What's sleep?

maizulee after a meeting at the throne room

Lu Ten: *describes the horrors*

Ta Min: … wh-what

Lu Ten: And that’s BEFORE I died. I’ve been gone for six years! Who knows what’s happened since then

Lu Ten: … Maybe we should have a drink first.

Ta Min: Things are in worse shape than we thought

Zuko: Hey Azula do you hear something in the kitchen

Azula: You making me a sandwich that’s what

Lu Ten: Azula, just move that piece there, move it there and you’ll win!

Ta Min: Lu Ten, that’s cheating!

Lu Ten: Let me live vicariously through her! I never got to beat him.

Zuko: Seriously, do you guys not hear it?

Ursa: Hear what, dear?

Azula, eyes never leaving the Pai Sho board, has a distinct feeling someone is glaring at her: *moves piece where Lu Ten wanted*

Iroh: *goes to make his move but stops, stunned* You won.

Azula: I won?

“Was it always this beautiful?” He asks of the Spirit World.

“I’m just going to finish this in 30 minutes” “My teammates need me to do this so I’m just gonna finish it”

There have been times where I’ve tried to continue to complete all of my work, however, things didn’t really work out and I felt extremely burned out afterwards. If you think that you need a break, then please consider taking it. 

By Canis-Infernalis.

I am fucking tired

I can't

As students we get told a lot about study techniques and what to do to study, but this often involves the advice of studying in quiet areas instead of suggesting activities that might actually contribute to good grades. In this post i hopefully will answer this apparently difficult question and give you some ideas to integrate into your own study sessions.

Flashcards

Flashcards are scientifically proven to be a good way to retain information, this may be because as you write the cards out you go over key concepts then you get to test yourself on knowledge in the future as you use the cards. They can also be really fun to design and effective if used properly. They can be used as studying by making the cards one session and then maybe going over and testing yourself in another. 

Practice Problems and Tests

Testing yourself is the most effective way to go over material, refresh concepts and also highlight which areas you may need to focus on when studying. You can usually find these in textbooks, off professors or by searching your course online. One night you may set out to do one chapter’s questions or questions on a particularly hard topic. It’s good to write down any issues you had and research them until you understand. Even more importantly is to do tests under exam conditions and time otherwise you will never truly know what you can do under that pressure.

Brainstorm Page

Like practice problems, this method has many of the same benefits. How it works is that you get a blank page and write all the information you can think of about a topic as if you were doing a summary. Afterwards you read it over alongside your notes and record anything you forgot to mention, these things would be key topics to go over.

Notes Summaries

For some people this technique might not be effective as it is recording information very similarly to how it was first consumed, though if you are a visual or kinetic learner it can be helpful. This way you go over your concepts and condense information so it easier to revise when exams come around. You can jazz this up by using your iPad or making notes bright and pretty so it is more engaging.

Mindmaps

Mindmaps are extremely useful in that they help establish connections between ideas within a concept which often furthers understanding. Similar to above they also help revise information taken in class or in textbooks and condense them in an engaging visual fashion.

Using the syllabus

the syllabus is usually set out in the form of questions or things you will need to know about a topic, these will also be the things you will be tested on so if you nail them you are essentially nailing any test. So in a study session i suggest writing out each syllabus point and answering it as if it was a question given to you in an exam to the best of your abilities and focus on getting a strong understanding of how to fulfil that question.You are normally given this before the start of a class if not you should ask your teacher/prof.

Videos

As a visual learning i find watching videos on topics extremely helpful and a way for information to be explained in a new way. So if you are struggling to grasp a concept try watching a video on it but remember to take notes because that way you stay engaged with the material. Documentaries can also really help in tying concepts together and build understanding.

Forums and Discussion

Have you heard people tell you that if you can explain a topic you know it, well this technique stems from that. Say one afternoon you have time to study, maybe get together with people from your class and try to explain things you’ve learn or discuss the whys and hows behind things you’ve learnt. This is a very social and very engaging ways to further understand course work. as always its good to take notes.

