LSAT Diary: Finding Time to Study For The LSAT In College

This installment of LSAT Diaries comes from Chris, a 24-year-old recent college graduate.

In this LSAT Diary, he talks about the struggles involved in finding time to study for the LSAT while taking his college classes.

If you want to be in LSAT Diaries, please email me at LSATUnplugged@gmail.com. (You can be in LSAT Diaries whether you've taken the exam already or not.)

Please leave Chris some encouragement below in the comments!

Chris's LSAT Diary:

Here I am (somewhat) fresh out of college and at the nexus of determining the next step in my academic career: the LSAT.

For the better part of six years, I have entertained the dream that I could command my way into a top law school if I worked hard enough. It all started when I was a party in an unfortunate personal injury case involving a hit-and-run driver. An accomplished attorney grilled me for three days straight and it was one of the most stressful experiences I had ever encountered at that time. Yet, during my courtroom experience, I noticed that lawyers were just mere mortals and I became fascinated with the mechanics and components of practicing the law. I said to myself, "This is cool. I could do something like that." After wrapping up the trial, I flung myself back into the daily grind of college (lectures, homework and work) with a renewed confidence.

For the next four years, I challenged myself to perform at the highest possible level that I could. My academic goal was to get straight As throughout my undergraduate career and to put in the necessary time to make that happen. It wasn't easy, but I survived each day with a lot of diligence, persistence and support from friends, family and teachers. As time went by, I focused primarily on school and working full-time as a Resident Assistant. Being on call 24 hours a day didn't exactly leave me much time to study for the LSAT before I graduated. School and work ate up most of my weekdays and weekends. Taking breaks for myself required the rest of my time.

After coming to the gripping realization that my 4.0+ UGPA isn't automatically going to translate into an elite score, I enrolled in several classes that built fundamental LSAT skills, like critical reasoning. Before I knew it, it was time to graduate, and the LSAT was the last hurdle that I would have to complete before I could go to all those dream schools whose allure captivated me during my spring break trips. I planned on studying the entire summer, which I thought would be brimming with free time. If you sprinkled in a few personal crises, family troubles and post-grad anxiety, then you would have recreated the situation that my idealistic study period turned into.

I have read a variety of books (the best being A Rulebook for Arguments and How to Think Logically), pored over countless LSAT Blog posts, taken a lot of PrepTests, and brutally dissected myself based on their results. While that sort of mentally taxing experience is never easy to deal with, I'm having fun. I'm excited to finally take the test and not have it take a hold of nearly every conversation I have with someone when he or she asks, "What are your plans for after college?" If I don't do well, then I'll just regroup and prepare again (hopefully with fewer distractions).

The most important thing that I have learned is that we all make mistakes and we deal with the consequences. Buying into the mindset that taking the LSAT only once and doing well is the only way you're ever going to make it as a successful lawyer isn't going to help you. Sure, your application might be dinged somewhat if your scores are averaged, but the ABA only requires law schools to report a student's highest score.

Also, there is a popular tendency among individuals, especially stressed-out students, to champion fear-based memes for public consumption on the Internet whenever the LSAT is mentioned. In my opinion, that's all nonsense. To all those people who are prepping with me or are going to study in the near future, I hope that you'll just put the time in to understand the test and stay positive. In turn, you'll likely learn more about yourself. As for me, I'm just enjoying the process.

Photo by Paul Watson