There is no denying the truth – exams are stressful. And an exam that will affect the next years of your life can feel absolutely overwhelming. While a little stress can help motivate you, too much stress will have the opposite effect and can paralyze you with fear. Here are 6 tips to help you keep control of your stress levels.
- Watch the company you keep. Just a negative people can bring you down, and optimistic people boost your mood, worried anxious people can transfer their stress onto you. So pick your study partners carefully and be aware that their mood will affect yours.
- Live well. Eating healthy “brain food” (think more protein, less sugar), and exercising on a regular basis will keep your body happy, which in turn affects your mood. Plus, physical activity, like jogging or dancing, helps burn off the nervous energy that comes with stress.
- Guard your time. Between work, classes, friends, and family you may find your time getting eaten up, leaving you little time to do important things like study, or sleep. Learning to say no to extra commitments will help you balance your time more effectively.
- Schedule downtime. Remember that famous saying, all work and no play make Jack a dull boy? Will just like Jack, your brain needs rests too. Taking a 10 min break every hour will actually increase your concentration and the amount of information you can absorb.
- Visualize success. If you feel the panic rising, take a moment to breath and visual walking out of the exam centre having just aced the GRE. Picture your ideal score, you acceptance from your dream school and focus on how relaxed you feel. Imagining a happy ending tricks your brain into relaxing and helps you subconsciously make decisions that will help that ending come true.
- Build your confidence with preparation. The more prepared you feel to handle a situation, the more confident (and less stress) you will feel going into it. Practice tests that provide your score show exactly how confident you can afford to be in each section.
How confident can you afford to feel about the GRE? Take a test to find out.
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