The Writing and Photography Blog of Kevin J Sabo

After an intense three week push, it’s all over but the crying.

I wrote the final exam for the first half of twentieth century history today. I say this after every exam, but I do not have a good feeling about this one. The exam was three long answer questions where you were expected to give as much detail and supporting argument as possible, and it felt like my brain vapour-locked. Oh well, as long as I pass. That’s the main thing. And regardless, I start the second half of the course March first.

The studying I’ve been doing over the last few days has been intense, and I am definitely feeling the stress. Still, with the exam done and over with, there is nothing to do but take a few days and recharge. If necessary, I can rewrite the exam within 90 days of the original writing, and now that I have a better idea of what I’m dealing with, that may be an option. I think I’ve learned in this course that I definitely do better with multiple choice exams.

I’m not going to let myself stress over it right now though. What will be, will be. Right now, what I need to do is let myself recharge. I’ve left my next few days deliberately light. I’m taking the dogs to the groomer for a pedicure tomorrow morning, then I’m meeting up with B to film his weekly devotional. We bumped it from our usual Thursday to give me a chance to do some writing and studying.

Sunday, I have a couple of articles to clean up before my Monday deadline.

Monday during the day, I’m doing as little as possible, and letting myself recharge.Monday night, I’m covering one of my councils, and Tuesday is writing it up. The rest of the week is pretty light as well.

With the exam done, my goal for the next few days is recharge, start updating my blog a little more often again, maybe getting out and taking some photos now that it isn’t minus stupid outside, and work on getting back into a regular workout routine, because to be honest, all of those things help keep me level with my moods, and they’ve all gone to shit over the last month.

Basically, I want to work on getting back to basics before I start my next course.

I know I’ve been pushing it hard over the last few weeks. I’m actually surprised I fared as well as I did. I bent, but didn’t break. That is a huge accomplishment.

What helped me get through the stress is setting goals, allowing myself a bit of downtime in between, and setting my sights on the goal line. I knew I had to make it to today, and I also knew that there is downtime on the other side of today. I deliberately set my schedule after today to get some actual time off, and I am actually looking forward to it. I’m looking forward to enjoying some downtime with Lynn, even if it is just curling up on the couch to catch up on our shows.

The biggest takeaway from all of this, aside from the course, is that I pushed myself, hard, and I didn’t break. I’ve pushed myself harder and longer than I have been able to in years. In short, it was one hell of a stress test. I’m going to build on those successes, and keep pushing and growing myself, though maybe at not such an intense rate for the next while.

Kevin