I recently had a powerful conversation with one of my bar exam mentees, and it reminded me so much of my own journey. Let me tell you, when we prepare for something like the bar exam, it can bring up some intense emotions that we might not expect—even for those who don’t typically suffer from test anxiety.
During our session, my mentee shared her experience of taking the bar for the third time. She’s usually pretty calm during exams, but this time, something different happened. After the first day of testing, she was ready to cry. She even called her mom and her best friend, fighting tears because she felt completely overwhelmed. This was new territory for her, and it was rattling her confidence. She had never felt that way before and wasn’t sure how to bounce back for day two.
Listening to her, I knew exactly what she was feeling. That first day was filled with essay questions, and she started second-guessing herself toward the end. She told me how she was mentally cycling back through her answers, thinking, “I haven’t written enough” or “I don’t know what I’m doing.” By the time she got to the final essay, she felt rushed and like she’d missed some key points, which snowballed into that overwhelming feeling of defeat.
I paused and asked her, “Could it possibly be that what you wrote was enough, and what made you feel bad was you indulging in second-guessing?” There was a moment of realization. She hadn’t felt that same way on the second day, which was multiple-choice, because she didn’t allow herself to spiral. She paced herself, stayed focused, and finished early.
What happened was a classic case of imposter syndrome creeping in, whispering all sorts of lies: “You don’t know what you’re doing,” “You’re going to fail,” and “You haven’t done enough.” We talked about how these voices can drown out what we truly know and how they don’t reflect reality.
I shared with her my own struggle with those negative voices and how they can take control if we let them. Imagine sitting in a room with a panel of people saying all those negative things, like, “You’re not good enough” or “You’ll never pass this.” How could you leave that room without tears? That’s exactly what happened to her. She gave air time to those voices.
The real key was that the voices weren’t true. They were just noise. She’d done the work. And like I always tell my mentees: your performance is not the sum of your worth.
By the end of our conversation, she could see the power she had to take charge of those voices and stay in control. It was a breakthrough moment. And now, she’ll carry that strength into her career as a lawyer.
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