Those of you working and studying...how do you do it? Tips?!

[manohman]

How do you make working full time and studying work?

Im working 9-7 and afterwards im so beat that i can never bring myself to study.

I need some tips/succes stories!

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[Traumweber]

I studied for about a month. It all depends on your schedule.. I have a 7AM to 5PM schedule only on weekdays thankfully. So I found 1 to 2 hours a day to review content (lunch break etc.). I also made sure to do atleast 2 timed verbal passages daily.
Saturday and sunday were reserved for FL exams and thorough post test review.
I have not had a class in anatomy/physiology, and so had to spend a lot of time in content review of the BS section. Thankfully I remembered most things from PS.
Oh and make sure to do the week's worth of laundry while you take the FL!

 

[Odi]

I know the feeling. It's extremely hard to get in the zone to study after work.

The best advice I can give is take complete advantage of your days off. Run a study marathon with plenty of breaks. Caffeine is your best friend... And try to focus most of your limited time on weaknesses.

 

[sps27]

I can probably write a book on this topic but suffice it to say that work and mcat don't go together. Both together are undesirable, to say the least. So fully explore opportunities to go part time. If you MUST be full time, be ready for some major insanity!. Find an isolated spot in a lib near work where you can sit and study. One lib will not work since your study time (6 pm to 11 pm) is off the charts for most. I had to shuffle across 3 lib on different days not to mention holidays. By far the biggest issue you will face is RETENTION and MOMEMTUM. You may put in 10 hrs each day on weekends and finish 2 big chaps in TBR but come Monday, whosh! all of that momentum is gone and you are still nibbling on a single chap for 4 out of 5 weekdays and your counterparts sitting at home studying 24x7 are completing full TBR books. A few months fast forward and you will still be on content review while the rest of the gang is well into their FL's and spitting out un-f-believable scores which will seem like magic and unattainable to you. The pile of stuff you read and did not revise and forget due to paucity of time will only increase. A huge frustration will set in. You will miss questions because you just don't remember now. You read it, solved it months ago and just cannot remember, simply because you don't have time to go back and read it all over again. Meanwhile folks will press you to do more practice, more practice and you wonder, what the heck is the use of practice if I can't recall. God forbid but you may get trapped in a loop of read forget, read forget, read forget and the cycle is unending as there are a **million** things to read and remember for this exam and recall with lightning speed which only comes with a repeated and frequent revisions and then all over again. Need I say more. I guess I will stop. I had to work full time and study for there was no other option. But I will remember this phase for the rest of my life. It was that terrible! I won't sugar coat this with one or two liners and make it sound like magic which will only lead you astray. No sir, it ain't magic. It is damn difficult, psychologically and physically. So do not desire it......

 

[John Doughnut]

I can probably write a book on this topic but suffice it to say that work and mcat don't go together. Both together are undesirable, to say the least. So fully explore opportunities to go part time. If you MUST be full time, be ready for some major insanity!. Find an isolated spot in a lib near work where you can sit and study. One lib will not work since your study time (6 pm to 11 pm) is off the charts for most. I had to shuffle across 3 lib on different days not to mention holidays. By far the biggest issue you will face is RETENTION and MOMEMTUM. You may put in 10 hrs each day on weekends and finish 2 big chaps in TBR but come Monday, whosh! all of that momentum is gone and you are still nibbling on a single chap for 4 out of 5 weekdays and your counterparts sitting at home studying 24x7 are completing full TBR books. A few months fast forward and you will still be on content review while the rest of the gang is well into their FL's and spitting out un-f-believable scores which will seem like magic and unattainable to you. The pile of stuff you read and did not revise and forget due to paucity of time will only increase. A huge frustration will set in. You will miss questions because you just don't remember now. You read it, solved it months ago and just cannot remember, simply because you don't have time to go back and read it all over again. Meanwhile folks will press you to do more practice, more practice and you wonder, what the heck is the use of practice if I can't recall. God forbid but you may get trapped in a loop of read forget, read forget, read forget and the cycle is unending as there are a **million** things to read and remember for this exam and recall with lightning speed which only comes with a repeated and frequent revisions and then all over again. Need I say more. I guess I will stop. I had to work full time and study for there was no other option. But I will remember this phase for the rest of my life. It was that terrible! I won't sugar coat this with one or two liners and make it sound like magic which will only lead you astray. No sir, it ain't magic. It is damn difficult, psychologically and physically. So do not desire it......

Haha man, this hit home. Working full time and studying is overly trying...but you gotta avoid the doom and gloom. Each person deals with a different circumstance, and you just have to find a way to make it work for you.

 

[CharlieKelly]

Try to study away from home, or any place uncomfortable enough to not lay back in. Drinking a lot of coffee and using vacation days and weekends to pull all day study sessions should help. Lay out a "syllabus" of sorts of different mcat topics for each section and dedicate yourself to a couple weak topics each session, so there's a "mission" or task to accomplish each sit down. Use YouTube to watch lessons on days you really don't want to read.

Hope that helps!

 

[faith hopelove]

I agree with most of you. It is really hard to juggle both. But if you have no choice (like me) to work full-time you just have to suck it up and bite the bullet. I work on the off shift which makes it more challenging since I just want to pass out when I get home. I would say make a schedule for yourself and stick to it!! That is important. If you work 9a-7p, go home take a nap and get up and study. I agree that it is best to study when you are not home so you are not more likely to be relaxed causing you to slack off on your studying. But try to find a library that opens late. For example, college campus may open until 10p but find another library such as a medical school library (I had one close to me) that opens until wee hours in the morning. That way you can be out of your element which may help you keep the momentum going. Also, take any opportunity you have during work to study. I do not know what you do but during lunch breaks bring your flash cards or a book to read through so that when you wake up from your nap you're answering questions and reviewing. If you're working in an office have a flash card posted on your computer so that you are reviewing it constantly. I went through content slow but I found that you shouldn't focus greatly on knowing every single detail. It's answering the questions that help you know if you got the content down or not. If there is a hole in your content then review it and answer more questions on it. But I would say stuck to your schedule and work in any time to study. Also I got this advice from someone else, but if you have a posted note on your computer or refridge (some where you would look often) that shows how many days left you have until your exam it helps you stay motivated to get up and study.