Having said that, after yesterday's test I am starting to see room for improvement in my ideal above
. I want to share my experience of yesterday's test in hopes that it will benefit at least some future LSAT takers.
First, under-performing
I had the misconception that since I seemed to score an average of a certain number i was guaranteed that my real LSAT score would hover around that average. Well, although the coming fact does not necessarily apply to all people it sure does to the majority of them; and that is you will naturally under-perform in actual tests due to a combination of psychological, mental toughness and other stray factors. In short, in the actual test you are not only up against assumptions and flaws but also against your biggest hurdle which is yourself. Imagine an olympic athlete who practices long jumps every day averaging 8 meters a jump. Imagine now this athlete is being asked to jump from the ledge of a skyscraper to the adjacent building's ledge which are 7 meters apart. The stakes are higher now and the errors are much more unforgiving. This leads to deterrent psychological factors creeping in affecting overall performance. I hope the analogy and the idea I am trying to get across are clear. Truly the best favor you can give yourself during the test is not to have the best nutrition or to be the sharpest and most alert as you've ever been, rather it is to relax.
Second, LGP
I call it LGP, "Logic Games Paralysis." The symptoms include re-reading the stimulus over and over with no grasp of the idea. You know you've been LGP'ed if you find yourself drawing multiple different diagrams without knowing what the heck is going on. Unfortunately, this happened to me from the get go in the LG section, which was the last section of my test. I couldn't comprehend the stimulus and couldn't put a sensible diagram together. I panicked for a moment or two then carried on and moved to the next LG. I solve the 2nd LG. 3rd LG isn't that bad. Starting to calm my nerves and pull myself together. 4th game, BOOM, paralyzed. Words cannot describe the amount of panicking that went through my poor head. I turn to 1st LG....blank, turn to 4th LG....nothing. 10 minutes left and alternating between the two games multiple times without a clue on how to even start I decided to get out of the test room. I went to the restroom. I washed my face and stared at the mirror for a good 1 or 2 minutes. I truly gave up at that moment, but somehow I convince myself to go back to the test and try to solve a game and guess on the other. I go back to my seat and open the 1st game and solve it under 6 minutes. If you are wondering what changed and how I was able to solve it, which turned out not so difficult. Well I calmed down and I started to look at the questions and answer choices to help me formulate an idea and come up with a diagram. With under 3 minutes left I move to the 4th game and apply the same thing looking at the questions and answer choices. I think I had a reasonable chance to solve it, but time had run out and I ended up guessing on most of the questions. In short if you are ever LGP'ed, calm down and try to look at the questions to formulate an idea of the game.
Good luck, this test has the ability to be very frustrating.
