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When your semester doesn’t go the way you hoped, it’s easy to feel down on yourself. It’s normal to ask yourself, “why bother trying this semester?” or to think maybe the whole year will just be a waste. While this thought pattern is quite common, it doesn’t have to be true that a bad semester means a bad year. Each new semester is a new chance to reset and have a fresh opportunity to achieve your goals. This blog provides some tips for resetting your mindset after a bad semester and giving yourself the fresh start that you deserve.
The most important place to start when thinking about the past semester that didn’t go well is your wins. Even if your semester didn’t go the way you hoped, it’s likely that you still had some successes and wins along the way. It’s important to remember those wins and celebrate them. Maybe there was a time in the semester where you did really well on the test. Perhaps you had a few week period where you were totally caught up on work. Maybe you learned a new skill, made a new friend, or discovered a new interest. No matter how small, it’s essential to think about your wins from the semester in order to motivate yourself to move forward. The best motivation is positivity, and it’s essential to build on your successes, rather than remain hyper-focused on your failures.
If you are unhappy with how your past semester went, you likely had challenges and barriers to overcome. It’s important to really reflect on those and get specific about what barriers you faced that kept you from meeting your goals. You may have had personal challenges or life events that got in the way. Perhaps it was a struggle with focusing, finding motivation to do work, or frequently feeling distracted. Your barriers might also have been around prioritization, always choosing spending time with friends or your hobbies over your schoolwork. Reflect on these barriers without judging yourself, with the only goal being to understand the barriers you faced. Once you understand the specific challenges that kept you from meeting your goals, you will be better equipped to find success in the new semester.
In addition to any barriers you faced, you should consider any habits you adopted in the past semester that didn’t serve you well. Considering bad habits doesn’t mean faulting yourself for every bad choice you made throughout the semester, but rather thinking about anything that became a frequent pattern. Did you stay up too late fairly consistently? Make a habit of procrastinating on your schoolwork? Frequently decide not to study for tests? If there are any habits you built last semester that made it harder to achieve your goals, it’s important to recognize them and commit to breaking those habits in the new semester.
One of the most important parts of a fresh start is to have a fresh outlook on what you are trying to achieve. For the coming semester, set some achievable, measurable goals for yourself that you would like to accomplish. Make sure your goals are ambitious enough that you will need to work hard to achieve them, but realistic enough that you feel confident you can achieve them and feel motivated by them. It’s also helpful to set goals around things you can measure, to make it easier to track your progress and determine whether you achieved your goal. Instead of “doing better this semester,” consider a goal like “bringing up my math grade to a B” or “being on time to school at least 90% of the time.”
The most effective way to build new habits and make changes is to start small. When thinking about your barriers last semester and what didn’t go well, consider what small changes you could make to make the new semester go slightly better. Perhaps you can commit to waking up 15 minutes earlier. Maybe starting to use reminders on your phone to remind you to complete schoolwork might help you. If you don’t currently write down your assignments, perhaps keeping a list of assignments in a notebook or your Notes App could be a good starting point. Making big, sweeping changes can be difficult and overwhelming, so create your fresh start using small changes that can make a big impact.
Asking for help can be difficult, especially if you’re not sure what you need. However, reaching out to others for support is a great way to make changes in your habits and stick to them. Consider asking someone you trust to serve as your accountability partner. An accountability partner is someone who you can share your goals with who will check in with you periodically to make sure you’re on track. Accountability partners are most effective when you both set goals and hold each other accountable. It’s important to remember that accountability partners are not about judgment or scolding you when you get off track, but rather providing encouragement to stay on track and helping you make a plan if things aren’t going the way you’ve hoped. Setting up a regular check-in with an accountability partner is a great strategy to ensure you never get too far off track.
You might also consider asking for help from teachers, tutors, coaches, or other adults in your life. Share your goals for the semester with a trusted adult and ask for strategies or advice on how you might achieve them. Asking for this input does not mean you need to take every piece of advice you are given, but it’s a great starting point to help you think about what might help. If you’re open to a higher degree of help, consider reaching out to a Success Coach who can help you develop strategies that will help you shift your habits, find success, and reach your goals both for the semester and beyond.
A bad semester can be fairly discouraging, but it doesn’t mean you have to give up on your goals! If you’re looking for some extra help in resetting your habits in the new semester and achieving your goals, consider Success Coaching. YA Success Coach emphasizes getting to know you as a unique individual and discovering the things that motivate you. We work with you to develop strategies that work for your unique needs and help you achieve the goals that you care about. To learn more about how Success Coaching can help you find success this semester, contact us today.
Having a conversation is the first step to helping your child realize their full potential and set them up for success!