An anchor in my stomach. Anxious and stressed are two adjectives I'd use to describe my current state of thought. I feel stuck between a rock and a hard place. This semester decides where the next five will drive me.
I am taking a relatively advanced Chemistry class this semester. One where I feel lacking in my prerequisite knowledge, due to no one's fault but mine. I let my previous Chemistry course's material outrun my grasp. It seems ever evident that this misstep wrote my fate in stone. I feel outclassed by all my peers; I don't even know what questions to ask. I am not one to relent from asking questions, but have I met my limit? They say a fool that asks a question is a fool no longer, and a fool that does not remains a fool. I hold that statement dear to me. If I know I am a fool, and I know I can change that about myself by simply asking, then I shall ask. If, on the other hand, I find that asking the question might not beget an answer that I can understand; that is, an answer that will not change the fact that I am a fool, would it not be foolish to ask in the first place? I detest being foolish, but is looking foolish -when it achieves nothing- not a foolish act by itself? It seems like a catch 22: I am getting bad grades in my classes, and I feel incapable of remedying that issue because I am getting bad grades in my classes. Thus continues the cycle.
I feel run down and defeated. Will I rise from the ashes like an undergraduate phoenix? Will I suffer yet another delay in my path to accreditation with knowledge from an Academic Establishment? Will I elect to follow the easy path, even though the harder, less traveled one bears more fruit to reap? I do not know now, but I shall know in a few months.
The thought of this semester being over steers me down an anxious path. The mere picture of failure that I paint in my head is handicapping. A whirlpool stirs. A looping whirlpool of anxiety, stress, dread and worry is stirring. I fear my ship is not equipped to cut through, yet the knowledge of successfully defeating this obstacle is invigorating. Perhaps this idea of a triumphant Ahmed will build a triumphant Ahmed.
We will see.