How to study microeconomics effectively

Hello everyone.  😉

Today's post I thought that i want to share with you how I study for Microeconomics for undergrad. I am happy to share with you what I had done in order for me to get an A /4.0 for microeconomics. For those who new here, I'm an economics undergrad student. Last semester had been intense for me to be honest. I was crying during final exams. Thank God, everything went very well. In fact, the result that came out was quiet unexpected. To be honest, I was not expected to get an A in Microeconomics, but I do know that I worked really hard. Excuse the other subjects please. This post is specifically for Microeconomics. 😁

1. Attending to all lectures.
Please attend classes even though you're late. This is because your professors are going to explain all those complex theories which are quite difficult for you to understand by your own. Since, economics consists of theories, applications, mathematics and graphs. If you don't understand how to calculate, please do ask your professors instantaneously.

2. Write and draw them down.
You have to write your notes handwritten and draw the complex graphs by yourself. This is crucial because even though you already understand how the graphs work, for instance why the slope is shifting to the right/left or etc, but it does not mean that you can actually draw it by yourself. Simply look at the textbook or how your professors are drawing are absolutely not enough. If you think you can draw them, trust me, You really don't.

(This photo is taken from google. It is purposely for an example.)

3. Do past papers as much as you can. 
Practice, practice, and practice. Do them by yourself. Try to find the answers by yourself, instead of copying your friends' answers. Even though, you are copying directly from the textbook, but at least you are striving to find the answers by yourself compared to your friends find the answers for you. No ones are going to spoon feeding you. You have to work for them.

4. Explain the theories out loud.
This helps for you to understand and memorize the material quickly and easily. However, in order for you to maintain the knowledge in the long run, there is no other ways other than understand them well enough. Or you could explain to your friends and classmates. Perhaps, this might helps them as well.

5.Apply those theories with your surroundings.
Apply those principles according to your environment. Make it simple. Whatever that relates to you based on your interest, apply them with microeconomics. This helps you for your essays section, where you have to give examples based on your understanding. If you already have examples that could relate with your interest, it will be much easier for you to understand and remember.

6. Do not memorize.
This is what lots of economics students do, they memorize instead of understanding the materials down. There is no such thing that you can memorize all those graphs at hand. No way, you'll go nuts. The graphs are tremendously complicated. In fact, the questions are going to test your understanding by alter some of the characteristics. This is to see either you are able to explain it well and draw the graphs based on the situations.

7. Write in your own words.
This is crucial for you in order to tell either you can write the essays without relying on the textbooks and notes. It looks quite easy by reading your notes or textbooks. But when it comes to the test or exams. You just can't answer the questions even though you had studied enough. Writing skill is crucial when it comes to any essays. In order to get them right, unfortunately is by write them right. If your first language is not English, it is okay if your grammar is incorrect. Through out the time by lots of writing practices, it will improves eventually.

8. Ask your professors for your mistakes.
If you don't get your answer correct, ask your professors what are your mistakes. This is crucial for you to learn from your mistakes. There is no point of doing the exercises again and again if you keep repeating the same mistakes. Every time you get your tests/quizzes, ask them why do you didn't get full marks.

In conclusion, regardless whatever you do, work hard because life is hard. No ones are going to help you other than yourself. Be consistent and be discipline. My dad always tell me that if you want to be successful, you have to be discipline. Best of luck 😘

Life lessons that I've learnt

Hello everyone. Happy New Year. May this year is going to be full with his blessings. InshaAllah :)

The reason i'm writing this is to remind me of my mistakes that i had done in the past as my remembrance and also hopefully whoever's reading this finds something beneficial.

I don't know about you, but i'm gonna tell yall a bit of myself. I honestly do not have lots of friends. I can defined myself as an independent individual. I have already get used to it due to my upraising. I live with one of the rules.

