 Alright guys, welcome to another episode of the TMJ show. I'm super excited to have you guys here. Today is episode number two and we're going to be actually talking about step one and specifically what mistakes you want to avoid while studying. And particularly, we're going to talk about three mistakes that cost most students and get them an average if not a below average score. So instead, if you're looking to study and get a 240, a 250, or even higher, you're going to list it out. Alright guys, what is going on? Luxury of an empty journey. We're here. I help individuals like you succeed on their medical journey with less stress. So if you're new to this channel, new to the podcast, especially if you're new to this podcast, make sure you leave an honest review and iTunes or Spotify, which helps grow this podcast and get in the hands and the ears of more and more individuals. And to encourage you, leave feedback at the end of each week. We're making sure that we're selecting one lucky winner to be selected to win either a free ebook or a free training course that we have on the website for absolutely free. So leave your honest feedback. It doesn't have to be five stars by any means. All of that's obviously very encouraged. Thanks for those of you guys that have done so already. And if you're watching this on YouTube, then you can still help me out by making sure you one, hit that like button and two, subscribe to the channel for more weekly content. And today's TMJ show is brought to you by my step one master class, which is all about teaching you how to get a 250 plus on your step one without the stress, the doubt, and the burnout. So if you guys want to understand three discoveries that I made during my step one prep to really help me get a really high score without that excessive stress, then go ahead and attend that master class after obviously watching this video or listen to this podcast. It'll be included in the description of the video as well as the show notes of the podcast episode. So make sure you check that out. Now let's get into the mistakes that most students make while studying for step one. Now mistake number one is that you focus way too much time and your attention on volume of material you're learning versus retaining the material you're learning. Now it's common because you're going to have so many different resources thrown at you. You're going to have first aid, you're going to have you world, not pat the little musketchy boards and beyond, it goes on and on. And then each of those resources have tons and tons of information that you feel like you have to memorize. But the truth guys is this is a bonus tip is that your step one score really isn't dependent on knowing a lot of information. It's knowing a good amount of information at a very deep level to where when you're faced with those test questions, your score is going to rise. And then when you're faced with questions that every student has difficulty with, you can make an educated guess. But if you have superficial knowledge on every single topic, you're going to do average, if not below average, because you can't really take that piece of memorization, you didn't actually apply it to a vignette. So instead of focusing on trying to do multiple repetitions to first aid or continuing to watch Pathoma videos or do X amount of flashcards every single day that's going to help you, you need to focus on is my technique going to help me with long-term retention. And a good test for me at this point is asking myself, what topics that I learned during first aid and step one, do I still remember to this day? Things like asthma, COPD, heart failure, those are things I know very well. And I think my step one studying to those to that knowledge base, but other things like HIV medications, I barely memorized for step one. And I'm still having to memorize to this day because it didn't focus on long-term retention. And if I was to see a step one question about HIV medications, even after my dedicated, I'd feel stressed out and anxious. So to help avoid that anxiety and the overwhelm feeling that you can get while studying for step one, make sure that instead of trying to get through multiple repetitions of your resources, that each time you're studying, ask yourself, did I actually remember this, not only for a week later or six weeks later or a month later, can I remember this a year from now? And I'm remembering it well enough. And obviously, you're not going to be able to do this with everything, but at least having that approach in that mindset really will help you build a foundation, which is the most important thing when studying for step one to make sure you start at a high starting point to help you get an even higher score. Now, mistake number two, and I see this all the time, especially with students that I've coached through step one. And that is that you're avoiding hard topics. Now, this is common amongst most med students is that there's certain topics that always trip us up, things like farm, biochem, micro bio, you may have certain things on your list as well. We tend to avoid those topics instead of focus more of our time on them. Like I said, I always avoided learning HIV medications because I never felt like I had a lecture that taught it to me well. And then I couldn't really parse them out through first aid for other different resources. So instead of saying, oh man, I really need to spend more time here. I actually just said, well, I hope this doesn't show up on the test and we're all kind of guilty of that. But instead, imagine what would happen if you focus more of your time on the topics that gave you the most difficulty. For example, if it's HIV medications or pharmacology, if you studied a little bit of those every single day, every other day, or had a very structured way of saying I'm going to spend 10 minutes, 20 minutes or 30 minutes at X interval doing this, then that topic is one, not going to be a weak point. And two, if it showed up on the exam, you're going to feel amazing for knowing it versus the other way around where you feel anxious for the rest of the test because the topic that you wish didn't show up does. So instead of just learning the topics that you really enjoy learning about, make sure you have a dedicated interval and schedule to focus on those weak points that way, nothing will trip you up on test day. And finally guys, mistake number three, and this is something I'm really big on, is that we sometimes focus way too much time on reviewing instead of questions and repetitions. So a lot of times, especially during your dedicated, the typical approach is to be in your day with first day reading and then you'll try to parse out and read through your notes through first day and maybe do some flashcards. And then you may have an hour where you actually do practice questions and quiz yourself. And then you're spending more time reviewing those questions. And then you may be watching videos before and after lunch. And then you'll do more first aid and maybe, maybe you'll get another practice session in. You see the ratio of how much time you're actually quizzing yourself to actually where you're learning. And I put that on quotes and purpose because not all that's led for long-term retention is off. And so to help you get a higher step one score, you need to make sure that you're having at least a 50-50 split between the amount of time you're spending doing questions and the amount of time reviewing them. That includes first day watching videos with Pat Bellman sketching and whatever resources used. The main way to help your step one's rise is by giving yourself plenty of practice that includes new topics as well as topics that you know you have stunk at in the past and structuring it that way. Now, that brings us to the end is that we talked about a lot, but how do you do these things, Lakshman? I really want to point you again to our step one masterclass. It's completely free. It's 30 to 40 minute session where I talk about three discoveries that I mean during my dedicated to go from a very low step one sport to enjoying this bumping when I finally saw my step one score at the variant. So if you guys want access to that masterclass, it's going to be in the show notes as well as the description if you're watching this on YouTube and you guys can let me know what you think. But if you have any more questions, you can either reach me at themdjourney.com at gmail.com or if you're watching this on YouTube, first of all, make sure you hit that like button and then to drop it in the comment section. But thank you guys so much for listening to the second episode of the TMJ show. Hopefully as you're enjoying it, more content like this is coming out to you on a weekly basis. So make sure you show your love. Again, if you're listening to this on a podcast, then take a second, just one second, maybe 10, because it's going to take you some time to find the iTunes or Spotify review, leave an honest feedback at the end of every week. I promise you we're going to go ahead and look through those feedbacks and make sure one lucky winner and it's an ongoing draw. So if you put your review in once, it's always going to be available to be selected in the future, but that one lucky winner each week is going to be selected to get a free ebook, if not a training course of their choice. So drop your feedback in there. If you're watching this on YouTube, hit that like button. Make sure you subscribe and drop your comments down below. I'll stop babbling. Thank you guys so much for listening and watching and I'll see you guys in the next episode. Take care, my friends.