Testing Anxiety
Take a deep breath.
You would think that test taking fears lessen over time. For most, the opposite is more in line with reality.
Today’s post goes out to graduate and professional students, the whole lot of them; a group mostly comprised of people with long-distance goals and the uncommon ability to delay gratification sometimes forever.
Each wants to become someone with particular unique and admired skills and sometimes these come with a title like Doctor or Professor.
In the hearts of many there is also the belief that this is the pathway to financial security – but this is just a belief, a hope. For every year people spend in school after high school, is a year they could have been earning a living and hopefully not accumulating debt. Also, many at this high-end of education are already married and some have little ones in tow. This means their responsibilities are enormous, which is why their parents worry and old friends question their sanity. Those at greatest risk, however, are the ones whose spouses are not completely on board with the plan.
At no point do the weights of these grad and professional students’ life choices bare down harder than when they are facing and taking tests, or waiting for the test results to be posted.
And now, let’s say the test goes poorly.
For many unsettled souls, the ramifications are enormous and potentially will affect not only them, but the ones they love and who love them the most.
So, let’s talk about taking tests in graduate school.
To begin with you have a simple choice. You can go it alone burying you fears, with even the altruistic spin that you don’t want to worry others. These are your problems after all and you must deal with them yourself.
Or, the alternative to the loner-scenario, is to seek and maintain connections, to establish a community that includes mentors, advisors, fellow classmates, along with your family and theirs.
What does this have to do with test taking?
Everything. For one thing, you are not alone in the process.
We all take tests. Tests are not necessarily bad even if they don’t go well. The important thing is to not allow test results to define you. In the end, school will pass and what needs to not only survive, but thrive, are your important relationships. Your strength should come through your community bonds – that through this difficult academic season you continue to strive to care about others and their problems as well as your own. And in addition, you allow them to care about you and your problems as well. You have to learn to open up without overdoing it. They don’t need all the details of the lecture you just heard. They need to know how it is affecting you. What you are happy and sad about. You and they need your humanity on display.
Let me take this even further. This is for anyone who doesn’t have a lot of free time – for every workaholic.
Find a church or a bible study. This is especially important if you are married. Don’t use your busy work schedule as an excuse for not attending church services and other gatherings. You need things like these activities that are weekly and frankly, not about you. Besides, if you are empty emotionally and spiritually, you will not perform well on tests. And even if you isolate and get great test results, if they come at the expense of your marriage and children, then you are failing at something more significant than tests in school.
In Conclusion.
Taking tests well, which is not the same as passing them or getting good grades, involves constantly working on your attitude. Attitude is a reflection of your faith. Another way to put this is, how you understand your existence, who you really are when everything is stripped away, has everything to do with how you feel before, during, and after test taking.
On the other hand, how well you do on the test has to do with how well you studied and elements of the test you do not control.
Hopefully, by now, you are mature enough to understand that some tests are better designed or written than others. Also, some are fair and others biased. In the end they are all flawed human instruments. For this reason alone, it is foolish to take them completely seriously. They are a tool in the education process. Nothing more.
Again, the test isn’t your problem, unless of course, you can’t manage your emotions. How you respond back to those who administered it is a tell as to your emotional maturity and stability. You see, sometimes the test isn’t the test. There are other critical long-term factors the faculty is in the process of considering when trying to decide who is and is not safe to unleash on the public in their licensed profession. How you deal with the faculty over poor test results can actually be an opportunity in disguise, because deep down, they love what they do and if you show an interest, they will usually bend over backwards to help you succeed.
Here is another way to look at tests. Unless you are in mortal combat, the worst that can happen following the taking of any test will be you will not pass. This means you will likely repeat it. Assuming you have a good attitude and you are not believing the results of tests define who you are as a human being, then this is actually an opportunity to learn a difficult subject at a deeper level.
Some people have even been known to fall in love with subjects they originally hated or did poorly in. Stranger things have happened.
If any of this described you and you found it helpful, then share it with classmates and family members. Perhaps use it to start an important conversation with those you care about.
