The Vision of a Warrior (And maybe those with a failing grade...)

                                                          The Student's Vision


It's close. You can feel it. The darkness seeps into your veins, its heavy, humid scent creeping into your lungs, lulling into into passivity. The dullness of your routine weighs on your mind and the very idea of another day of monotonous routine seems to suck your soul away.  "NOOOO!!!!"  you want to scream! But you can't even muster the strength to banish it.  All you want to do is lay there under the covers, basking in the cuddly warmth of your blankie, and try to muffle the persistent, annoying alarm with your pillow.  By the time you drag yourself in front of that *#&@^%#$! computer and wearily type in your username and password like some mindless robot, your brain fails to switch into even autopilot, and you begin clicking around on different sites while simultaneously keeping your OLS open.  You browse through the news, your friends' facebook pages, your blog, iTunes... and then here and there you manage to fill out a PE log, do a history lesson, dawdle on your Algebra notebook.  After a couple days of this, you grow even more restless, and get up periodically, reading a book that has absolutely nothing to do with your literature class, shuffling through your ipod, eating cookies... Soon, even the computer begins to look dull. Because it reminds you of what you should be doing. "What's the point?" you say? "Why do I have to do it? How is this even benefiting me? I stopped taking in relevant information a long time ago.  All this is is the system trapping me into it's futile barrage of empty knowledge that I'll forget in a month."

Okay, so maybe the darkness isn't creeping into your veins, but admit it: You know exactly what I'm talking about. That's right, The dreaded, the feared, the inexplicable.... Senioritis. It happens to many students around February and March and it is a master at infecting the student, and making them so sick, that they fall waaay behind in their classes, fail, or even drop out!!!  Oh yes, its' real and it's out to get you.  Senioritis is your enemy.  And believe me when I tell you it is alive.  It's a disease of the spirit.  It has a mind of it's own and its singular goal is to make you fail.  Drag you down in the dirt.  Weaken your shields.  Let down your guard.  Give in to the trance.  It will bring you into the heart of the war zone that you didn't even know you were in.  Well, it's on now.  Granted, it doesn't happen to everybody, and even then, not to the same extent to the people it does choose to go after.  But the point is, if you have a weakness, Senioritis will happily attack you, and throw everything at you to get you to give in.  You will feel assaulted on so many levels.  Like an external force is making you think a certain way.  Truth is?  You're not just lazy. It IS an external force. It is your enemy.  It WANTS you to fail.  That is Senioritis' express purpose.
So How do you beat it?

How do you win the war?

Well, first of all, as I said, you have to know that you are fighting against a real enemy. It's not some trick of your mind or sudden laziness.  It's not a feeling- It's a force. Once you identify your enemy, you can begin to strategize ways to push back.  Here are the vital foundational steps to kill Senioritis, the bane of the aspiring student:

1. Identify your enemy.
2. Identify your weak spots- the "breaches" in the wall.
3. Strategize ways that you can build up your "wall" and fix those weak areas. If there are no breaches in the wall, the enemy can't get in.

One of the first things you must realize after you identify your enemy, is that you cannot fight it on your own. Oh, you can sure try, but willpower won't kill it. It will push back, it will make the enemy retreat for a while, but willpower can't win. Period. End of story. What you have to have is:

 A commitment to overcome (no matter what it takes)

And...

A VISION.

You're going to fail. But if you commit to doing whatever necessary to beat your enemy, than you've won. Period. Of course, you have to follow through. You have to have faith. But the point is, you can't let anything stand in your way. If you wish to succeed, you must not let a single obstacle come between you, and that success. Obstacles are distractions. Distractions are breaches.  That's where Discipline comes in.
I don't really need to talk about the second thing- if you want to overcome, well, it's pretty obvious that you need to have a vision.  It's the whole reason you've made the decision to commit to overcoming.  There must be something you're looking towards.  Perhaps it is a diploma.  perhaps it is the achievement of something you value.  Perhaps you envision the kind of person you want to be when this is over.  Whatever it is, it needs to be clear in your mind before you start anything.  If you don't have a vision, than your commitment to overcoming is going to fizzle out pretty quickly.  One of the reason's Senioritis had seemingly so much power in the first place is because I didn't have a vision that I was clinging to.  Something's going to fill your mind. If it's not one thing it's the other, so be sure you have a vision and you know where you want to be headed.  Me?  I decided that even if I felt all my schoolwork was meaningless, I was going to LEARN something valuable by the time I finish my senior year.  Maybe the only thing I will take away from this is the importance of having a vision, and how to overcome my weaknesses. But that's still a vision!  And it will be worth it if I can even learn that.

After the Vision, there must be Diligence. There must be Discipline. There must be Faith.

With these three things, your courage shall be renewed and the enemy shall be in full retreat! You just have to believe it!

It is alive.  It is your enemy.  It will test your courage, as it tested mine. Identify the enemy. Identify your weakness. Identify your vision.

Win the war.

Sincerely,

A fellow warrior with a vision

~KnightRanger :)