Overlearning

For many universities or classes the real difference between those who study and the top performing students is those who go above expectation. This isn’t saying that you should write a advanced paper on something completely unrelated to your content, however knowing evidence from different articles or the view points of different scholars is going to be the quickest way to show the time you’ve invested into the course. This can be done by reading articles, papers, watching documentaries, arguing in forums, searching Reddit, or anything that allows you to gain different perspectives and a more rich base of knowledge on a topic. Of course this is something you would do after compulsory units are nailed but maybe squeeze in time of a week to research the latest science articles or a different historians view or a new English text.

here it is, my first playlist masterpost!

these are the playlists i’m loving right now (oct 2018)

- coffee house: curl up with a book in your favourite coffee house

- lo-fi: mellow and good for your concentration

- synths & co: synth goodness

- muted: a place for songs with no words

- first coffee: just getting you through the morning

- green tea: restore your mind and body

- introduction: it’s the world’s best song intros

- oatmeal: it’s warm and cosy, a bowl (or playlist) of comfort

- boss lady: you’re a boss lady, here’s some songs to make you feel like it

- happiest: songs from all the films that make disney the happiest place on earth

- 01:59: when it’s 01:59 and you’re feeling lonely, this is company

- espresso: bitter and disappointed

- gibson: it’s what alex turner plays, right?

- peachy: upbeat and fresh, some peachy tunes

- lavender: your ideal bath playlist

- sunny d: 90s bops

A new “How To Study” series!! Part 1 of ???

see part 2: How To Study Physics

How to study BIOCHEMISTRY (from yours truly, a biochem major at ucla)

(but also note that i’ve only taken one biochem specific class so far but this class was general biochemistry so hopefully the tips and tricks i learned from taking this class will apply to higher levels of biochemistry!)

studygram: @markiveelle

Biochemistry is a VERY dense subject, it requires a good background in general chemistry (such as acids and bases, thermodynamics) and a strong biology background (hence BIO cheMISTRY) (who would have ever guessed)

Anyways I like to think that biochem is not exactly a strenuous subject in that you won’t need to rack your brain to solve application problems, but it DOES require a LOT of memorization which is arguably less painful, but is still scary.

General Memorization Tips

Start early! The earlier you start your studying, the more time your brain has to process the information which means it will get more comfortable with it and you’ll probably be able to remember it more easily later.

BABY STEPS, don’t try to memorize like 600 terms in one sitting. You’ll probably get them mixed up. The brain doesn’t work that way (for most of us!). Instead, start with the first ten things, get them down really well, then move on to the next ten, then try to get all twenty together. And then the next ten, and then a cumulative self check, and so on. I think this was the best way to start. You have to find how much information you can retain in one sitting!

Make use of free time, try to recall things when you’re waiting in line for food, for the bus, for the shower to warm up, etc. Jogging your memory at all times helps make it more solid.

Make whatever you’re studying your phone/laptop background so it’s of easy access to you! I made the amino acids my iPad lockscreen when I was trying to memorize all of those!

Seriously flashcards help

Memorizing the 20 Amino Acids (and their structures…) in one week

My first quiz in my biochemistry class was to be able to remember all 20 amino acid names, three letter abbreviations, one letter abbreviations, and structures at physiological pH. It was scary lol I had to memorize all that in oNE WEEK (evil)

Grouping them into their respective types can help you in the long run when you may be asked which amino acids are present in polar/nonpolar environments. 

I started memorizing the negative and positive amino acids first (there were the least of them lol). I used the cumulative batches method where I memorized the negative ones completely and then moved onto positive ones, and then did a cumulative self check. When I felt comfortable with those I moved onto nonpolar, then aromatic, then polar (idk why i did that order tho)

Most of the one letter abbreviations are the first letter of the name of the amino acid, especially in the nonpolar cases. I remembered the names and abbreviations of the nonpolar ones by just remembering GAVLIMP (read down the column!)

Glutamic Acid is GLU, E (which just spells glue)

Arginine is ARG ARRR ® like a pirate (lol)

Glutamine is Q and that’s weird so that resonated with me

Glutamine and Asparagine are similar to Glutamic Acid and Aspartic Acid in structure!

The nonpolar amino acid structures kind of build upon the previous one, which is also how I remembered those structures

I mainly took advantage of photographic memory in this case because whenever I was asked to recall a certain amino acid, in my head I would think about where that amino acid was on this poster I made. That helped my brain keep everything organized!

Memorizing Fatty Acids/Certain Carbohydrates

FLASH CARDS

Whenever you have to identify or name things, flashcards are the best!! I remember I made flashcards for everything on this page and me and my friends quizzed each other while waiting to be seated at korean bbq lol

Photographic memory again!! Write out all the stuff you gotta know onto one piece of paper (try to limit it to just one side) and study from that. It’s like organizing how your brain will remember stuff (kinda like you knowing exactly where something is in your drawer because you organized it that way)

Memorizing Pathways or Cycles

Glycolysis was the first pathway I had to remember, this one took me the longest because we were required to remember the structures, the names of the enzymes, the cofactors, LITERALLY EVERYTHING in one week it was a STRESS MESS

On this poster I have the detailed version that includes structures on the top and then a brief overview on the bottom that just has the names of stuff. I thought this helped (not sure how)

If you have taken organic chemistry in the past, then memorizing the structures may come a little easier to you because the names of the structures are super close to IUPAC naming so you can deduce from there!

