Education:

reading a textbook for class and i’m going insane. why is this just poetry. what. this is a STEM class what’s going on.

STUDY MASTER-POST

• Making a schedule

• Every schedule is different. You shouldn't feel the need to make every second productive just as long as you find enough time to finish what you need to for the day.

• Make sure to sort your to-do list first. Start from the things that are the most urgent and important. After you do this, you can choose to either start with the hardest task so that its out of the way. Or you can start with the easiest so it gets your momentum going.

• When you make your schedule, give extra time for yourself to finish a task. Suppose, if you say you will take 40 minutes to finish a summary, schedule it down to 60 minutes so even if you end up procrastinating in between or if you take an extra break, your entire schedule is not throw into a mess.

• Account for breaks. Always. Take regular breaks between every task. Don't make it too long, 2-5 minutes for a small task and 15-20 minutes for a big task.

• Once you're done with your to-do list, make a schedule with a set amount of time for each task. Try to start exactly when you planned you would.

• Make sure to do tasks in chunks of 20-60 minutes, whatever works for you. Because humans suck at focusing for more than 50 minutes in general.

• Take a small 5 minutes break after one chunk of 20-60 minutes. After you finish 4-6 chunks of 20-60 minutes, reward yourself with a long break, like 20-60 minutes depending on how much work you have left and what time you can spare.

• Getting stuff done

• Break bigger tests into small chunks so it's easier to get into. So rather than saying "I will completely this chapter today," you can do "I will finish 5 pages of this chapter now and then 7 in an hour. I will finish the remaining 9 pages, 4 hours from now." That makes the work smaller and you also feel more productive.

• Most people have a problem with starting. So just start the task and say you will do it for 5 minutes without getting distracted. Once you get through the first 5 minutes, you should have no problem getting through the rest of the task.

• If you still can't get yourself to work after 5 minutes, the problem is not you, its the task. See what's bothering you about the task. Do you not understand a concept? Or do you not have all the required resources for it? Look into it. If you can't find the problem with the task, move on and get to the next task. You can deal with this later.

• Your work space

• Work space can make or break your momentum. You can be the person who works best with all your materials sprawled on the bed. Or you can be the person who gets work done best in a library. Don't try to make things fits for you when they clearly don't.

• You could be the person who gets more work done at the evenings or in the mornings so don't feel pressured to get work done at the set time everyone says you should do at.

• Remove things that distract you. If you get distracted by the internet, I'll link some things that can help you out in the resources section down.

• Don't over crowd your working space, keep it to a minimum so you don't get too distracted.

• Self care

• The most important thing, no skipping this. Sleep well, everyday. For a minimum of 6 hours no matter what. You can break it up if you can't sleep for long hours in a strecth but make surr you get that sleep.

• Get fresh air and move around. For a minimum of 30 minutes everyday.

• Make sure to eat at least two full meals a day. Try to eat as healthy as possible and snack in between meals.

• Make time for the hobbies/interests you love. Let yourself explore and have fun. You deserve it, you're beautiful.

• How to avoid burnouts

• Break works into small chunks as I mentioned earlier. So rather than saying "I will completely this chapter today," you can do "I will finish 5 pages of this chapter now and then 7 in an hour. I will finish the remaining 9 pages, 4 hours from now."

• Make sure to reward yourself. Doesn't have to be anything big. Give yourself a nice cup of tea or bake a cake from time to time. Reward yourself.

• Do shower and change into a new set of clothes every single day. It really helps. Seriously.

• Make sure to at least work for 30 minutes a day on days you don't feel motivated enough to work so that you don't slip into leisure mode.

• Make sure to maintain a school-life balance. It's a very thin line so make sure to finish your important tasks before going out and doing something fun.

• Resources

• This chrome extension blocks websites.

• This blocks websites for the Mac book users. (This is free but there's also paid verified alternatives here.)

• This website gives alternatives to any software or website, paid or free. Mac or PC or LinusX compatible versions.

• This lets you print any website without all the clutter in it.

• This lets you highlights parts of a web page and lets you share it.

