Bar examination results.

Tens of thousands across the country confront them time and time once again. Promise and despair, rinse and repeat.

You endured the onslaught of "aww… you lot got this" and "I'm sure you passed!" for weeks and months.

Feet, excitement, dubiety squirting into your center every time yous thought of the moment of truth. Waiting is the hardest part. Uncertainty is existence locked in a padded room alone with delusions of hopes and worries.

Then… t he ruthless truth. This is the result of all your work, condensed into one screen. It has declared that your efforts were non plenty.

Maybe for the first time, a humbling moment. Mayhap non your first fourth dimension, even more painful.

How do you face your family and friends? How do you face yourself?

Yous "trusted the system." What needs to be inverse?

"The more I review, the more I realize what a waste of time the big bar prep programs are. . . . Never will I 'trust the process.'"

This is a hazing procedure. Worst of all, it's plush—non just in terms of coin but time and energy.

Information technology'due south tempting to think that this is a result of different factors: Your life situation isn't ideal for studying (kids, a job, etc.). The exam is getting harder. The pass score is as well loftier. The laissez passer charge per unit is as well low. The MBE is getting trickier. Essays are getting more complicated. Issues are subtle. Or maybe you feel that y'all're incompetent, non fit for the police. Maybe it's all of the above.

"It is possible to commit no mistakes and nonetheless lose. That is not a weakness. That is life."—Captain Picard

Right now, it doesn't matter "why." The one thing that matters Correct NOW is getting back on your feet.

How? The technique for billowy back is to written report your failure.

This defeat is fodder for your next victory. If you lot can graduate law schoolhouse, y'all're capable of passing the bar exam.

If you'll allow me, I'k going to assist you lot with your bar quest. I'll take you lot through steps to acquire those bar skills and proceeds those bar intuitions.

I'm also going to enquire a lot from you. Equally you know, this shit isn't piece of cake. In fact, it'll be one of the hardest things you'll e'er do. Just there are besides many things worse than failing an exam.

"Information technology won't be easy, but I'll exercise it." I like that.

First, let'due south talk well-nigh how to arroyo your grooming to come.

The Barbri Regret: How to Recognize the Trap and Decide for Yourself

I was chatting with a homeless man at a grocery store the other night. I asked David where he sleeps. He gave me a smirk and said, I sleep wherever I desire.

Dude! Information technology was a pretty profound moment for me.

To "optimize" our lives and fit in with others, we "demand" a charter, a mortgage, a car, a fancy getaway, the latest gadget, this or that. We think we need things that actually complicate our lives and impose obligations on us. It's not a bad thing or a good thing. Information technology'south part of normal club.

Only David does what he wants, in his ain style. It didn't matter that he was forced into that situation. He made it work for him.

You lot're besides your own person… or I assume you want to be.

Commercial "big box" bar courses will impose a very specific plan on y'all, downwardly to the number of MBE questions to do and which lectures to watch during which part of the solar day, complete with checklists and a fright indicator (showing you how close to you 100% you are, y'all perfectionist).

"You better practice X, Y and Z at these times—or else!" Many will practise merely that, and that'southward fine. That's not necessarily a bad thing or a good thing. It's simply that it may not be what you need, as your own person.

But there'south something that you may not want to admit near your bar prep… The elephant in the room, the nagging paper cut of a doubt, the final valve keeping a wave of panic at bay…

"Actually, my bar course isn't really helping…"

You spent a lot of time comparing Barbri, Themis, Kaplan, BarMax… You made a personal pick and paid a lot of money for it. It's what you lot were supposed to practise. It's what anybody else was doing.

So you lot're gonna keep that nagging idea to yourself. When everyone else is going the same direction, nosotros assume they're correct.

But these are what your beau students in the trenches have said about their own regrets…

Enough. You go the film.

But that's not to fustigate on the "large box" prep courses like Barbri (or whichever visitor yous prefer). And information technology's easier said than done to abandon the bloat. Maybe information technology'south not even a expert thought to do and then.

We call up we demand things that actually complicate our lives and impose obligations on united states of america.

But I merely think it would serve you well to look at one of the many other available paths because there's no one set path ! Yes, taking a large course is one mode to pass, but there are many other ways too.

Bar examiners are already well aware of common prep materials, and the exam wouldn't exist an effective filtering procedure if anyone who took a course tin can pass.

Self-studying for the bar examination

I followed Kaplan's program to a tee the first time. I was getting frazzled and stressed in the process. I failed the California Bar Exam.

I went lean my second time. It was more simplified. I did what helped me learn. Information technology's most learning, non education. My mom said I looked happier. I passed the California bar.

I was "serious" both times, but it was much more effective the second time when I intentionally did things that made sense to me instead of being pulled by someone else's prefab approach.

Cocky-written report worked for me, and it's worked for others, which is why I talk near it. Also, it'due south not necessarily the tools you use (although some are preferable over others, no doubt). It's more than virtually the mentality of learning—expending mental effort vs. letting tools gather around you and letting articles wash over you lot similar a warm shower.

"Taking it on my own was a lot more manageable with the structure your site & recs provided"

Whatever you lot've been putting off is here, right at present. Concentrate your effort in the time you have. Expect it to be difficult. Refusing to suffer now is going to be doubly more than costly. You shall apologize with time, money, and opportunities.

