Should You “Trust the Process”? You’re the Dean of Your Own Bar Exam Studies

Here’s something that people who pass the bar exam never say:

“All I had to do was listen to all the bar course lectures and take a lot of notes. Just complete the course and you’ll pass!”

Sometimes we think “doing whatever it takes” to pass the bar exam means exhausting yourself and throwing 1000 hours and even more dollars into a black hole. (But it doesn’t have to be expensive.)

Or following some unsustainable cookie-cutter schedule that doesn’t care if you have other responsibilities like work or family. Good luck if you fall behind by one day.

Or letting a perfectly fine morning slip through by religiously sitting through 4 hours of droning lectures. Worse, pausing lectures to fill in all the notes.

Then not even remembering 99% of it.

Rewinding the video for the 5th time because you can’t stop thinking about the Roman Empire

I remember those days. All of those things above are things I stopped doing on my second attempt at preparing for the bar exam.

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Why You Feel Exhausted Studying for the Bar Exam

Let me guess. Is this your idea of bar prep?

  • Listen to lectures while sitting still like a statue
  • Pause to take notes and fill in the blanks (doubling the time it takes to finish the lectures)
  • Read giant outlines and fall asleep with the lights on (osmosis didn’t work)

It’s like you’re experiencing the most annoying part about traveling—sitting for hours next to someone who takes up the armrest even though they got the window seat.

And repeating this every day. Is this what Limbo is like?

You’re drained and demoralized because you’re trying to “study” but aren’t feeling a sense of progress as words and days pass by you.

But why are you trying to do this the hard way?

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UK Attorney Got a 316 on the NY UBE on Her First Try While Working Full Time

Sushmita passed the February 2025 New York Bar Exam on her first attempt:

  • as a UK-trained attorney
  • right after taking another exam
  • while working full time
  • starting with ZERO prior knowledge of American law
  • with a score of 316 (!)
💬 “I did not study any US law during my LLM save for a short intro module for international students, i.e., I did not require an LLM to be eligible to take the bar exam.”
💬 “I am delighted to share that I’ve passed the UBE in NY with a score of 316.”

That’s just unnecessarily impressive.

On top of that, she went into prep already knowing she didn’t want to use a big box bar review program.

💬 “I have no wish to purchase bar prep from the big players like Barbri, Themis, JD Advising, Kaplan etc.”
💬 “Given my trauma in dealing with these terrible companies, I was looking for assistance similar to what I found for the [Solicitors Qualifying Examination (SQE)], from people who genuinely want to help students. I found your website again when looking through my old bookmarks from 2022, and I am glad I did.”

Most first-time bar takers default to using a big course. How did she so confidently decide not to use one?

More importantly, how did she beat this exam without using one on her first try?

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Marilynn Winged Bar Prep and Failed. Then She Passed the Bar Exam Doing This

Marilynn passed the February 2025 California Bar Exam on her second attempt. A classic repeater situation.

Right now, you have a massive advantage:

If you’re a repeater, you are starting from experience, not from scratch.

If you’re a first timer, you have a crystal ball into your future. It’s up to you to decide how much of these visions you’ll adopt or let pass as a dream.

If you aren’t confident academically, the good news is your law school grades are meaningless. It took one cycle of mistakes for Marilynn and me to realize that law school and bar prep are separate skills.

💬 “I was feeling so much disappointment, despair, and guilt for not passing the first time, especially as someone who also finished at around a 2.8 GPA in law school.”

Here’s where you’ll once again learn about the pitfalls of first timers you can avoid today.

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Bar Prep Wisdom from Succulents

I went to a succulents gardening workshop the other day 🌱

I figured succulents wouldn’t wither under my care like the flowers I tried arranging before. There’s a limit to how much talent one person can have, I guess.

But there’s no limit to how much I think about bar prep because that’s what I started thinking about when I was listening to the instructor 🤦🏻‍♂️

4 relevant lessons and also photos of my bald-looking succulent bowl:

(First lesson: “You have to kill a lot of plants to be an expert.” 🤯)

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