Panic Attacks, Anyone?

I haven't actually had a major panic attack since P.M.R., but S.A.M. seems to be doing a pretty good job at nudging me to crumble, literally, before exams.

And they're not even really exams. They're just Common Tests ('common' because everyone doing SAM who takes that subject, takes the roughly same exam at almost the same time). But why do I take them so seriously? Why do I constantly act as if Common Tests form, for me, the personal equation of CT = Life Or Death?

I'm not acting like how I acted while preparing for SPM -- hours of dilly-dallying, lazing around, not wanting to face the fact that I had to study very hard if I wanted to do well. It didn't even really bother me then, that I wasn't prepared for SPM.

But I cared less then. Now I care too much. Now every point matters so urgently to me, that every single time I make a mistake, it feels as if someone reached into my rib cage and gave my lungs a too-hard squeeze. I find myself no longer able to say, "Aiyah.. never mind-lah.. next time do better lah...". So when I do badly for exams, I feel so disappointed in myself.

The thing about S.A.M. that you have to understand, is that every point really does matter. Almost every test we sit for is taken into account for our final TER score. So every time I lose a point, I feel like I'm worsening my chances to get into a good university. Every time I look at a question in a test and am thinking about how to answer it, I think about how my answer would affect the rest of my life. And that, my friends, is what pushes me over the edge. T_T

So maybe it's just a phase. Maybe I'm still new to this programme (after all, it's only April), and I haven't learnt to take it easy yet. Perhaps maturity will come hand in hand with the ability to stay calm and keep my mind focused. :P

On a relevant note, I got back my Econs CT2 paper from Mrs Goh today... She was going to give them back to the whole class, but most of my classmates didn't want the papers just a day right before Parent-Teacher meeting (tomorrow morning) and less than an hour before a common test (Accts CT2, just). But I needed to take mine back (one of the few who actually wanted them back sooner than necessary, heh)... because if I screwed up my test, I would know that my method of studying for essays was wrong. And therefore, I would have to think of a better way to go about it, and not waste time studying the wrong way. And .... I was curious. ;P

My score didn't really affect me as much as I expected, although a 16.5 over 25 is concrete enough evidence that I really did screw up my test. My SAQ's was havoc, only 5 over 10. Half my answers were wrong, in that case. My essay was so vague -- but I was still lucky enough to get an 11.5 over 15. It turns out that I was supposed to heavily emphasize on the Trade Practices Act, which I didn't do. And I shouldn't have naively left a big blank in the middle of a jungle of words, where I forgot the words "exclusive dealing". Hehe. Mrs Goh did me the favour of filling up the blank in my sentence with: ??. Over 80% of my essay was completely irrelevant to the question posed. Ha, ha, ha. Thank goodness I wrote a full 2 pages, so I still got half a page's worth of marks.

And I had Accounts Common Test 2 today. We had a mock one two weeks ago, and I only managed a 19.75 over 30 for that; so I had to work extra hard for the real test. I feel quite happy with what ever I managed today -- my structure question was a little bit berserk, and my General Journal was definitely messed up (we weren't provided a multi-columnar journal, only the ordinary one, BUT I acted as if we were given a multi-columnar one... ish. Mistake. Wonder what's going to happen to those marks?)... but I was so happy when the total from my Debtors Schedule equalled the balance from my Debtors Control account. Here's to hoping for at least an improvement from my Class Test (Mocks).

P.S: Was so tense before the Accts CT today, I walked somewhere and tripped. Like twice. Haha. Brain didn't connect with feet anymore.