Self-paced
for my peeps who work full time besides studying and who work in something they are passionate about, any tips on how to turn off your thoughts, worries and concerns from the work day? I still think about my clients and what to do the next day and I find my studying quality to suffer. ill take any tips to improve focus and staying on track, thank you!
also tips on how to make the lsat something one is excited or enjoys doing would be really appreciated! ive heard from high scorers they begin to love the lsat, and I am a firm believer of mentality and focus while testing being huge in accuracy.
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3 comments
I completely relate to this. I worked while studying, and one thing that helped me was accepting that I could never do my best studying if part of my brain was still at work.
For context, I earned a 515 on the MCAT (about the 91st percentile) and a 170 on the LSAT (about the 96th percentile). These are the habits that made the biggest difference for me:
I gave myself a 20–30 minute "shutdown routine" after work. I wrote down every client issue, task, or idea that was on my mind. Once it was on paper, I reminded myself, "I'll handle this tomorrow." That made it much easier to mentally transition into study mode.
Before opening my books, I spent 5–10 minutes taking a walk, stretching, or doing light exercise. That physical transition helped separate work from studying.
I studied in a different environment whenever possible. Even moving to another room or a library made my brain associate that location with LSAT mode instead of work mode.
I studied in focused blocks (45–60 minutes) with my phone completely out of sight. Even brief interruptions noticeably reduced my concentration.
I didn't aim for perfect focus—I aimed to get started. Once I was 10–15 minutes into a Logical Reasoning section or Reading Comprehension passage, the work thoughts usually faded on their own.
As for actually enjoying the LSAT, my mindset changed when I stopped treating it like a test and started treating it like a game of finding flaws in arguments and solving puzzles.
A few things that helped:
I celebrated getting difficult questions right instead of being frustrated when I missed them.
I reviewed every mistake until I could explain exactly why the correct answer was right and why every other choice was wrong.
I tracked my progress instead of obsessing over my score. Watching my accuracy improve made studying much more rewarding.
I reminded myself that every question has one objectively correct answer. That made the exam feel like a puzzle with rules rather than something subjective.
The people I know who scored in the 170s didn't necessarily "love" the LSAT at first—they learned to enjoy the challenge because every mistake was an opportunity to sharpen their reasoning. Once I viewed each question as a puzzle instead of an obstacle, studying became much more engaging, and my focus improved significantly.
@PrateekDevulpally thank you, very helpful! I have a reminder to do to do lists or write things down like you said while at work to get paid to do it, but I usually ignore it. I will stop ignoring it because I can’t keep hurting myself like this.
@lagata My pleasure! I'm really glad it helped. I think that's a great decision. Writing things down at work has made a huge difference for me because it gets those thoughts out of my head and onto paper, so I'm not carrying them around afterward. I hope it helps you too, and I'm wishing you all the best!