of others, almost like I was in a trance. Everything else fell away and the worlds I immersed myself in were built up around me. I didn’t become interested in writing until I was in the fourth grade and I was required to write a two page, doubled spaced biography of a given poet. I was assigned Emily Dickinson. I spent an entire day reading about her life and learned she was somewhat of a recluse. I felt I could relate. I remember lying sprawled out on the floor of my room, with library books and printed articles strewn across the ugly green carpet.

After the whole Emily Dickinson affair, ten year old me decided I’d give poetry a try. At the time I was also undergoing a severe Britney Spears phase. My poems sounded like the lyrics to possible pop songs; in other words, they were awful. I realized this when I reread them after some time and promptly threw them out.  I temporarily gave up on poetry and tried journaling. Middle school was not a very eventful time in my life and most of my entries consisted of whether or not my sixth grade crush looked or talked to me that day.  After looking back on those entries, they too, ended up in the garbage.

Academic writing did not become a consistent until I got to high school. Most of the essays I wrote were based on the books I read in English class. All the English teachers at my high school taught the same exact essay-writing format called the Jane Schaffer. This format was created with the intention of drilling the “correct” paragraph format into the students mind. The ideal body paragraph consisted of a topic sentence, a concrete detail, such as a quote from a book or article (something you could cite), followed by two commentary sentences, and a conclusion sentence.  The one concrete sentence along with the two commentary sentences was considered a “chunk.” Students were asked to write one, two, or three chunk paragraphs on an almost daily basis.  This approach was practical when in trying to teach students organization. Teachers aimed to help students make their papers structured and somewhat thoughtful. Too much emphasis was put on arrangement and facts; style was left out of the equation. High school teachers seem to lack both the time and the resources needed to help students develop their own style. High school English was a breeze for me and that’s when I thought I was a good writer.

College ensued and I realized I was missing a key component when I read the papers of some of my peers. That component was style and I’ve been hard at work trying to develop it since then.  There are times when I think I’ve cultivated my own and then I realize that I am simply mimicking. At first is was fear that held me back, the fear of being wrong. Although style should be kept within the confines of grammar, it stems from creativity where there can be no wrong or right; there are only people who like your style and people who don’t. My goal is to create a writing style that is so honest, it’s unsettling in way that makes you keep reading, Hannah Horvath-esque (not involving cocaine or promiscuity). I keep a journal where I write as often as possible. It’s filled with disconnected thoughts, inspirational quotes and lyrics, brief encounters that I turn into full-length stories, bad poetry, and the occasional to-do list.

Lately reading, what was once a passionate hobby, has been difficult to do. If sit down with a nice cup of something hot and a book, I find my mind wandering off within ten minutes. The older I get, the more it seems there is to worry about.  This is why writing has become so important to me. If I write it all out, it plagues my mind a little less, whatever it may be. My personal writing has yet to make its debut to the public; however, I have recently started this blog where I plan to, among other things, post advice based on past personal experiences that I would have liked to receive in my time of need. I will use this blog to get feedback on writing that is less intimate, but exhibits the same style that I use in my journal. Ultimately, I know that I am my own worst critic. It is not unusual of me to tear up and throw out my work before anyone else has ever seen it. Optimistically speaking, the opinions of others will help me to not critique myself so harshly.

I don’t expect to reach my destination any time soon just because writing is a journey that never ends. I am certain that my writing will never stop improving so long as I keep educating myself. The beauty of an individual’s piece of writing is that so many people see the same things and write about them in such distinctive manners. There is enough to write about in the world so that you never have to stop growing. At times, I feel discouraged by my work because someone has been there and someone has done that. What I remind myself each time is that I have the ability to make others see things exactly the way I see them, and I may not view things the way the previous person did.

Time Management Tips to INGRAIN in your BRAIN

The transition you make from high school to college is one in which you finally inherit the freedom from parent signatures on your report card. Your motivation for good grades is no longer avoiding a lengthy scolding from your parents about how you need to learn to apply yourself. Your motivation for excelling in college is a better future for yourself, rather than the satisfaction your parents. This newly found freedom, however, might cloud your judgment when prioritizing tasks.

These tips apply to the busy college student, but more so to the college freshman that has found himself/herself living on campus. In other words, this is a basic guide to making the best use of your time as a college student who wants to excel in school. This is what I wish someone had been kind enough to drill into my mind before I started my freshman year living in the dorms. As the first offspring of two overly protective parents, the freedom I encountered living on my own was so new and exciting that it got the best of me. The prospect of so many new friendships overwhelmed me. I forgot what I was paying thousands of dollars for.

