It is nice to have a balanced life. Every once in a while you may need to temporarily break that balance to achieve difficult goals. Once you move past the challenge, you can become balanced again.

For the past two weeks I was going through the most intense study session of my life. Never before have I been more focused and never before have I been more unbalanced. I was preparing for my first actuarial exam, which has a 30% first time pass rate.

I was stressed to my limit. Last Thursday, I took my exam and was overjoyed when I was greeted by the computer screen saying “Congratulations! A preliminary analysis of your test results shows that you were successful in achieving the passing score.” I was relieved to find that my two weeks of being unbalanced paid off.

Step 1: Decide to Temporarily Pause Your Life

Prior to these past two weeks, I was living a balanced life. I was hanging out with friends, exercising, studying a few hours a day, writing for this blog, keeping my house clean, etc. The turning point came when I went out with friends for three nights in a row and didn’t do much studying in those days. I had two weeks until the exam and the material was still elusive to me, so I started to panic.

That panic caused me to realize that I really needed focus on studying and not much else. I talked it over with my girlfriend to let her know that we would still hang out, but we couldn’t be taking all-day trips for a couple of weeks. She was understanding and supportive, so I was off to become a hermit focused solely on passing the test.

Step 2: Have Planned Distractions

Although I am good at concentrating, I usually cannot last for more than an hour or two before becoming fatigued. I needed to take frequent breaks. The breaks needed to be energizing and I needed to be able to return to studying when I was done. I couldn’t go to the movies because it would have taken too long, making it difficult to get back to studying. I couldn’t work on this blog because it would have drained my mental energy, which I needed to save for the studying.

I ended up doing two things for my breaks: watching DVDs of TV episodes and going for short walks. The TV episodes were nice because there were a bunch of them and a single episode wasn’t too long (I mainly watched House and The Office). The walks were nice because it kept my blood flowing, I was able to clear my mind, and they also helped me stay in shape for my 5K run (which was on Saturday). Although they took time away from studying, they helped keep me going consistently throughout the day.

Step 3: Re-Balancing

It has been a challenging two weeks and I feel satisfied with myself that I was able to make it through to the end. I spent a few days relaxing, but now I need to regain some balance in my life. It has only been two weeks, but it is pretty amazing how quickly I can lose my productive habits. I have five more of these tests in the future, so I’m going to need to fine tune this process to make the transitions smoother. Do you guys have any tips?