Amelia was a 12-year-old, well-disciplined child, but not a very high-scoring student. Everybody in her school liked her manners, she was well-respected and she was respectful towards others too! The only thing she lacked was good grades and she desperately wanted them. She couldn’t understand the reason for her not getting an ‘A’ grade, despite studying well before tests or exams.

Amelia’s best friend was Emily, also a well-mannered girl, but Emily was a bright student. Both friends were admired by everyone in their school. They had almost the same interests and both liked the same band and loved their songs.

However, there was a difference, Amelia had posters of her favourite band all over her wall, she would take out information about them and would often tell Emily about the band’s whereabouts. She was so crazy that she had all her accessories such as pencils, sharpeners, erasers and pouches with pictures of them. She would even cut out their pictures from magazine and paste all over her room.

Contrary to Amelia, Emily did none of that. She loved the band, but didn’t follow them crazily like Amelia. She believed in one thing, ‘Too much of anything is bad’, so she would apply that in her life. She followed a schedule for five weekdays of proper nap, studies and family time, and, on weekends, she would relax and do whatever pleased her.

So once, soon after their tests, when the results were announced, as usual, Amelia didn’t get good marks like Emily did. That day Amelia decided to seek advice from her friend.

“Emily, I also study and do my best, but how do you always manage to get good marks? Do you study all day and night?” Amelia asked desperately.

Emily smiled and asked Amelia about her daily schedule and she was surprised to find that Amelia spent more than two hours listening to music, then doing her other favourite activities, and if she got school homework, she would do it. If there was no homework, she wouldn’t touch her school bag.

Emily was really surprised, and she asked, “Amelia, do you know the saying ‘Too much of anything is bad?’ If yes, then listen to me carefully, if you want to score well, then you must revise and read all that you have done in school every day. Spending time on other activities rather than studies is not a good idea, but if you do, there should be some time limitations. But I see that you don’t give time to studies at all, so how can you expect to get good grades?” Emily enquired sincerely.

Amelia looked at her shocked. “But whenever there is a test, I study a lot, you know I spend my whole day studying,” Amelia said protesting.

“You do, but don’t you agree that when you study for the test, everything seems new to you and you feel like it is so hard to learn,” Emily retorted.

Amelia seemed to agree, “Yes, you are right, usually those topics seem to be very difficult.”

“Yes, that’s because you study and read notes for the first time, while I give a regular reading to all the topics that we cover, that is why nothing seems difficult to me when I am learning it for a test and this is the reason I score well!”

Amelia smiled sheepishly. Emily continued, “You know I do my studies in balance. Weekdays are for studies and weekends are to relax. If you’re asking about tough times like exam times, then other activities will have to be kept aside until after the exams.”

This was the turning point in Amelia’s life. She listened to her friend’s advice and changed her daily activity schedule, eventually, her grades improved because she understood the meaning of too much of anything is bad!

Published in Dawn, Young World, December 30th, 2023