Overcoming Burnout: Tips for Struggling Physics Students

[Mulz]

I'm currently in my third year of physics and need advice on how to manage my situation.

I tend to always crash once or twice a year, unable to gain motivation to study. Currently, I'm probably in one. For the whole duration of my current course, I have not done much at all and the exam is in around 10 days. For the labs we had, I was not really active and I had to ask a lot of questions in order to get along with them. Writing the science reports was not an issue but the performing of the labs were a nightmare because I didn't prepare myself. I just didn't have the motivation.

I'm not sure why I'm getting burned out. Maybe it's because of poor study habits. I'm very slow at reading compared to others and very little gets stuck in my head, that means I have to exert much more effort to learn the same material as others. I studied a lot last semester and I got good grades. It's probably because I don't feel like putting a lot of time.

I'm suspecting there's something wrong with my brain. Everytime I study, I either lose attention or I forget what I read. I have tried to actively read but it takes a lot of time. Last semester went well probably only because I threw a lot of time into it just to remember the subjects. Took me around 8 hours to read 15-30 pages.

Any general advice? I'm not going to take a year off since I know that after this course, my motivation will be fine again.

Sorry for my bad english.

 

[jedishrfu]

What about dropping the course? Is that an option?

Its hard to say what's going on here. I know the junior year is often a shock to students especially those whose study habits are weak. Often a student breezing through high school has developed no habits because whatever the teacher taught you just absorbed without taking notes (ie no notetaking skills) and were able to do the homework easily. (That was me)

Since college 1st and 2nd year, you are either relearning stuff you knew (ie no need to take notes) or from what you knew you picked it up and glossed over the stuff you didn't understand. (that was me, I worked 20+ hours per week while attending school and just didn't put in the time to understand also I skipped some Calculus courses to get more challenging work which meant I skipped some key things I should have known)

Now you hit the junior year which depends on those subtle things you didn't pick up earlier and things get immensely more difficult. (that was me)

My feeling has been that using the HS year as a measure. Undergraduate college years are equivalent to 3 high school years and so now at the junior year you've advanced 6 years in education and the difficulties are similar to a 6th grader or even a 9th grader taking 12th-grade stuff.

So now you feel you've hit a wall. This wall gives you academic anxiety and makes reading about your course much more time consuming and difficult.

My suggestion is to get with your prof and ask for some suggestions. He/she may suggest dropping out and trying again later on. Or get with some students to form a study group or even get tutoring from one of them.

Identify the areas you don't understand and focus on them with the goal of passing the test. Sometimes you have to force your self to be singleminded and self-motivated like going on a starvation diet, no junk food, no games, no chitchat, no social media (turn off your phone) nothing matters only the test. Afterwards, you can take a break.

One advantage you have is the resources on the internet like Khan Academy where you can brush up on math concepts that you skipped before. However, you must honestly asses where you are weak and then pursue corrective action (you could do that by scanning the Khan course list however that could be a rabbit hole of wasted time)

 

[Mulz]

What about dropping the course? Is that an option?

Its hard to say what's going on here. I know the junior year is often a shock to students especially those whose study habits are weak. Often a student breezing through high school has developed no habits because whatever the teacher taught you just absorbed without taking notes (ie no notetaking skills) and were able to do the homework easily. (That was me)

Since college 1st and 2nd year, you are either relearning stuff you knew (ie no need to take notes) or from what you knew you picked it up and glossed over the stuff you didn't understand. (that was me, I worked 20+ hours per week while attending school and just didn't put in the time to understand also I skipped some Calculus courses to get more challenging work which meant I skipped some key things I should have known)

Now you hit the junior year which depends on those subtle things you didn't pick up earlier and things get immensely more difficult. (that was me)
So now you feel you've hit a wall. This wall gives you academic anxiety and makes reading about your course much more time consuming and difficult.

My suggestion is to get with your prof and ask for some suggestions. He/she may suggest dropping out and trying again later on. Or get with some students to form a study group or even get tutoring from one of them.

Identify the areas you don't understand and focus on them with the goal of passing the test. Sometimes you have to force your self to be singleminded and self-motivated like going on a starvation diet, no junk food, no games, no chitchat, no social media (turn off your phone) nothing matters only the test. Afterwards, you can take a break.

One advantage you have is the resources on the internet like Khan Academy where you can brush up on math concepts that you skipped before. However, you must honestly asses where you are weak and then pursue corrective action (you could do that by scanning the Khan course list however that could be a rabbit hole of wasted time)

Now that you mention it, I have for the past couple of months eaten A LOT of junk food, stopped exercising all together, stopped going outside the home, stopped trying to socialize and probably more. I feel lethargic every day, regardless of sleep quality. Bringing myself to study is painful, doesn't matter if it's interesting or not.

Going to at the very least try to eat healthy and/or avoid junk food.

 

[Choppy]

Now that you mention it, I have for the past couple of months eaten A LOT of junk food, stopped exercising all together, stopped going outside the home, stopped trying to socialize and probably more. I feel lethargic every day, regardless of sleep quality. Bringing myself to study is painful, doesn't matter if it's interesting or not.

Yes, this is a good place to start. It's easy to get caught up in the cycle of assignments, quizzes, labs and exams, and as a result, neglect to take care of yourself.

Make sure you're getting adequate sleep, eating balanced meals, getting exercise, socializing and getting in some down time. This is no easy task, especially if you're already at the bottom of your barrel, but when you're taking good care of yourself you're likely to see improvements.

 

[Dr. Courtney]

I viewed each semester as a 16 week marathon. I did most of my decompression during the breaks between semesters. My motivation came from my years bussing tables in bars and washing dishes in seedy restaurants and working fast food.

There may be fitness, nutritional, or other factors in your burnout, especially right now which has sometimes been a time of midwinter blues for me, but that was more grad school in Massachusetts than undergrad at LSU. I've always been careful to eat a balanced diet (old school balance, four food groups, plenty of meat and veggies, not much sugar) and get in plenty of outside time (walking or bike riding mostly in Feb with basketball and tennis in warmer months.)

But you have to shake off the blues pretty quickly to succeed in a physics major. Sometimes, when one recognizes a lack of motivation, one just simply decides to keep working hard anyway.

 

[Marisa5]

You might lack discipline, perhaps due to poorly defined life goals. Clearly state to yourself what you truly want and build it brick by brick, nobody can do that for you. Undergrad can be difficult but you'll be tested to a much higher degree beyond that so you need to make sure that what you're doing now is on the path you want to travel. Take it a day at a time.