This post is for people taking the bar exam this month.

All through June, I’d been in this awful limbo—
studying some, but not intensely—
with too much time left to go “all‑in,”
but not enough to relax.

The result?

A whole month ruined by self‑doubt, guilt, and truly elite‑level procrastination. If there had been medals, I definitely would have placed.

And then, suddenly, it was July 6.

The bar exam was 3 weeks away.

I needed to get my head straight and get laser‑focused on studying—and I needed to do it FAST.

If any of this sounds even a little familiar, here’s the practical move that helped me SO much in starting to buckle down:

 🗺 MAP YOUR DAYS 🗺

Time‑blocking your days cuts down on that wasted, guilty, in‑between time.

—How to do it—

 🔹 Decide in advance when you’ll study each subject.
 🔹 Put specific blocks on your calendar
 (e.g., 9–11 AM, Evidence essays; 1–3 PM, MBE practice).
 🔹 During each block, think only about the task assigned to that block. Nothing else.

That way, when you finish Torts at 7:20 PM, you don’t waste 30 minutes spiraling about, “What should I do next?”

You’ve already decided. You just follow the plan.

—Why it works—

Fewer tiny decisions = more mental energy saved. ✔️

More energy saved = less end‑of‑day fatigue. ✔️

Less fatigue = better focus and productivity when you are studying. ✔️

👉 By mapping your days, you also protect your real off‑time—

-the walks,
-the zoning out,
-the quiet minutes when your brain is secretly consolidating everything you read.

You get to rest without that constant bar‑exam guilt humming in the background.

Future‑You will be so proud you protected that rest.

***
So your job for today is simple:

Make your schedule for the week, and commit to following it.

Let the plan hold you up when your willpower is shot.

Future‑You—the one opening that “Pass” letter—is going to be very glad you made this schedule today.

And I will be rooting for you every single day.

💌 Amanda

P.S. That first bar for me was New York in July 1996.

Although I’d been top of my class and had a BigLaw job lined up, chronic back spasms had meant I literally couldn’t sit in a chair for months.

So an in-person bar-prep course was out of the question.

I studied on a quilt on the floor of my bedroom at my parents’ house in Newport. I had a boom box of cassette tapes that BarBri had sent me pursuant to my requested ADA accommodation.

Eventually, I took the exam lying on the floor of a private office a short drive from the main test site.

And somehow, I passed.

You can, too.