 "Go for quality friends not quantity"

I always keep telling myself that friends are crucial. They are going to make a huge impact on myself. Due to that, i have to be extremely careful when choosing friends. I always tell myself that i am going to pick my friends like i'm picking up my makeup stuff, but way moreeeeeeee careful and choosy. And that's why i literally don't have much friends. I guess i do have lots of friends but they are not close enough.

However, i do have friends and i feel like they're more likely as sisters to me. But honestly, i can count them with my fingers. 

I guess I have never told anyone about it, but we all messed up sometimes or most of the times. Including me i must say. I used to be extremely sad because someone i barely know left me. At that time i certainly had no idea why i had to be so sad. I keep telling myself that i am so grateful with everything i have. I guess since i was in my public policy school i have this kinds of issue where i feel so sad because i dont get what i want. As i'm growing up i feel like this issue is going to happen in my life anyway. The difference is that what are the "things" of making me feel sad about. The "things" are vary from times to times. Even though i know for fact that Allah swt gives me things that i need the most instead of things i want the most. But it is certainly easier said than done.

It is extremely hard for me to deal with it. Every single day i wake up and i feel sad. Plus, i'm comparing my life with everyone else's life where i see happiness which i don't see in myself. Until to that extend i feel like probably this is my life, I'm going to feel this forever. But the feeling of sadness is sort of like ups and downs. It's not consistent. Sometimes i feel okay sometimes it is sort of coming back. And let's be honest, I think i have never found anyone who can give me somethings sort of advice/motivation that satisfy me 100%. Until I read the Holy Quran translation and i've gotten my answers. Somethings that could relate to me, answering my questions and thoughts that have made me wondering all these times and in fact something unbeatable. It really satisfy me more than 100%. And i wish someone has told me about it earlier. Due to that, probably things were different.

Besides, i also have things where things do not turn out the way i want them to be. Honestly, it is really frustrating. I can say that i felt like i didn't want to be existed anymore. One thing  that keeps me stay is my faith. That's all i can say. I know things happen for reasons. The reasons why are certainly something i have no idea. But i keep thinking positive where Allah swt has better plans for me and it's fine to cry. I feel lonely. I feel no one can helps me out. No one feels me. But i know he knows and he's listening. I know he loves me that's why he's testing me every single day. I know that the "thing" that makes me sad is definitely going to happen anyway. Perhaps, it might be different. But the feeling that i'm feeling regardless of different "thing" is definitely the feeling that he wants me to feel. What i'm trying to say is that i will feel it no matter what. It's the causes of what make me sad perhaps may be vary. So, why i have to be continuously feel sad. Things are meant to happen. That feeling is meant to feel.

Prior to that, what should i do? My answer is hold on to your faith tightly. As close as you can. Do not forget where you belong. You belong to him, to him you put your trust. Just trust him, Trust him as much you trust him let you breath every single day without you realize that you're actually breathing without controlling it. Who controls it? Who has the power to do that? Certainly, we all know the answer. Same goes to the other things. He has the authority to plan what he wants, Everything he says is definitely going to happen. When you feel that means you care. When you don't feel that means you don't care. I can talk about this for ages. All i can say, regardless what happens hold on to your faith, stop crying, stop thinking about what makes you sad because it does not do you any good, do not take too much time try to calm yourself down, instead, get up and enhance your strength. Keep doing good things and striving your goals. Make sure one of your goals is to achieve a place for you and your family in paradise because we all know this world will end soon. Certainly, my family and i need a better place to stay. Hihi :)

I'll add more afterwards. It's time to sleep. Gotta go! Adios Amigos.
Thank you for reading until the end of this post. I wish you and your loved ones are doing well. Alhamdulillah :)
Peace be upon you :)

The end of week-14 and the beginning of study week.

Hello my friend,

I've been busy with assignments, tests, quizzes, presentations and etc. There were so many things needed to be done within the limited period of time given. And it was ridiculous! Surely, lack of sleep yet need to wake up early to catch up for other things coming up. Finally, after struggling and juggling from week-1 until week-14. Here comes to an end of the academic weeks. And say hello to study week (which I'm not ready, but let's pretend I'm ready).

