...But Is It Worth The Effort?

  

    I fondly remember a day in my high school economics class where the teacher asked us a rather simple question: Is it worth it to put 100% of your effort in, all of the time? Of course we were supposed to look at this through an economists eyes, nothing is free, your time costs you something, and on... We thought unanimous answer was yes, and as we walked to the designated side of the room for "yes" we turned around to see that one student had firmly plopped himself down on the side of "no." The debate that ensued is one I continually go over in my head as I try to apply the principle to my everyday life.
   On the "yes" side, was myself, several of our would-be valedictorians, salutatorians, the winner of the county's student of the year award, and a general slew of high-achievers and bright minds. Not to say the singular "no" crusader was not amongst this crowd, in fact he was extremely bright, but did he know something all of us didn't? I think for the majority of us, being told putting 100% effort in, all of the time was folly and a waste of our time and energy, was rather upsetting. As the debate opened, a wave of reasons the "yes" side was correct came crashing down upon the singular "no" defender. The yeses argued that giving 100 percent of your effort enables you to always succeed, because you will continually push to understand what you are learning or working on, and then you can't ever feel like there was more you can do, because you gave it your all, and on and on. 100 percent effort means good, successful results, every time. That is how all of us had gotten through school, and for the majority of us it worked out very well. Now for defense of the no. Mr. No, argued that it is not efficient to give 100 percent all of the time, and it is not sustainable. He argued that it isn't worth our time to put 100 percent effort in, lets say a paper, when 70 or 80 percent effort will get the job satisfactorily done (for us, some shade of "A"). If you can get away with putting less effort in, and still get the same results as 100 percent, isn't it more efficient? Wouldn't that save you time, and the energy you must exert in order to focus in on that task one hundred percent? This internal dialogue has plagued me since its occurrence, and I think I have finally found a response that is realistic, and I have found useful in my everyday living.
     I have decided it really isn't worth it to put 100 percent of my effort into everything I must do (Mr. No would be proud.) Some things just aren't worth it, as I have been finding out in a certain class I am currently enrolled for. This class, is interesting in subject matter but the teacher is quite bad at delivering her lectures. Until right before the first test, I attended all of her lectures, took notes, did the homework, and when the test came about, I scored slightly higher than the class average, but quite low for my standards. Clearly, traditional methods were not to be trusted in this instance, so I stopped going to class. Instead, I continued doing the assigned readings at home, doing the homework, and only attended the test review a few days before the test (done by the TA) and I scored a 95 on the next test. In this scenario, my effort was not to be clocked at 100 percent, I wasn't even going to class for goodness sakes, but the results were far more impressive this way. This made me realize that being smart with my efforts and not blindingly giving them to all projects, is more worthwhile. In both scenarios I did give the same amount of effort, but in such a way that it was more valuable to the task at hand, which worked out better for me in the end.
     When I now approach a task, the question of "is it worth my best?" no longer floats around in my brain. Instead, I think to myself, "is this the best method to maximize my efforts?" And see what my brain can come up with from there.

Currently Listening To: Crystallize by Lindsey Stirling

Using My "Adult Discipline"

    

     Last year, while I was signing up for my classes for my current semester, I signed up for Spanish 102. It is the second part of the intro course to Spanish, and I was pretty psyched to continue learning a language that I could actually use (as opposed to Latin, which is really cool, but unless I learn how to time travel, rather useless). The first day of class, was met with utter disappointment. My teacher looked to be only a few years older than me, was clearly not a native speaker, and didn't even have a copy of his own syllabus. He might have also been high, but that one is up for debate.
     I decided to give him a chance, and stayed in the class for about two weeks, by which point I could not take the pain anymore, the pain being watching Will Ferrel's "In the House of my Father" with English subtitles. So I switched to a class with a teacher I had heard good things about. Why the long prelude? My point is coming, I swear. The first day of this new class, I learned twice as much as I had in the several weeks of the old one, and it was such a sigh of relief for my developing Spanish-brain. Perhaps the most important piece I remember learning that day, is when we had to write down a whole list of vocab words to be tested on next class. They were all obscure words that we as a class thought would be good to have in our vocabulary. Anyway, he was explaining to everyone, that in language, the general philosophy is if you are constantly bombarded with all of these words and phrases, some of them will sink in, eventually. He then told us, while that is fine and dandy, a more efficient way of learning this vocab, is to sit down, use our "adult discipline" and learn it.
     For some reason, this really struck a chord with me. No one, at least not for a very long time, has told me to just sit down, use some discipline and just get my work done. It is usually more along the lines of "well of course you'll do it, you always end up doing it" and while this is true, it really doesn't motivate me, or help me in any way, because usually just "getting things done" translates to staying up until all hours of the night trying to not fail, but not necessarily get 100 percent out of it.
     It struck me as of late, that not failing, is really quite different than thoroughly succeeding, and actually learning deeply from my studies. This may seem obvious to most everyone, but to me it was a different way of looking at what I am learning in school, and how I am learning it. Until recently, my philosophy had been to get the work done in a way that gets me a good grade (A-B range) with the absolute minimal effort put in. It was an exaggerated efficiency system, designed to work by producing an acceptable result with the lowest possible input, and while I thought it seemed like a good idea, I am really disappointed in it.
     I kept finding myself looking at a grade, that was just shy of what I wanted, and thinking, "well that isn't bad for only studying for 15 minutes." Sure, it's not bad based on that frame, but imagine what I could achieve if I had actually put my best effort in? I don't know where in my life I lost this will to not simply avoid failing, but to pursue excellence, but I want it back. I miss those 100 percents, I miss that conquering feeling you get when you put in your all and you achieve marvelous results. I miss actually learning my material, not simply cramming it in for the singular purpose of an exam. So, in the spirit of this blog, where I am trying to stop dreaming about my "adult life" and actually try and live it day to day, I am invoking my "adult discipline."I know it probably doesn't have much strength right now, but I think if I work on it little by little, day to day, it will soon become a force to be reckoned with. How's your "adult discipline"?
xoxo

P.S. Still going strong with my morning yoga. 
Currently Listening To: Booty Swing by Parov Stelar