Hello, everyone!

I hope all of you are enjoying this true atmosphere of fall! As most of you probably know, the OU/Texas game was upon us. Unfortunately, I was not able to make the trip to Dallas. Instead, I returned to Oklahoma City for a very much needed three day weekend.

Now, I’m sure a lot of you are wondering about my title for this blog (catchy, is it not?). Well, the derivation of this title has to do a lot with my past week at school. I had taken my Organic Chemistry exam last Friday on October 9th and gotten my results back on that next Monday. I was absolutely devastated to find that I had gotten an 84 on this second exam.

“Minh, seriously. I can’t believe you are freaking out over a B on an Organic Chemistry test. You did fine. Stop stressing. Now would you leave me be so I could maybe get a hamburger in peace?”

That’s right. I had actually stopped one of my friends when I saw him at a hamburger joint to pour out my feelings about my grade. And it was not just that one friend. I moped and groaned about my exam the whole week. I started telling my friends that Organic Chem and I had broken up (I had started calling Organic Chem my boyfriend since, you know, I spent a good amount of time with him, felt happy with him, got frustrated over him,  felt sad with him, argued with him, yelled at him, threw my pen at his pages full of chemical reactions…I mean that’s boyfriend enough to me) and that I was just going through a really bad time.

In other words, I was completely and utterly STRESSED about Organic Chem. Although, I really shouldn’t be. Because people are right. Having a B on one exam is not bad. People get B’s. College students get B’s, it’s totally natural. So why was  I freaking out so much?

Am I a perfectionist? Maybe. Am I just being a drama queen? No, actually I had and have no intention of being any type of queen. Am I just being paranoid about grades in college since I was a straight A student in high school? DING DING DING! Come on down, inner thinking voice, and get yourself a nice prize! Because that was precisely the reason!

I know I talked about how high school coursework is different than college coursework in my last blog, but I guess I still had not wrapped my head around the connection of high school coursework and high school grades with college coursework and college grades. Of course I might not get straight A’s anymore. The coursework is at a higher level, requiring more critical thinking. The pace of the work is faster. Obviously, my grades are going to be alter a bit as I’m getting more used to college level work.

Also…a B is not a bad grade! Not at all! I did the best I could. I studied the material thoroughly, did all the practice problems, and went to tutoring. Now I’m not saying there wasn’t room for improvement somewhere in there. Maybe if I had studied certain concepts more than others, I might have pulled off an A on my exam. But I’m veering off my main point here. My main point is…Being a perfectionist in college is not the most healthiest character to be. I might get grades I don’t want in tests or quizzes, but I can’t let that get me down. I have to realize that I still have the potential to do better on my next exam or my next quiz.

Being stressed in college is never ideal, especially if it’s going to be stress over something like getting a B (a perfectly nice letter grade) on an exam. I have to remember that I am doing the best I can and that I will only improve if I keep up my hard work.

Also, here’s an interesting fact I’d like to share with you all. Did you know that if you are having a really tough time with a practice problem or homework assignment, sleeping will help you comprehend the material better? I’m not saying if you take a fifteen-minute nap after dealing with the monster of all monsters math problem that you will wake up with the answer miraculously in your brain. No, I’m saying that if you struggle and use all your brain power on that problem and still don’t understand at the end of the night, just go to bed and relax. Your brain will still be working while you sleep. When you wake up in the morning, you might not have the answer still, but you will definitely feel that you understand certain aspects of the problem better. I wholeheartedly  believe in this little studying tip so I encourage you to try it when you are dealing with challenging material!

That’s all for right now. I’ll write more later! BOOMER SOONER!