To sum up, from week-1, obviously week-1 was quite freely and steady. However, when it comes to the middle of academic weeks, things became quite complicated. I can say, I slept averagely at 2-3 am in the morning. That's pretty normal for me.

Parts that I certainly enjoyed the most were English presentations and statistical methods lectures. I think it's quite relaxing compared to other assessments. Of course, there were times where I felt not motivated at all to do homework and exercises. Since, economics is a quantitative subject, massive amounts of homeworks and calculations needed to be done. I always try to finish my homework a couple days before as I'm a slow learner. Sometimes, I had to postponed my works (I should not have to) due to other important things needed to be submit early.

Here are the pictures of me and my classmates through out the semesters.

Me and my classmates during our last class and test with Dr Rosilawati. She teaches us Intermediate Microeconomics/ EC0539. 

This is how intermediate economics looks like. But this is quite okay (I think) 

Miss Zuraidah Derasit teaches me Quantitative Business Analysis. Thank god, I switched classes because I love her teaching style. It suits me really well. Yeayyy!

Arabic class with Ustaz Ramlee.

Here comes my favorite part among all the pictures. Me and Dr Chuah Soo Cheng. She teaches me Statistical Methods/ECO541. In fact, she's also my academic adviser.  She's definitely one of my favorite lecturers. (No offence, all of my lecturers are my favorite, but this is quite special case lol)

Atiqah is one of my economics friends. She's nice ,sweet and friendly. We're actually from different groups.

My project paper teammates with Dr Chuah Soo Cheng.

I actually have so many things to share. Perhaps next time would be great. Thanks for scrolling down and reading everything through out the end. 

Nevertheless, I wish all the best to all my friends for your finals and future endeavors. I apologize for my mistakes, weaknesses, selfishness and anything in between. I really hope we all make use of the knowledge that we have learnt all these times for good and intentionally for him, the most gracious and most merciful. Certainly, university ends but learning does not. Embrace the knowledge for the benefits of ourselves, families, friends, societies and everyone in this world who needed. That's all that matters. Regardless of our results and cgpa, certainly there are so many things out there to learn other than books. 

Until next post, thank you. :)

****(All the photos are mine, please ask my permissions if you want to use them)

Things to know before going into economics degree program

Hello readers! This is literally my very first post. 😃

As you can see from the title, probably you're interested in economics or you just read this for fun. Never mind, let's get into it. Shall we?

First of all, there's no such thing as "easy peasy lemon squeezy" in degree life. Regardless whatever course that you're going for, it's going to be real hard. And trust me, you have no idea what's going to come.

Next, economics involves both reading and calculating. Meaning, there're lots of theories to get the concepts down, on the other hand, there are lots of maths exercises that you have to deal with.

- The reading part is crucial. YOU HAVE TO LOVE READING, otherwise you'll find things very difficult. The theories are quite complicated, worst, those theories need to be translated into graphs. Meaning, if you don't get the theories down, you are not able to construct the graphs. In fact, the graphs are insane!

- The calculating part is really TESTING YOUR MATHEMATICS SKILLS. If you love additional maths, algebra, or calculus, I think you'll do good. The basic in economics is maths. You need to do lots of exercises in order for you to be able to differentiate which formulas you need to use. Plus, if you're not good in maths, you'll fall behind. Because in uni, your professors or lecturers aren't waiting for you. So you have to catch up!

Plus, you need to be hardworking. It's quite impossible to study at the very last minutes unless you're a genius. Because economics involve both reading and calculating. If you can't understand the theories, you won't be able to calculate. However, if you understand the theories but lacking of exercises, you won't be able to trick the questions.

My lecturer said once "An economics student must be a hardworking person. Second would be smart". There are certain courses need smart students first such as accounting, actuarial science and medicine. In economics, smart comes second, however, hard work comes first.

As for now, I hope these things help for those who are wondering what's an economics degree program looks like. Thank you for reading. Have a nice day everyone! Goodbye.