National Donut Day: A Dozen "Do-NOTs" of Bar Prep

Happy National Donut Day!

Before anyone emails me: Yes, I realize that a "donut" and a "do not" are two completely different things. But if you've spent any amount of time reading ProfessorTommy.tips, you know there was no chance I was letting a perfectly good pun go to waste.

Today, people across the country will celebrate with glazed donuts, chocolate donuts, powdered donuts, jelly-filled donuts, and perhaps even a dozen donuts. Since donuts are traditionally sold by the dozen, I thought it would be fitting to offer a dozen "Do-NOTs" for bar prep. Get it?

The good news is that passing the bar exam does not require perfection. It does not require studying twenty hours a day. It does not require photographic memory. In many cases, success comes from consistently avoiding the mistakes that cause students to underperform.

So in honor of National Donut Day, here are a dozen things you should DO NOT do during bar prep, and what you should do instead.

Do-NOT No. 1: Do NOT Compare Yourself to Everyone Else

One of the easiest ways to create unnecessary stress during bar prep is to compare yourself to other students. Someone is always going to be ahead of you in their commercial course. Someone is always going to claim they completed more multiple-choice questions. Someone is always going to post about studying twelve hours a day.

The problem is that comparison often focuses on activity rather than effectiveness. You rarely know how much another student is actually learning, retaining, or understanding. More importantly, their progress has absolutely no effect on your score.

Instead of measuring yourself against others, measure yourself against your own progress. Are you completing assignments? Are your scores improving? Are you identifying and addressing weaknesses? Those are the metrics that matter. The goal is not to win bar prep. The goal is to pass the bar exam.

Do-NOT No. 2: Do NOT Let One Bad Practice Set Define You

At some point during bar prep, you are going to receive a score you do not like and receive feedback on a written assignment with which you do not agree. You may perform poorly on a multiple-choice set, miss several issues on an essay, or struggle through a performance test. When that happens, it is easy to assume the result says something about your likelihood of passing the exam.

It does not.

Practice is designed to expose weaknesses while there is still time to fix them. In many ways, a disappointing score can be more valuable than a strong score because it identifies areas that require additional attention. The students who improve the most are often the students who learn the most from their mistakes.

When a practice assignment goes poorly, resist the urge to dwell on the score itself. Instead, spend your energy understanding why you missed the questions and what you can do differently next time. A bad practice set is not a verdict. It is feedback.

Do-NOT No. 3: Do NOT Confuse Being Busy with Being Productive

Bar prep offers countless opportunities to feel productive. You can reorganize outlines, create color-coded notes, purchase new study supplies, or spend hours perfecting your study schedule. While those activities may have some value, they are not where most learning occurs.

The bar exam tests your ability to recall information and apply it under pressure. That means the most effective study activities are often the least glamorous ones, like answering questions, writing essays, reviewing explanations, and practicing performance tests. These activities force your brain to engage with the material rather than simply observe it.

At the end of each study day, ask yourself a simple question: "Did I actively practice today, or did I merely prepare to practice?" The answer can reveal a great deal about the effectiveness of your study habits.

Do-NOT No. 4: Do NOT Ignore Your Weak Subjects

Most students enjoy studying certain subjects more than others. As a result, there is a natural tendency to spend more time with familiar or comfortable topics while avoiding the subjects that create frustration.

Unfortunately, the bar exam does not grade on preference.

If Evidence, Real Property, Civil Procedure, or another subject consistently causes problems, that subject deserves additional attention rather than avoidance. Ignoring weaknesses rarely makes them disappear. More often, it allows them to grow into larger problems as the exam approaches.

A better approach is to devote a portion of each study day to your weakest subjects. Small amounts of consistent effort often produce greater improvement than occasional marathon review sessions. Progress is rarely achieved by avoiding discomfort.

Do-NOT No. 5: Do NOT Skip the Explanatory Answers

Many students focus almost exclusively on whether they answered a question correctly. Once they see the result, they immediately move on to the next assignment. That approach misses one of the most valuable learning opportunities available during bar prep.

The explanation is where much of the learning takes place. Sometimes you answer correctly for the wrong reason. Sometimes you answer incorrectly but learn a rule you will never forget. Either way, the explanation helps deepen your understanding of both the law and the testing process.

One rule of thumb I often share with students is to spend at least as much time reviewing the explanations as it took to answer the questions. If a question required one minute and forty-eight seconds to answer, spend at least one minute and forty-eight seconds reviewing the explanation. The review process is not optional. It is part of the assignment.

Do-NOT No. 6: Do NOT Wait Until You Feel Ready to Write Essays

Many students postpone essay practice because they believe they need to memorize more law first. They tell themselves they will begin writing essays once they feel more confident or once they know the rules better.

The challenge is that essay writing is a skill that develops through practice. Waiting until you feel ready often means delaying the very activity that would help you become ready. No one learns to write strong essays simply by reading outlines.

Even if your early essays are imperfect, they provide valuable opportunities to improve issue spotting, organization, analysis, and time management. Every essay helps identify areas for growth and reinforces substantive law. You do not become ready and then start writing essays. You become ready by writing essays.

