Promos

Well, I ought to be getting to work preparing for my papers, but I've been bothered by this for the past week now, so getting it out is crucial to my moving on.

I'm in the midst of my promos right now and anybody who says that these stupid exams don't scare him is either a genius or a liar. I've only had mid-years to test my ability and let's just say it didn't turn out so well. Naturally, the nerves leave one antsy and paranoid about retaining or unconsidered for opportunities (read: OGL).

I set myself up for bitterness through the week the moment I attempted the essay for GP. I was counting on the arts question and fortunately for me, it was an easy one: How accessible are the arts in Singapore?

Hell yeah, I thought. This should be a breeze. So I did my planning, which was a brilliantly conceived outline featuring accessibility in the form of location, pricing, content, awareness and even opportunities to major in the Arts. Yet I didn't pull off an essay I was proud of. On the contrary, I submitted a sloppy piece of work, hastily patched together and not impressive at all. Needless to say, I felt like I had let everyone down. 

It's really embarrassing to come out of the exam hall and have your classmates tell you "You did the Arts question right? That should have been easy for you." or, in your presence, remark, (in the third person, no less) "If she did that question, it would be easy for her because it's so straightforward."

Easy. Easy. Easy.

Yes, the fact that it was supposed to be easy is what has got me wound up so tightly about my performance. There was not one good thing about my essay. Trust me, I've spent the five days sieving out good points about it to placate myself with, to no avail.

You know, the environment can be really screwed up at times. You genuinely think that you will do badly but people think you're just fishing for compliments. We have so many different expectations for ourselves but others just can't seem to accept that. At the same time, they place so much undue pressure on people that have done well.

This is why I hate exams. It's not the days before the exam, not the exam itself, not the day of the results. It's that disgusting sense of failure you get immediately after a paper, when there's no exam/study adrenaline pumping through you to go on auto-pilot, when you haven't had the time to carefully prepare yourself for your results, weeks later. It's that moment you wake up from a mad rush, to the realisation of all that you had done wrong, knowing you could have done something differently in the past hour or so.

Dramatic, yes, but no less traumatising. The only thing that could have saved me ruined me instead.

I can't keep this bitter regret with me for my next few papers. I can't keep from enjoying more arts events just because I cannot let go of my own folly. It's over, it's over. There's nothing you can do anymore. You're human, limited by human errors, susceptible to failure, affected by expectations, prone to shame.

Focus on what matters now, your two other papers, after which you can get down to working on your post-promo plans:

- Meet up with friends: picnics, movie, lunch dates

- Watch stuff: films (going to rewatch lotr!!!!!!!!!!), movies (TDOS!!!!), tv series (and cry) OH AND fan made films like Storm Over Gondolin YAAAAA

- Read books, hell yeah read books

- Work out: swim, run

- Make art: visual, written, code a couple of blogskins, knit a couple of things

- Go exploring: food/snacking trails, walking adventures

- Attend events: Singapore Writers' Festival, (fingers crossed) The Suit

Even though there are other work related things to get ready for:

- Work on tsd group piece + mono and duos

- Prep for SYF

- Prep for next year's work: do readings and film watching for fun lit and tsd, revision

- And I really hope I get to be an OGL!!!

I'm going to take away the gp paper pain by reading lotr/hobbit news or watching the trailer three thousand times or something bye