Has anyone tried mindfulness/meditations to improve scores?

[fonekarrr]

Hey guys,

There seems to be pretty strong clinical evidence for the impact of mindfulness on stress/emotional well-being.

Has anyone tried mindfulness/meditation as a strategy to cope with stress/improve scores? I just started using aurahealth.io and seems pretty good so far. I'd love to hear about your experiences.

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[Jillofalltrades]

Hi 🙂

My situation with MCAT: I took the old MCAT (January 2015) and didn't do well, so the next time I took it (April 2016) it was the new MCAT. I sucked at time management (senior year, distractions, more crappy excuses, etc etc) and suddenly there was 12 days left (I'm not even joking about this) to cram for this exam. Luckily, I was a bio major and did research on the side so at least I stayed connected to the science the whole time.

What really helped me was to set manageable goals for those 12 days and adjust my mindset.

Mindset
As I was studying, I told myself... every moment you spend studying and engaging with the material, you are moving forward. Don't allow yourself to get frustrated, even if it's going really slowly. Always think about building up instead of tearing down. Don't deduct from 528, start adding it up and head towards 528. I say this to everyone and I think it's so important - BE KIND TO YOURSELF. If you were watching a friend who was studying for the MCAT, you would never freak them out by saying "oh my goodness, you haven't studied that yet? Get on it!" so don't do it to yourself either. Be as encouraging to yourself as you would someone else.

Setting manageable goals
I found that a lot of people are bad at this, and it only became apparent when I had 12 days to study. Often times, they don't set manageable goals, they set dream goals and when they don't reach those goals it's demoralizing. Yes we'd all like to sit down for 3-4 hours at a time and cram in a lot of hard material, and maybe some of us can really concentrate for that long, but I certainly couldn't. Instead, I set my goals on the concepts I struggled with the most. I didn't really know how long it would take to learn about pitot tubes, so I didn't give myself a time limit. After I did learn the concept, I gave myself a pat on the back, took a break and did something fun, then came back to tackle the next concept.

Meditation
Before I started any chunk of studying, I gave myself 2 or 5 or 10 minutes to just sit there, close my eyes, and envision what my studying for that concept would look like. I blocked out all the things I hadn't learned yet, blocked out all the panic of all the other crap I have to do, and just focus on what I'd like to achieve in the next couple of hours. Also said a lot of encouraging phrases too - I can do this, I am capable, I have faith in myself.

Sorry that was such a long post. Not sure if that was any help, but I definitely endorse mindfulness 1000% in this whole MCAT business.

 

[GrayArea]

Hi 🙂

My situation with MCAT: I took the old MCAT (January 2015) and didn't do well, so the next time I took it (April 2016) it was the new MCAT. I sucked at time management (senior year, distractions, more crappy excuses, etc etc) and suddenly there was 12 days left (I'm not even joking about this) to cram for this exam. Luckily, I was a bio major and did research on the side so at least I stayed connected to the science the whole time.

What really helped me was to set manageable goals for those 12 days and adjust my mindset.

Mindset
As I was studying, I told myself... every moment you spend studying and engaging with the material, you are moving forward. Don't allow yourself to get frustrated, even if it's going really slowly. Always think about building up instead of tearing down. Don't deduct from 528, start adding it up and head towards 528. I say this to everyone and I think it's so important - BE KIND TO YOURSELF. If you were watching a friend who was studying for the MCAT, you would never freak them out by saying "oh my goodness, you haven't studied that yet? Get on it!" so don't do it to yourself either. Be as encouraging to yourself as you would someone else.

Setting manageable goals
I found that a lot of people are bad at this, and it only became apparent when I had 12 days to study. Often times, they don't set manageable goals, they set dream goals and when they don't reach those goals it's demoralizing. Yes we'd all like to sit down for 3-4 hours at a time and cram in a lot of hard material, and maybe some of us can really concentrate for that long, but I certainly couldn't. Instead, I set my goals on the concepts I struggled with the most. I didn't really know how long it would take to learn about pitot tubes, so I didn't give myself a time limit. After I did learn the concept, I gave myself a pat on the back, took a break and did something fun, then came back to tackle the next concept.

Meditation
Before I started any chunk of studying, I gave myself 2 or 5 or 10 minutes to just sit there, close my eyes, and envision what my studying for that concept would look like. I blocked out all the things I hadn't learned yet, blocked out all the panic of all the other crap I have to do, and just focus on what I'd like to achieve in the next couple of hours. Also said a lot of encouraging phrases too - I can do this, I am capable, I have faith in myself.

Sorry that was such a long post. Not sure if that was any help, but I definitely endorse mindfulness 1000% in this whole MCAT business.

This post was very inspiring! Thank you for sharing!

The MCAT is such a big burden to all of us on this journey because it is a significant determining factor on our acceptances. While it is not everything, the MCAT can still make the difference on wether you attend medical school or not.

Personally, I have been attempting to be more positive about the MCAT as well. I have taken it once, but voided it because I felt that I underestimated the difficulty and in all honesty, I kind of freaked during one of the sections of the exam.