• This checks your writing for grammatical and spelling errors.

• This is also for checking your spellings and voicing in anything you write.

• This lets you convert URLs into QR codes/ shorten URLs.

I'll add more but I gotta dash to class so just these for now.

Have a nice day. ^^

tips for applying to colleges as a 21 year old?

Apply using the Coalition Application to save money and take special care to apply to colleges that have no application fee outside of the Coalition App. Go out of your way to apply to as many places as you possibly can and just have fun with your applications. I would apply to a variety of large state schools and smaller liberal arts colleges and have a huge mix going on so that your application pool is large and relatively varied. Apply to some huge SEC schools, apply to some cute liberal arts schools, apply to colleges with a few great scholarships, apply to colleges that you idolise, take the time to just have fun and apply all over the map. I applied to the American University of Bulgaria just for the thrill of it and I don’t regret a single application. Most colleges consider January 15th the last day to do applications but some have rolling admissions so try to get on that right now and get to applying to schools.

Don’t be afraid to move far and start anew, there’s nothing like a fresh beginning and you can be whoever you want to be. There’s no shame in moving away and getting away from your old reputation and recreating yourself, there’s no shame in making new friends and forgetting that you used to be shy and fearful, and there’s no shame in taking full advantage of all of your new opportunities. There’s no reason why you should refrain from moving and becoming your best self in a brand new city and making the choice to become who you were always meant to be and enjoying your life. I know so many women who had total glow ups and took the time to get thin, change their style, and fix what was hurt upstairs before they went to college as older students and I’ve seen how they’ve succeeded and actually ended up giving life another fair chance.

Apply for all of the grants and scholarships that you possibly can so you’ll have an excess. I used to apply for a huge amount of scholarships just so I could have an excess and spend it on the things that I wanted and so I could use my scholarship money to help fill out my savings account and offset my cost of living. If you get scholarships and you already have your tuition on lock, a lot of the time the money will just be given to you in check form, same with grants. I used to use the money that I got from grants to buy clothes and travel just so that I could continue improving my quality of life. Life is for living and college is for fun and if you have the ability to win scholarships and grants, some of the funds should be used for your own enjoyment and your savings account, not everything should be so serious.

Rush a sorority. I’m telling you. Rushing a sorority truly changed my life and has given me friends and so many opportunities that I would have never had had I not chosen to go through rush. My sorority has changed me and changed my life, it’s given me purpose, and it’s helped me get so many career opportunities and become friends with women who I literally would not be able to survive without. My sorority has given me access to so many things, I’ve been able to learn so much, I was helped with scholarships and with learning better English, my sorority has helped me through the hard parts of life, I’ve been able to learn and experience history, I regret not going to a school that gave me the ability to Go Greek for four years and have that family. I’m constantly recommending that women go through rush and I would strongly recommend that any older first year at university go through rush just so that she could have the ability to make friends and have all of the same benefits that I’ve been blessed enough to have. I’d consider Going Greek my best decision ever.

Go on tours!! So many colleges give you the chance to tour free, so many are easily accessible, and so many are accessible with minimal money spent and so my advice is to try to tour all of your top colleges and get a feel for where you want to be. Tours, having the opportunity to experience a college, and having the ability to see the campus and witness the culture are really what can make or break your decision. I’m a huge proponent of trying to go somewhere and trying to see what’s up before you make the decision to spend four years in said place. Going on tours helped me, I got to meet cool new people and have even cooler walks on the campuses where I went, and I got to have the time on campus that helped me decide if the university was for me or not. I did this with the schools I applied to for my year abroad and for my actual undergraduate uni and I had the ability to fall in love with both campuses. Tours are an essential part of applying to colleges and I would highly recommend doing affordable uni tours.

i got a New Planner which means that i will suddenly and miraculously become organized despite this technique never having worked in the past

i almost forgot what day it was

Do you have any tips on how to choose a college major?

unless you're getting a free ride scholarship or your family will be paying for your education, this will be one of the biggest financial decisions of your life. most of your friends and family are in student loan debt and hating every second of it.

