Nervous breakdown

I think today I set a record.

Every semester I usually end up having a nervous breakdown, usually right before a big project is due. I'm not quite sure how i end up this way, it must be the power of negative thinking. The best way to describe how these instances of shear panic and terror happen is best explained by the slippery slope effect (a common campaign strategy for the radical right in this country, but that is for another blog).

According to Wikipedia, my source for explaining everything, the slippery slope is one of the classical informal fallacies. It suggests that an action will initiate a chain of events culminating in an undesirable event later without establishing or quantifying the relevant contingencies.

Or simply put, I become intimidated by something, and being the perfectionist I am, freak out. I over analyze the situation and all that could go possibly wrong if one project does not go right.

The couse of thinking usually follows this pattern:

"Why am I spending a grand to take a class where my first project is folding paper? I have to have this class to take the next one. What happens if I do not understand the project? What happens if I fail the course? What am I going to do with my life, because for three years all I have wanted was to go to school here, and get a degree in architecture."

I have calmed down now, and realized that by the end of this semester I will either become the best possible version of myself, or an alcoholic with lung cancer (from all the stress smoking). I'm putting my money on the first one, and going to attempt to not think about the second.

I set a record for the first nervous breakdown in a semester, after one day of classes.