It’s important to run through this IN ORDER over and over and over. Write it out so your hand gets a feel for it. 

GOING IN ORDER IS JUST SO IMPORTANT because it conditions your brain to follow that order and you’ll notice that everything builds upon the other (the brain loves patterns and order so this will expedite memorization)

We also had to track carbons, so color coding would have helped in this case too! Color code each carbon so it’s clear where everything goes. 

I think biochemistry is also a subject that requires a lot of time and effort, so make sure you give yourself time to study for it. Make a good study group as well so that you have many other people to correct you if you make mistakes, and you can correct them on their mistakes! I also think that catching errors or learning from previous errors is the BEST way to remember the RIGHT information because it shakes you; no one likes to be wrong!

Discipline: “discipline is doing what needs to be done, even when you don’t want to”, which means that you have to force yourself to start doing things. 

Concentration: when you make a real effort in your work (study, homeworks etc…) you will be more likely to actually focus, understand and learn. 

Organization: always set tasks and goals and organize a study-schedule. Maybe you don’t really want to plan all the week, but if you just wake up and open your agenda/bullet journal/iphone calendar and write down all the things you have to do, setting due dates and deadlines, you’ll feel more conscious and encouraged to stay on track. 

Tasks-splitting: sometimes, you write down your tasks. Some of these tasks may be very hard and complicated, and it will take a long long time to complete them. So, you can split them in smaller tasks, so you will feel satisfied after a shorter period of time, instead of studying for hours and still seeing that chapter undone on your study-schedule. 

Watch the sunrise: when I wake up late, I feel like I don’t have enought time to do my work and lose my motivation. I literally panic and then I think “whatever, I could not complete all the things anyway”. So, if you wake up earlier you will feel more positive and  controlled. 

Smart reading: try not to read your textbook just like a newspaper. For every paragraph you read, try to underline and write down key words and then your question about that subject. Literally, turn your textbook into questions. If you write down question - particularly why…? - and think about the answer, you will be more likely to remember that stuff later. 

You may be thinking you’re a fraud, that you don’t deserve to be where you are and that you’re totally incompetent. You think that what you’ve accomplished is only due to luck or because « anyone could have done it ». You only focus on the small mistakes you made instead of being proud of what you’ve achieved and, as a consequence, you feel like a total failure. Well, this is how I feel 99% of the time and tbh we’re a lot out there to feel the same way. 

This post is for us, for the perfectionists and for all the people that set ridiculously high expectations for themselves. Performance anxiety  is part of our daily lives and even if it forces us to do a great job most of the time, the darker side of it is that it can totally make us sick in a psychological and even in a physical way. For me perfectionism was a huge shield that I used to carry around to protect myself from any criticism, judgment or shame. Well, guess what, it didn’t work. AT. ALL. 

There are a lot of reasons that may have caused me and you to think like that, it can be so engraved in our beliefs that we don’t even question it. We just believe it 100%. But the good news is that it can be fixed. 

What can you do to slowly change this belief and finally starting realizing that you deserve to be where you are? Here is what I’ve learnt throughout the years : 

Acknowledge your thoughts and how they make you feel. Once you’ve identified these thoughts, you can observe them and question them : how do they make you feel ? From a scale from 1 to 10, how much do you believe these thoughts? What makes you think they are true? Don’t you think they are a bit exaggerated? How can you reframe them in order to make you feel better about yourself? 

Talk about it. Last week I had to call a friend because I was feeling like shit just because I couldn’t answer to a simple question from my professor. She reassured me and reminded me that lots of people feel like that. 

Practice positive feedback. Write down the good things you did during that day, even the smallest ones. By doing that, your brain will recognize them more easily and you’ll pay more and more attention to them 

Comparison is the thief of joy, and most of the time we compare ourselves to the embellished and flawless version of the people we meet and/or see on social media. We tend to forget that EVERYONE can have self-doubt and feelings of not being good enough. Like come on, even Albert Einstein didn’t think his work deserved all that attention! 

Be patient. It takes lots of time and energy to reframe and change beliefs we’ve had for such a long time. But knowing we have them and that we can change them is a great start :) 

Anyone with a name that starts with a “Z”, ends with an “i”, and isn’t some kind of Italian pasta, IS SERIOUS