Test Prep Books/Effective Study Skills for Test Taking Anxiety

Calmness observed

After a long day at work yesterday I walked down a main and very busy thoroughfare in Portland. My head was full of the day’s events.  I was still carrying around a pile of cares with me as well as all of the anticipated concerns about tomorrow.

Unexpectedly I came across a fountain with a beautiful sculpture. I stopped. The calmness radiating from the white marble and the sounds of the fountain gently permeated my busy mind and tired body. I stopped walking and took in the sight and sounds of what I’d just stumbled upon. I took a long deep breath.

The noise in my head and the tension in my body faded quickly and then I was left simply taking in the statue and the fountain. I walked around it, looking at it from all sides. Then I caught its reflection in the window of the skyscraper behind it. Something about that was soothing.

Reflecting the peace within

It was like seeing the still center within all the movement around me.

As you go about your day look for the quiet spots, the silent spaces, the moments of respite. Let yourself become absorbed by them. Breathe deeply down to your belly. Feel your feet on the ground.

Revel in the peace. It’s around us —  and inside of us —  all the time.

Please share with us what you discover.

Appreciate your greatness

It’s well known, in the circles of positive psychology, that expressing appreciation is a powerful tool for improving relationships and performance. Usually we think of expressing appreciation  to someone else– someone who has done something for us or with us, whose contribution we want to acknowledge.

We don’t often think of expressing appreciation to ourselves, about ourselves. In fact, in workshops I offer when we get to this part, people are often stymied. What can I appreciate about myself?

Appreciation means “perceiving value” and “expressing gratitude.”

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Are you tense?

At a recent lecture I gave at the University of California San Francisco medical school, I was teaching the first year students how to use the calming tools:  breathing, grounding and sensing.

Breathing is by far the most important of all 9 tools in the performance model. So much has been said and written about breathing, and no wonder!  When we don’t breathe regularly it causes all sorts of mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual problems.

After we worked on grounding, one of the students had a brilliant observation.  First, to remind you:

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Use a timer: you'll stay focused

Often people ask me “What’s the best way to stay focused?”

Here’s what I recommend:  use a timer. Whether it’s on your digital watch, your i-pad, your cell phone, or one that you set up on your computer, I’ve found the timer to be my biggest aide to staying focused.

The procedure goes like this:

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Why are we stuck listening to the negative voice?

A student I am working with has a problem. Here’s what she says about it:  “Every time on a test when I’m not sure if my answer is right, I immediately have negative thoughts, ‘You’re not going to get this right,’ ‘You don’t know the material,” ‘You can’t figure this out.’ Why do I always think these negative thoughts?”

This is a great question and something I’ve wondered about for a long time. It’s a very common situation: in a difficult or doubtful situation most of us usually veer towards the negative. What’s going on?  In a series of posts I’m going to address this issue. Today we’ll look at one cause  and one method of dealing with it.

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Today I watched a TV clip of an interview with someone who wrote about reducing test anxiety. If I were a student about to take the SAT or GRE or GMAT or LSAT,  I would have found it woefully wanting. It’s not that the information was wrong (the specialist talked about “breathing”) but it was all so “tips” oriented.  What do I mean and what’s wrong with “tips”?

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PTO Emery is a bright light in East Bay

On Monday night I had the honor of being the featured speaker at the Emeryville Unified School district’s parent teacher’s association meeting. After a delicious holiday dinner we all moved into the library of Emery Secondary School and PTO President Brynnda Collins introduced me. The school district generously provided each parent at the meeting with a copy of my book. I gave a talk on the book and particularly chapter 5, “How to Calm Down.”  I think the material in this chapter is particularly helpful for parents when their kids are stressed out about tests.

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Recently, I met a student who was anxious about taking the LSAT.  She came to my book launch, brought by her sister, to get help for her test taking anxiety. The student was skeptical, but her sister bought her a copy of the book anyway.

A month later I received the following email from the student:

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