Mindfulness is very important because even if you know all the content required, you can still perform badly because of the stress associated with the exam. On top of all the information required, you also have to learn to test calmly and perform well under pressure (something that is equally important in med school and more important once actually practicing medicine).

I am going to incorporate the suggestions you gave, and if there are more people with other techniques that helped them study and test under pressure, I would also love to read them! 🙂

 

[GrayArea]

Also, how did you do the second time you took it with 12 days of cramming? If you do not mind me asking.

 

[Jillofalltrades]

Also, how did you do the second time you took it with 12 days of cramming? If you do not mind me asking.

520! I was shocked too O____O

 

[GrayArea]

520! I was shocked too O____O

Wow!!! Lol how did you even study for 12 days? Just took practice exams?

 

[Jillofalltrades]

Wow!!! Lol how did you even study for 12 days? Just took practice exams?

It was a hardcore 12 days.

I did 7 days of 10-12 hours of cramming over spring break. Then took 2 days off to rest.
The other 5 days I didn't go to any of my classes and studied another 10-12 hours everyday.

Definitely lived on a nap schedule for those 12 days. I studied when my brain felt good and rested when my brain was tired. Mentality was just gain as much knowledge as possible, and don't stress about the things I don't know because things won't improve just because I stress about them.

Had a super low budget MCAT experience. No MCAT review books. Just pulled out my old AP review books for the sciences and supplemented with Khan. Bought the $10 AAMC online practice questions and one $35 scored practice exam. Took the practice exam in sections because I didn't have 7 hours to run through a whole test.

^^ All of that should just speak to how much remaining calm in an extremely stressful situation pays off.

The day after my MCAT (Friday), I also hopped onto a megabus to treat myself to a day in DC (Saturday) to see cherry blossoms. Then I came back to school to pick up the pieces (bio midterm Monday) from not going to class for a week. It all worked out just fine. HOORAY for positive thinking!

 

[DaAlienist]

It was a hardcore 12 days.

I did 7 days of 10-12 hours of cramming over spring break. Then took 2 days off to rest.
The other 5 days I didn't go to any of my classes and studied another 10-12 hours everyday.

Definitely lived on a nap schedule for those 12 days. I studied when my brain felt good and rested when my brain was tired. Mentality was just gain as much knowledge as possible, and don't stress about the things I don't know because things won't improve just because I stress about them.

Had a super low budget MCAT experience. No MCAT review books. Just pulled out my old AP review books for the sciences and supplemented with Khan. Bought the $10 AAMC online practice questions and one $35 scored practice exam. Took the practice exam in sections because I didn't have 7 hours to run through a whole test.

^^ All of that should just speak to how much remaining calm in an extremely stressful situation pays off.

The day after my MCAT (Friday), I also hopped onto a megabus to treat myself to a day in DC (Saturday) to see cherry blossoms. Then I came back to school to pick up the pieces (bio midterm Monday) from not going to class for a week. It all worked out just fine. HOORAY for positive thinking!

Hi 🙂

My situation with MCAT: I took the old MCAT (January 2015) and didn't do well, so the next time I took it (April 2016) it was the new MCAT. I sucked at time management (senior year, distractions, more crappy excuses, etc etc) and suddenly there was 12 days left (I'm not even joking about this) to cram for this exam. Luckily, I was a bio major and did research on the side so at least I stayed connected to the science the whole time.

What really helped me was to set manageable goals for those 12 days and adjust my mindset.

Mindset
As I was studying, I told myself... every moment you spend studying and engaging with the material, you are moving forward. Don't allow yourself to get frustrated, even if it's going really slowly. Always think about building up instead of tearing down. Don't deduct from 528, start adding it up and head towards 528. I say this to everyone and I think it's so important - BE KIND TO YOURSELF. If you were watching a friend who was studying for the MCAT, you would never freak them out by saying "oh my goodness, you haven't studied that yet? Get on it!" so don't do it to yourself either. Be as encouraging to yourself as you would someone else.

Setting manageable goals
I found that a lot of people are bad at this, and it only became apparent when I had 12 days to study. Often times, they don't set manageable goals, they set dream goals and when they don't reach those goals it's demoralizing. Yes we'd all like to sit down for 3-4 hours at a time and cram in a lot of hard material, and maybe some of us can really concentrate for that long, but I certainly couldn't. Instead, I set my goals on the concepts I struggled with the most. I didn't really know how long it would take to learn about pitot tubes, so I didn't give myself a time limit. After I did learn the concept, I gave myself a pat on the back, took a break and did something fun, then came back to tackle the next concept.

Meditation
Before I started any chunk of studying, I gave myself 2 or 5 or 10 minutes to just sit there, close my eyes, and envision what my studying for that concept would look like. I blocked out all the things I hadn't learned yet, blocked out all the panic of all the other crap I have to do, and just focus on what I'd like to achieve in the next couple of hours. Also said a lot of encouraging phrases too - I can do this, I am capable, I have faith in myself.

Sorry that was such a long post. Not sure if that was any help, but I definitely endorse mindfulness 1000% in this whole MCAT business.

Than you for the advice. I think this aspect of our mental preparation gets overlooked way too often in the scientific disciplines.