Leah is a NINJA CPA Blogger.

I am writing after a couple of weeks of studying for BEC. I’ll have a total of 7 weeks of study time, and I am feeling more overwhelmed with it than I did for FAR or AUD.

This deceptively thin ‘textbook’ contains a huge amount of definitions and calculations. I’m hoping things will start clicking once I start doing MCQ’s.

Thanks to some tipsters on Another71 forum I learned the powers of playback speed. I am all about anything that will save some time, but not at the expense of understanding. So, I played with the speed rate until I found what works for me, and I’ve gotten used to it after a little practice.

For my second exam ever, AUD, I ended up being as nervous for it as I was for the first one. It starts a couple of days before the exam, but when it’s go time I seem to be able to channel the nerves into a source of power to help me get through the exam. I try to psych myself up by focusing on passing instead of fighting all the stomach butterflies.

One cool thing about the Prometric testing center closest to me is that they have decent chairs. I don’t know if that is true for all testing sites, but my backside appreciates it after four plus hours of sitting.

I have yet to be able to make myself take a mid-exam break even though I’ve had time to do so. I would kick myself if I did and then failed an exam because I ran out of time.

I have also found the whole ‘turn your pockets out’ somewhat amusing. Pockets on ladies clothing tend to be very small so the last ‘pocket turning out’ event ended up being more of an awkward fumbling.

And, trying to get the back pockets unbuttoned gracefully? Not happening. What’s a lady to do? I apologetically told the attendant, “That’s as far as they go”, and “Sorry, I never used my back pocket”.

I’m sure they deal with that sort of thing all of the time. On the other hand, I’m thinking I need to find some pants that have no pockets just to wear on exam day. Maybe I can find some to wear along with a NINJA t-shirt once they are available.

I’m optimistic; if I pass all of the exams then I won’t have to deal with pocket raiders. Motivation is motivation!