Blogging and Design

Hey guys! So I had planned to write a lot more this week, but it turns out I was rather busy with blogging... just not necessarily my blog!

I ended up helping two of my good friends, Raveena and Isabelle, (who are coincidentally both also flute players!) set up and design blogs of their own this week. It made me incredibly happy to know that I inspired them in some small way and was able to help them achieve something they wanted to do.

I have always wanted to inspire people, and even something as small as Raveena messaging me and saying that my blog made her decide to finally start one of her own, well, that's a great feeling.

Not to mention I have so much fun designing my website and theirs! The design might just be my favorite part of having a blog, and I've even considered being a web designer as a career. At least now I've got more to add to a portfolio, am I right?

If you want to check out their blogs and support them, that would be fantastic, both for me and for them! I'll post the links below so you can check them out. I may even have them do guest posts sometime here, who knows!

And to you out there, if you want to start a blog, what's stopping you? If it's not knowing how to set up and design your blog, you can start by asking for help here. I'm definitely not charging now since I'm certainly not a professional, and I can't promise results will be as good with other hosting websites. But you know, it's a start, right? Right...

Anyway, check out their blogs below!
Raveena: www.artsyreevs.blogspot.com
Isabelle: www.majortreblemaker.blogspot.com

(Also, thanks to www.angiemakes.com because I used a lot of her free graphics on both blogs and they're amazing!)

Secrets of a Straight A Student

So part of the reason I didn't post much last week is because I had a bit of a breakdown when some of my teachers put in zeros for work that I had done or hadn't had time to make up yet, which dropped my grades down to a D and an F.

And when you've always been a straight-A student like me, seeing the letter D, or, heaven forbid, the letter F on your grades is downright terrifying. Dreams of perfect grades and a stellar GPA go flying out the window, you wonder how low your class rank will drop, you wonder what all those colleges who have been pestering you will think of you now.

Thankfully, I did all of the work and my teachers put the grades in, and I'm back to A's. But this just goes to show that it can be really stressful trying to maintain all A's in school, and it can be really scary when something you're used to and take pride in suddenly isn't there anymore.

I'm not calling this post a list of study tips, because it's not. If I'm telling the truth, I don't study as much as people might think I do, and I don't study as much as other people may have to. And that's okay.

I also don't slack off all the time. I don't skip class every day, or sleep through every lesson, or never turn in my homework. That said, I may slack off from time to time. I'll text in class sometimes, or read a book, and yes, I have fallen asleep once or twice. I may get my homework done at the very last minute, but hey, I get it done.

Honestly, I think the biggest secret to doing well in school is knowing what works for you.

I know when I need to be in class, I know when I need to pay attention, I know when I need to review the material at home. I know when I need to ask for help. Knowing how you learn best is much more important than following any sort of list of study rules you can find on the internet.

This kind of goes back to my last lifestyle post as well. Just like being healthy means doing what's best for you, so does being a successful student. And the two can really be linked as well. If you're studying so much that you never have time to have fun and you're completely stressed out about school, that's not good for your brain or your grades.

Unfortunately, keeping good grades really can just boil down to doing the work. Which, I know, is super boring. There's a lot of things I would rather do than my homework. Even just right now, I'm writing a blog post instead of doing my homework. But I know that eventually I will get it done. And yes, there's other things to think about like test scores and essays and projects and all of that, but really, just doing your assignments makes a big difference.

Going along with that, you actually have to be able to find your assignments when they're due. Now, I'm not perfectly organized by any means, but if your backpack looks more like a garbage dump than notes and homework, you might want to clean that up a bit. It won't help to do the assignment if you lose it in a black hole before you can turn it in.

The other big part of maintaining good grades is being motivated to make good grades. If you really just don't care if you barely pass, then you're probably going to barely pass. I know that personally, I'm motivated by my success. When I do well at something (e.g., keeping straight A's this far), then I'm a lot more motivated to keep doing well (e.g., keeping straight A's until I graduate).

That said, there's internal motivators like what I just described, and there's external motivators. These may include money for getting good grades, or getting into the college you want, or getting the job you want, etc, etc, etc. Different people may be motivated by different things, and that's okay too.

I wish I could give you some secret tip that would instantly make you a top student, if you're a student at all. I just wish there was a tip that existed that would do that.

So, in summary, here's a few tips for how I keep my grades up in school.

1. Know what works best for you. Know how much you need to study, and what ways you need to study. 
2. Don't stress yourself out. Prolonged stress hurts your performance in school.
3. Do the work. You can't expect to just pull an A out of a hat, you actually have to earn it by completing your assignments. 
4. Stay reasonably organized. You don't want to lose papers before you turn them in.
5. Find what motivates you, and stay motivated to succeed. 

If you're a student (or were), how do you study for school? Do you have any tips for maintaining good grades? Let me know in comments!

A Bright Future?

What do you want to be when you grow up?

I'm sure every kid has thought about their answer to that question. Adults too, for that matter, since it doesn't seem to be all that common that people are actually doing the work they want to or dreamt about. But for us teens, who are on that precarious edge between our childhood dreams and our futures as adults, that decision is starting to look very real—and very intimidating.

As a kid, I don’t think my “when I grow up” dreams were all that conventional. Sure, princess was probably on the list, but I mostly remember wanting to be a veterinarian, author or service dog trainer.

 

I've since realized that I couldn't handle seeing animals sick or in pain well enough to be a vet, and that I couldn't handle giving away the dogs I’d trained once I got attached to them (which I inevitably would). I actually do still want to be an author, but at this point in time, it seems like that’ll be more of a side job than a career.

The next job that made it onto the list was an English teacher. I love writing and literature and helping people (especially helping make them smarter). But after a project at school in which we had to teach the class for a day, I’m no longer sure I can handle a certain few students who refuse to pay attention, ask stupid questions, then blame the teacher for why they can’t understand a simple concept.

My current dream job is actually to play in an orchestra professionally, the kind of orchestra that gets to record soundtracks for films and television shows. I’m only hoping I could actually make it to that level and not burn out on playing when I have to do it as a job.

But for all of us who want a career in an area as risky as the music business, we know that you usually have to have a backup plan. I suppose my backup plan would be to be a music educator, although my real “dream” backup would be to work with music therapy for special needs students.

But honestly, I don’t know what my future is going to be, and that’s okay. I know that I don’t actually have to have my entire life planned out, because things never go quite according to my plans. But if there is one thing, above all, that I aspire to be, it’s brilliant.

I adore the word “brilliant.” It means that something is so wonderful that it’s actually incandescent. It’s radiant. It’s illuminating.

And that is what I want to be. I want to be intelligent and clever and beautiful and inspirational and determined. I want to be a shining light in a dark world. I want to be a star—and I don’t mean celebrity. I mean the burning balls of gas in space that we all look up at on a clear night. Why? Because they get brighter when it gets darker. Darkness doesn't dim their light. They are brilliant. That's what I want to be.

What do you want to be?