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#1 Learn how to say no, thank you. It’s Thursday night and apparently you are the only one on your floor who got stuck with an 8am Friday class. Everyone is going to a party. Your friends are all begging you to come. This scenario can work out a number of ways. You can go to the party and get back around 3am. You’ll probably wake up the next morning and decide that sleeping in is a better use of your time than attending class (hint: it’s not). Or you might wake up at 7:52 am (after unconsciously hitting the snooze button too many times), throw on the first thing you see, and chew on a stick of gum while hauling your buns to class. You’ll get there late and, in spite of it being a cold morning, sweaty. Your chances of not nodding off throughout the entire class are slim. But say you resist the peer pressure and stay in. You’ll feel free to unwind whilst watching an episode of whatever series you’re currently hooked on and be in bed by 11pm. You’ll be out of bed by 7:02 am, get ready (aka brush your teeth), eat breakfast, get to class on time, and take quality notes. It’s up to you.

#2 Make to do lists. Part of you morning routine should be to make a list of goals you would like to accomplish for that day. Make sure that you set realistic goals for yourself. Consider how much time each task will require before putting it down on your list. This will help keep you organized and motivated. Some people keep a mental list, but I find that visual reminders help the most. For iPhone owners, the reminders app allows users to list tasks and designate priority level. This is my to-do list for today. The tasks are doable seeing as I’ve already accomplished one. The exclamation marks are visual reminders of which tasks are most important to me.

#3 Treat your body well. Sleep? But everyone is hanging out until 3 in the morning! I’m missing out! I promise you that getting an A in your hardest class is much more fulfilling than watching the late night shenanigans of your dorm mates. There is a time and place for all of that. The time for the aforementioned shenanigans is not the night before a day jam packed with classes that you need to pay attention in. Try to go to bed early and wake up early. Early morning is the best time to work because distractions are kept to a minimum. Adequate sleep is imperative to keep your mind alert and strong. Lack of sleep can cause unnecessary stress and even lead to depression.

Everyone knows about the freshman fifteen. Late nights call for late night hunger pangs, and if you have a car or a friend with a car, you better believe you’ll be making late night trips to McDonalds. This could’ve been avoided if you had just gone to bed. Try to keep healthy snacks within your reach for times like these. Weight gain will also cause you unnecessary stress. Schedule in time to exercise to relieve the stress from school. Everyone needs a break at some point, so why not make yours a productive one. Gather your dorm mates and plan semiweekly games of soccer or volleyball. Sweat and smiles are guaranteed.

#4 Go to class! I cannot stress this enough. Ugh! But attendance doesn’t count and he puts all the lectures online. Your professors view you as an adult and they expect you to attend class. They are not there to force you to go to class. The decision is up to you and if you don’t, the only one the will suffer is you when you’re entirely lost in that class. Going to class and paying attention saves you so much study time. What professors explain in class is what you can expect to be on the tests. When study time comes around, you won’t have to cram all the material because you will already know most of it. Attending classes and paying attention in them saves you so much time and stress.

#5 Make use of the Swiss cheese concept. According to Alan Lakein, in his book How to Get Control of Your Time and Your Life, the Swiss cheese method consists of making holes in large tasks in order to make them less intimidating. Your professors give you a syllabus within the first week with all of your assignments laid out for the quarter/semester. Make a list of all the steps it will take to complete large assignments.  These are tasks that can be completed when you find you have spare time. Say you have a gap between classes. Head over the library and check out a few books for that research project due week five. Take it slow and don’t let the entire load fall on the night before the assignment is due. Try to keep some work with you, so that whenever you have some unexpected free time you can make some dents in that whopping ten-page paper.

#6 Create a study environment in which you can focus with ease. This means put your phone in a drawer and leave it there. Instagram and Twitter will still be there when you get it back. Studying with others is common, especially when living in the dorms. Make sure that the people you choose to do homework with have similar goals. If their main concern is cracking jokes and slacking off, then you probably shouldn’t be working with him.

Focusing also includes not wasting your time stressing about what you have to get done. Overthinking your assignments is a waste of time. Stick to your to do list and get started as soon as possible. Dedicate a few solid hours to actually working, instead of goofing off or complaining about how much you have to do.

#7 Stay motivated. At times the workload may be overwhelming and you may start to think, “Why am I even doing this?” Make a list of the reasons why to remind you when those difficult times roll around. I am motivated by many things, but most of all, I am motivated by my younger brothers. I want them to see me pushing forward and I want them to follow. I’ll just leave a little visual reminder for myself here.