Do-NOT No. 7: Do NOT Forget the Performance Test

When students think about bar prep, they often focus on memorizing rules, completing multiple-choice questions, and writing essays. As a result, the performance test sometimes becomes the forgotten portion of the exam. Many students convince themselves they will "get to it later" once they feel more comfortable with the substantive law.

That approach can be costly. Performance questions represent a meaningful portion of your overall score, and unlike many other parts of the exam, it rewards skills more than memorization. Success depends on your ability to read carefully, follow instructions, organize information, identify relevant facts, and produce a professional work product under time pressure.

The good news is that performance test skills improve quickly with practice. The more often you work through a task memorandum, review a file and library, and develop a response under timed conditions, the more comfortable the process becomes. Treat performance tests as a regular part of your study schedule rather than an afterthought. A strong performance test score can help offset weaknesses elsewhere and may become one of the most valuable points you earn on exam day.

Do-NOT No. 8: Do NOT Study in Isolation

Bar prep can feel like a solitary journey. Many students spend long hours alone with outlines, lectures, flashcards, and question banks. While independent study is important, some students take it too far and attempt to solve every problem on their own.

The danger of isolation is that it often causes students to spend hours struggling with concepts that could be clarified in a matter of minutes. A conversation with a professor, academic support professional, bar review instructor, mentor, or classmate can sometimes provide a new perspective that suddenly makes a difficult topic understandable.

Seeking help also creates accountability. Regular check-ins with mentors, professors, or study groups encourage you to stay engaged and maintain momentum throughout the summer. Most importantly, asking questions helps ensure that misunderstandings are corrected before they become ingrained habits. Successful bar examinees are not necessarily the students who know everything. They are often the students who recognize when they need help and are willing to seek it.

Do-NOT No. 9: Do NOT Sacrifice Sleep for Study Time

As the exam approaches, many students begin searching for additional hours in the day. Unfortunately, sleep is often the first thing they sacrifice. Staying up late to complete one more assignment or wake up earlier to squeeze in additional studying can feel like a productive decision.

In reality, the benefits are often overstated. Sleep plays a critical role in learning, memory consolidation, concentration, and decision-making. When you consistently reduce the amount of sleep you receive, you may actually decrease the effectiveness of the studying you have already completed. A tired brain processes information less efficiently and is more likely to make mistakes.

Rather than viewing sleep as time lost, view it as part of your preparation strategy. Just as you schedule lectures, practice questions, and essay writing, you should prioritize adequate rest. The goal is not to maximize the number of hours spent studying. The goal is to maximize what you learn during the hours you study. Often, an extra hour of sleep provides more benefit than an extra hour of exhausted studying.

Do-NOT No. 10: Do NOT Neglect Your Physical Health

During bar prep, it is easy to spend entire days sitting at a desk. Hours are devoted to lectures, outlines, multiple-choice questions, essays, and performance tests. Before long, many students realize they have barely moved all day and have paid little attention to their physical well-being.

The problem is that your brain does not operate independently from the rest of your body. Concentration, energy, memory, and mood are all affected by factors such as exercise, hydration, nutrition, and overall health. When these areas are neglected, studying becomes more difficult and less effective.

You do not need to train for a marathon or spend hours in the gym each day. Small habits can make a significant difference. Take a walk. Stretch between study sessions. Drink water. Eat reasonably well. Step outside occasionally and get some fresh air. These actions may seem simple, but they help create the conditions necessary for effective learning. Taking care of yourself is not a distraction from bar prep. It is part of bar prep.

Do-NOT No. 11: Do NOT Quit After a Bad Day

Every bar examinee experiences setbacks. You may have a day when your scores are lower than expected, your focus disappears, or nothing seems to click. On those days, it can feel as though all your hard work has been wasted.

The reality is that bad days are normal. They happen to nearly everyone preparing for the exam. What separates successful examinees from unsuccessful ones is often not the absence of setbacks but the response to them. Some students allow a bad day to derail an entire week. Others acknowledge the setback, learn from it, and return to work the next day.

Remember that the bar exam is not won or lost because of a single study session. Success is built through consistent effort over many weeks. If today was difficult, focus on tomorrow rather than dwelling on what went wrong. One bad day is a speed bump. It only becomes a roadblock if you stop moving forward.

Do-NOT No. 12: Do NOT Forget Why You Started

As bar prep continues, it is easy to become consumed by completion percentages, practice scores, assignment lists, and study schedules. The process can begin to feel mechanical, and students sometimes lose sight of the larger purpose behind all the work.

When that happens, take a moment to remember why you decided to pursue this profession. Perhaps you are the first lawyer in your family. Perhaps you want to advocate for clients, serve your community, create new opportunities, or achieve a lifelong goal. Whatever your reason, that purpose existed long before your commercial bar review course assigned its first lecture.

Reconnecting with your "why" can provide motivation during the inevitable difficult moments of bar prep. The assignments matter. The practice questions matter. The essays matter. But they matter because they move you closer to becoming a licensed attorney. The bar exam is not the destination. It is simply a gateway to the career you have worked so hard to build.

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National Donut Day is only one day on the calendar, but the lessons from these Do-NOTs can carry you throughout bar prep.

If you can avoid these dozen common mistakes, you'll put yourself in a much stronger position to succeed when exam day arrives.