How often do you struggle with self-doubt?

Really tests/midterms are only there to see what you retained, a lot of people cram the week before... honestly if you're studying for your career the learning doesn't stop when you exit the classroom.

I never took my test score as to what I needed to improve. I would study hard to ace a test and wouldn't remember anything a month down the road because I didn't treat it as my career, but as a hurdle I needed to pass to get a useless piece of paper.

Even when you're in the workforce you have tools and resources at your disposal and as you said, you do well on assignments which is more practical in what you'll encounter later on.

It's unfair to compare yourself to the successes of your family in this time of your life. Like you, they most certainly struggled at something or at some point in their life. Comparing successful people to your current state in life is the wrong way to look at it. Even for your peers, they have different circumstances than you.

Book an appointment with your college counselors as they're trained to help with situations such as this and they encounter it daily.

As for myself, I've been through this in College. It's the stress of failure. Like you I did well on assignments, struggled on tests. Felt unintelligent, anxious, pessimistic ...etc. Failure is an acceptable part of life, find the root cause of that failure and work on it.

The whole career mentality didn't click for me either till a few years post college after seeing and speaking to successful people in my field... I barely squeaked by, cramming for tests not retaining half of it. Anxious about my grades, peers, teachers, not sleeping, missing classes out of embarrassment... it's a vicious cycle.

You sound like a smart, ambitious College student. Talk to your college counselors. Good luck friend (aka- Former self.)

ps- The dreams of missing class and showing up to an exam that accounts for 100% of your term still happens well after college.

/r/CasualConversation Thread