2 . How to Deal with Academic Failure

Experiencing failure in academic settings is inevitable in your journey to study. However, once you get through it, you can bounce back from almost any academic failure.

Adopt the proper mindset

The proper mentality plays a big part in dealing with academic failure.     1    , focus on how you will feel when you have mastered the areas that give you trouble. Stop thinking of yourself as a failure, and regard yourself as a person with a fixable problem. The problem is an opportunity, because how a person responds to a problem is what creates success or failure.

    2    

Consider the troubles of chaotic personal relationships and stress. They are the most common external factor making students' academic performance suffer.    3    . Activities including sports, partying, or arts are social distractions that are also a common source of academic struggle. Disorganization is a huge factor. Making an inventory of upcoming assignments work as well.

Bounce back

    4    . Were your grades good and then suddenly fall, slowly decline, or are they changeable? If they slowly declined, this probably indicates a lack of proficiency in a foundational skill set. If your grades suddenly fall, then that can be indicative of the sudden presence of a troublesome external factor, like moving to a new school.

Once you have determined that, you need to develop a plan of action. Try to study at the same times and same places each day, so it becomes a routine. Enlist someone to help you stay accountable to your plan of action.    5    .

5 . Have you ever felt numb, overwhelmed, or excessively anxious after seeing the flooding of suffering shown on the news, Internet, and social media? I know I have — and I recently learned that this feeling has a name: compassion fatigue (疲劳).

For decades, researchers have studied compassion fatigue among health care workers, therapists, social workers, vets, and other people who are frequently exposed to other people’s trauma at work. Over time, they can develop emotional exhaustion or even PTSD-like (类创伤后应激障碍) symptoms—including difficulty sleeping, anxiety, and feeling triggered by troubling stories or memories—as a result of immersing themselves in the problems of others, studies show.

While compassion fatigue hasn’t been widely studied among the general population, experts agreed that it can affect anyone, even those who are witnessing trauma from afar. That means almost everyone is at risk these days, because of ongoing conflicts even wars between countries, frequent gun violence, and other difficult world events that are all over the news and social media. Triggers (诱因) vary from person to person, experts say, so there’s no way to know for sure what will cause compassion fatigue. If you are reacting more strongly than usual to difficult situations—perhaps by yelling at others or growing angry when you’re usually level, you may be experiencing compassion fatigue.

To protect yourself from compassion fatigue, the experts recommended taking purposeful breaks from the news to focus on personal wellnes — such as by spending time outdoors and with loved ones — and finding ways to give back to your community and remember the good in humanity.