When I first found out that I had qualified for the National Bible Bee Competition, I was so excited and thankful for the opportunity to compete at the NBBC and dove enthusiastically into the study. I set lofty goals, spent most of my spare time studying, and approached my studies with eagerness, enjoying the treasures of Scripture. After a few weeks though, the initial excitement waned and the day-to-day reality of memorizing, reviewing, and studying (often for hours every day) left me feeling burned out. I know I’m not alone, other contestants also deal with burnout at times. Have you…
- … lost your motivation to continue studying?
- … felt like quitting, giving up completely, or like you’re a failure?
- … found yourself procrastinating over the study tasks you used to enjoy?
- … been feeling exhausted, discouraged, frustrated, irritable, or stuck?
- … felt like you can’t focus, can’t remember things you learned, or can’t absorb new information?
- … frequently distracted yourself from studying with things that waste your time (like scrolling social media) or used your study time to do unimportant things/things you don’t normally do?
- … been feeling unusually tired or mentally foggy?
- … withdrawn from or spent little time interacting with your family and/or friends?
- … neglected or ignored other important responsibilities in your life so you could study?
- … skipped meals or regularly stayed up late/got less sleep to study?
If you answered “yes” to some of those questions, maybe you’re dealing with burnout right now.
While I’ve since aged out of participating in the National Bible Bee, I remember those moments well. When I first qualified, I didn’t do a good job managing my self-imposed studying workload and ended up dealing with burnout, which made studying more difficult and less enjoyable, but over my years as a contestant, I picked up tips that helped me balance that area of my life better. I didn’t always apply those tips consistently so I had to learn this lesson repeatedly, but here are some of the strategies that helped me avoid burnout and maintain the motivation to continue studying.
Rest
The most important way to prevent burnout is the most simple: rest. It’s easy to justify sacrificing rest for the sake of studying, and while doing so occasionally isn’t a problem, making a habit of not resting will wear you out quickly and leave you feeling exhausted or unmotivated to continue studying. Resting not only means getting enough sleep (sleep is crucial for brain function, and conveniently, it also boosts your memory), but it also means giving your brain a break from all the information you’re filling it with. Rest should not be dependent on meeting your study goals or accomplishing enough so that you feel like you’re “allowed” to rest. God gives us the gift of rest, so we ought to receive it gratefully, not conditionally, based on our own performance.
Take breaks between study sessions
You can only study for a limited amount of time before you start losing focus and your brain stops effectively absorbing new information. To avoid overloading your brain, study for limited blocks of time and take short breaks in between blocks of study time. Figure out how long you can study while staying fully mentally focused, and then make your study sessions a little shorter than that. You might study for 25 minutes and take a break for 5, or study for 50 minutes and take a break for 10, or any other split that helps you maximize your brainpower. The important thing is that you do something completely unrelated to studying during your break. It is also helpful to take a longer break every few hours (tip: taking a short nap during a longer break can help solidify what you just studied while you sleep).
Take rest days from studying
Especially if you’re feeling burned out, you need to periodically take a break day from studying. Even if you’re not burned out, it’s still a good practice to set aside a day to do anything but study. Your break day from studying could coincide with your sabbath, whether that’s Saturday or Sunday, or you could schedule your rest days less frequently than once a week; however you choose to do it, having a day when you’re not studying will mentally refresh you and make it easier to study effectively when you jump back into it.
Don’t do mentally taxing things while you rest, instead do refreshing things
It’s easy to fall into one of two traps when taking a break from studying: either using your break time to do other work as long as it isn’t studying for NBBC or using your break time to do something completely frivolous that won’t refresh you. Neither of these is helpful if you want to feel reenergized and motivated to come back to your studies. Things to avoid during rest time include studying for anything else (including school), planning or executing other projects, or anything that leaves you feeling more mentally tired afterward. On the other side, activities like too much time online, watching movies, or playing a lot of games can also make you reluctant to return to studying. While none of these activities are bad, and they can be refreshing, too many of those things can make you feel unproductive without giving you the energy or motivation. Instead spend most of your rest time on things that you know make you feel energized and excited about life. For some people, that might include things like playing a sport or doing something that gets you moving, creating something, playing or listening to music, interacting with people, or spending time on a hobby. Since studying is so cognitive, it’s a good idea to bring balance by doing things that involve other parts of your life, like creativity, relationships, or physical activity.