first things first: why do you want to go to college? what kind of life do you want to live? will you be living it alone or with a spouse? will you be having kids? what income do you need to enjoy your overall quality of life?

have you considered a trade school or certifications?

when you consider a major, you need to be living in reality. not an ideal world where you can do something goofy and make a million dollars from it. be realistic, practical, and financially responsible. don't have your mind in lala land. I'm serious, choose wisely.

supply and demand. if everyone can do it with a reasonable amount of training, it will pay little. if it's hard to do and most can't do it without considerable effort/skill/risk, it will pay more. this is why fast food pays low. if any teenager off the street can be trained in a few hours to work here and be side by side with 40 year olds, it's not a lucrative thing. dental assistants and technicians make less than the dentist. guess why?

watch this video on useless degrees (not as in they are meaningless or have no value, but bc they cost money that you will struggle to pay back and the job market will not be kind to you)

and watch this one too

watch this video on good degrees

and this one too

if "following your heart" puts you 100k in debt, maybe follow your brain instead

you don't have to get a degree in something that you enjoy learning about but it doesn't translate well into the job market. you can learn about it at home, on youtube, at the library, you can purchase textbooks, you can take free open-learning courses. please don't spend 4 years cramming and going into debt for things when you don't have to. not all degrees are worth it. you're trying to get a job and live a nice life right? okay. act like it.

remember that school name is not the most important thing in the world and chances are, it won't matter much in your life. unless you're trying to be a doctor or lawyer etc, I wouldn't stress too much about trying to go to the best and most expensive school bc you'll probably only be getting bragging rights and 5 seconds of people being impressed when you tell them about it. this is something that has been socially conditioned into us our whole lives though, so I won't be mad if you can't magically stop that thinking overnight. shoot for the stars but don't be obsessed with them.

it might be in your best interest to go to community college and then transfer to a 4 year. saves money, and your degree will only have the name of where you graduate from bc that's all that matters.

unless you have a good financial support system (family with money, spouse with money), you might not want to go for a cute career that pays little. I absolutely love and respect teachers and things of that ilk, but if you're footing the bill by yourself in life, I'd maybe save that for a more financially secure time in my life. try to get a degree that gets you the most bang for your buck. I have a friend who wanted to be a teacher, but waited until she got married to a high earner who takes care of finances to become one. you don't have to do what she did, but I think it was a good idea of her.

a global poll by gallop revealed that 85% (!!!!) of people hate their jobs. that's tragic considering it's such a huge part of our lives and we spend so much time and mental bandwidth working, thinking about work, preparing for work, etc. You want to try your hardest to be in that 15% who don't dread their job. picking a major that you enjoy, are competent at, and pays well is so important.

notice that I said enjoy, are competent at, and pays well. you can love your work but suffer bc it pays pennies. you can have a high paying job but suffer bc it's so incredibly difficult for you to keep up with and you feel overloaded and stupid. you can have a high paying job that you're good at doing but you don't enjoy the work and it feels so boring and meaningless to you. these 3 things are hard to find in one career choice but by God it's something you need to search high and low for. if you can't meet all 3 points of the trinity, choose the 2 that matter most to you and go after them. you'll thank me later.

you probably will never be in the highest bracket of earners in your field. if the median income is 40k and the highest is 90k, you will likely be in the 40k range or close to it. don't be overly optimistic when looking at salaries for careers you're interested in. only a few people make it to the top of a pyramid.

also remember that changing majors is normal and what you like at (presumably) 17/18 may be different than when you're 20. I originally wanted to pursue pharmacy like my brother but computer science called my name later on.

don't be afraid to take time off to work and save money to avoid taking out loans (or at least to keep them as low as possible). don't be afraid to attend school part-time instead of full-time to help manage your course load. you can go back to school later in life and go after your passion projects when you can afford them if you so choose to. you don't have to rush things right now.

hope this helped

it's kinda fucked up we don't have real enchanted jewelry like i wanna go to micheals and buy a ring that makes my pens use 10% less ink when i wear it or something

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