Finding your groove

One distinguishing characteristic between high achieving students and those who are struggling to find their groove is that high achieving students have relatively concrete motivations that compel them to overcome school-based and other challenges. Another characteristic is that they are confident in their ability to problem-solve, otherwise they would more easily quit in frustration as do other students. One other characteristic is that they enjoy what they do. Whether it be a general love of learning and problem solving or love for a specific subject, they’ve already found their groove. They enjoy what they do here in school. It makes sense to them and is integrated with and supportive of who they are as persons. A quote taken from the Freakonomics column in the NYTimes supports the notion that doing well in school has a lot to do with not finding school and problem solving tedious and onerous.

“Ericsson’s research suggests a third cliché as well: when it comes to choosing a life path, you should do what you love — because if you don’t love it, you are unlikely to work hard enough to get very good. Most people naturally don’t like to do things they aren’t “good” at. So they often give up, telling themselves they simply don’t possess the talent for math or skiing or the violin. But what they really lack is the desire to be good and to undertake the deliberate practice that would make them better. ”

So, an interesting question to ask yourself is that in your heart of hearts does learning, school, your major, your particular class turn you on. Is it sexy? Does it float your boat? If your answer is yes, then figuring out how to become more successful at school becomes just a question of metacognition and better technique. If the answer is no then talk of technique alone is insufficient. In this case your most important task is, finding your groove. This task of course is neither simple nor quick. In some instances, finding your groove will take a lifetime but if you start now you can discover important aspects of your groove that will make the decisions that you need to make much easier. Here is a personality inventory called Personality I.D. that will provide some personal insight, i.e. when you are sharply focused on a task, you may come across as being overly critical, judgmental, blunt, or impatient with others. The Career Development Center will help you to discover the careers that fit your interests and the Rutgers Learning Center can suggest and provide assessments to help you examine your school habits and begin to weed out unhelpful habits and cultivate more helpful ones.

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