Use your rest time to enjoy God and the good gifts He’s given you
You won’t get the full benefit of rest if you spend your resting time thinking about how you should be studying right now or what you could be accomplishing if you weren’t resting. Resolve to completely set aside your studies, especially mentally, and focus fully on your current work. Since every good gift comes from God (James 1:17), He means for us to enjoy them. By enjoying them and giving thanks for them we glorify Him (1 Corinthians 10:31). Approach rest and the enjoyable activities you spend time on with thankfulness and a desire to do those things wholeheartedly, knowing that we do all things for Christ.
Moderation
Another one of the most important factors in avoiding burnout is to manage your workload realistically. It’s easy to allow the studying you want to do to absorb most of the other things in your life. During the study season, it’s okay to change your priorities a little to make sure you have enough time to study, but if studying starts to consume your whole life you’re much more likely to burn out. You know what your season of life looks like, and what your responsibilities and commitments are, so set your schedule and your goals based on what is realistic and doable for you, recognizing that others’ lives look different, and their studying will reflect that.
Prioritize (and while you’re at it, cross some things off your to-do list)
Scripture is so deep and so full of incredible truths that it’s easy to end up with a list of things you want to study that is longer than the time you have to finish it. Add your other responsibilities and duties to that list, and it can feel like you need to spend every waking minute working to accomplish all of it. If you find yourself overwhelmed by looking at your to-do list, try cutting back as many things as possible, leaving only the most important. Prioritize what’s most essential (making sure to consider non-study related things and include time to rest as well), and then cross off less important things. If you find that you have extra time, you can always do extra tasks, but facing a list that you can’t possibly finish is very unmotivating and overwhelming. It’s so tempting to compare your study to someone else and feel like a failure if you aren’t doing as much as they are, but once you start comparing your priorities become blurry and you become vulnerable to discouragement. Make using your time well and fulfilling your responsibilities your goal, not living out someone else’s priorities.
Make sure you’re still doing non-study-related things
Everyone has multiple responsibilities and things they need to do in different areas of life, and it’s important to make sure you’re not neglecting other important things for the sake of studying. While you can multitask during some (easy or habitual) activities, most of the time trying to do two things at once will result in not doing either effectively, so set aside time when you’re not focused on studying to do other things. Those other things can range from school, to work, to interacting with people, to resting and having fun, among other things, but all of them are important enough to be done well.
Let go of perfectionism and goals/expectations that discourage you
Every contestant would probably like it if they could study everything that might be on the test, remember all of it, and do it all perfectly, but approaching the study with this perspective is counterproductive. Instead of studying every cross-reference you think could be on the test, it’s far better to spend the same amount of time studying fewer cross-references until you know them confidently. There will always be a few questions you don’t know the answers to, so study to prepare for the ones you want to be able to answer with confidence and accept that you will need to guess sometimes. If your focus is on knowing everything that you might encounter on the test, you end up spreading out your study time between more topics and being less certain and slower at remembering the information you did study, which leaves you guessing more often, not less. Focus on consistent, confident knowledge in key areas, not perfection. If you have a study goal that is making you less motivated to study instead of more motivated, it’s probably based on an unrealistic expectation, so be willing to let go of goals that aren’t helping you maintain your momentum in studying.
Finding a balance can be tricky, but it’s worth the effort to be able to enjoy the study and stay focused as you continue digging into God’s Word and learning more about Him so that you can know God’s Word and make Him known.
Written by NBB Alumna: Janese Hurst
