I'm grateful that getting into heaven isn't graded on a curve (because if it were, I might as well begin the short hike to hell right now).
But seriously. As I've been studying for/freaking out about/contemplating the doomsday nature of finals, I am grateful that when it comes to my standing with God, I am not compared to anyone other than myself. More than that, I am grateful that the road to perfection doesn't require me to be perfect to start walking down it (like I said, I might as well start walking in the other direction if that were the case).
I suppose I should translate this attitude of day-by-day improvement to law school. Problem is, I'm having a hard time making the two ideas mesh. With law school, the finals that I take in the next couple of days will determine my grade for the entire semester (and could potentially affect my ability to get jobs next summer). While the amount of studying I did from January until now will help me to do well on the final, my professors will never know how much effort or time I have spent trying to prepare. Nor will they know the day-to-day successes I've had in improving my understanding or the small steps I have taken to become a better writer. To them, all that matters in the final result (which is then compared to everyone else's final result and then plopped onto a bell curve). It's not so much a case of self-improvement as it is a case of who ended up looking smarter and better than everyone else. And because last semester didn't go as well as I hoped it would, I'm a little bit lost on what I need to do to be a little bit better, especially when improvement is only determined by a four hour space of time and my professor's mood as he grades essays. It's been a struggle for me to want to put in the effort to improve when I don't know what direction I am heading in or if my efforts will be rewarded at all (seeing as they are compared to everyone else's efforts (who could all be studying harder and smarter than I am)).
Maybe my problem is that in trying to transpose this attitude of do a little better/try a little harder, I'm forgetting how different the end goals are for life and law school. Law school certainly isn't life (and if it were, I might as well start running in the other direction), and life doesn't end with law school. In reality, law school is just a small stretch on the path I have chosen to walk. And when I reach the end of law school, as hard as it may be, I am certainly not going to be perfect (though arguably, at the end of life I am not going to be perfect either). But through all of my experiences, both now and later, hopefully I will be that much closer to being better, even if it means that this semester (which also isn't the end of either walk) doesn't go the way I want it to. But who knows. Maybe my improvements will decide to show themselves tomorrow (and the next day and the next) and my professors will take notice. And if not, at least I have done my best to take a few imperfect steps down the perfect road.
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