If you don't proactively and deliberately think near what's possible, you go the default. Your life decides for yous instead of you deciding your life. If life gave you lemons, you lot weren't looking for the oranges.

Whether or not yous use a prep course, it'southward withal up to you in the end. No one cares about you every bit much as y'all. Only you can preclude woods fires.

However, many (including my 2013 self) believe or assume that their "big box" course will magically ready them without realizing that it is still, at its cadre, a cocky-learning attempt . Yous're ultimately responsible for learning and internalizing the material and the skills to employ the fabric.

Yeah, the courses do provide excellent study materials. They'd amend for thousands of dollars. What matters ishow you lot employ the materials.

For instance, do you adopt to read outlines and do the problems? Great, don't get stuck in the trap of consuming the outlines while avoiding using their contents.

Do yous enjoy listening to lectures? Go alee. Just don't spend also much attempt trying to "get everything" and end upwardly exhausted for the residuum of the day. Perhaps you could even employ lectures as review at nighttime to help you fall asleep.


The signal is to exist deliberate well-nigh your choices and exercise what makes sense for you, while noticing common mistakes of those who go through the slaughterhouse every half year.

Pros and cons of using a bar prep course

For more than ideas, listen to this audio conversation with Mark, a recent bar taker. We discuss what he liked and didn't like about Barbri and, in hindsight, what his arroyo should take looked similar instead.

Here are some timestamps and so you lot can jump to the parts that involvement you:

0:00: How Barbri throws yous into the deep end after giving you lectures
1:30: "No, but follow the program"
2:00: What Marking would accept washed differently in retrospect, compared to their regimen
3:35: The extent to which lectures can be useful & what they fail to tell you
5:twenty: Information technology'southward yet a self-study course! But "big box" courses are not tailored for y'all
7:twoscore: What to exercise instead of blindly trusting the programme
viii:45: "I could have done that for 8 weeks instead of 2"
nine:40: What they do well (delivery, clear on what'due south tested a lot) & how y'all can make the well-nigh of their resources
12:00: What to exercise across the minimum work
12:45: Different ideas on arranging the work
14:00: How to larn the skills of arrangement and concepts of the material (particularly in the context of essays). Marking also mentions that this is how you larn which bug are clustered together (exactly ane of the bases of "issue checking")
17:15: They tell you what to report, but they don't tell you this…
18:00: Why you should listen to yourself

Barbri really doesn't control your schedule and approach; you practice! You're the dean of your own studies.

Despite that, you may feel like sticking with your prep course. You may feel locked into a sunk-cost mindset considering you lot paid thousands of dollars for it already.

Whatever the reason, that's totally fine as long equally it's your own reasoned decision. Your rationale and gut will convene together to tell you what's the right matter to practice. All y'all have to do is mind to yourself. If you can't come to a clean decision, at to the lowest degree just be enlightened that there isn't one set up path.

People accept passed with the cookie-cutter regimen. People have failed with the exact same regimen. Their one-size-fits-all schedule shouldn't exist the same in the kickoff identify when people have unlike lives and responsibilities.

How does it make sense to have the same study schedule for a 20-something with nothing to do and a parent working at the same time? When anybody has unlike strengths and weaknesses?

Pay attending to your progress. Are yous learning, or are you merely doing busy work? When you recognize that y'all're not getting anywhere, change grade and try something else. Recall that Barbri is simply one of your tools at your disposal.

Does all this sound exciting? Are y'all determined?

In a few weeks, though, the pain of failure will dull. You'll be less "motivated" than before. That's reality. Even if I tell y'all how important daily study habits and consistency are, that'southward non what y'all're interested in. That's reality too. And so I won't belabor the signal too much.

What's motivating is progress. But don't misfile motivation with progress. If you're a regular reader of my blog, so you know information technology's actually more effective to wish you were better instead of wishing things were easier.

And so when you showtime slipping, simply call back that information technology's the work you putupward front that you'll reap down the route. I'll go on reminding you, as well.

The CEO of Dropbox is a great case of upfront preparation. He's always found it valuable to ask himself, "1 year from now, two years from now, five years from at present, what will I wish I had been learning today?"

Similarly, one week from now, one month from now, once bar calendar week rolls around, what will you lot wish you had been learning today?

Get off the screen for only five minutes and think most it. Is at that place annihilation that's dissimilar near your answer compared to what your prep course tells yous?

"When you alter the manner you look at things, the things you await at alter."

If you're already on my electronic mail listing, I'll offering timely guidance and suggestions on how to prepare for your next bar (not all volition be published on the weblog).

If you don't want to miss whatsoever of them, sign upward for my famous weekly emails along with coupons for UWorld, AdaptiBar, BarEssays (and other goodies) hither.

Or not. It's up to yous. It always has been. If the web log doesn't jibe with you, move on, and find improve guidance for your own sake.

You be the guess on whether what I'm saying is sensible and applicable to your situation. But I as well encourage you to think about how to apply imperfect advice to your own personal state of affairs.

Perchance it'due south merely me, but I always go skeptical when someone says "trust me." Trust yourself and your preparation.

Iii months from now, what volition you wish you'd been learning today?

Brian