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 After reading William James' speech "The Gospel of Relaxation" I must admit I feel very sorry for him. It certainly did not take at Bryn Mawr, no matter how ernest his wish may have been. It is very nice for him to have spoken to the women about not caring about intelligence for only then it can be achieved, but it is a whole other story for the woman to take that to heart. Possibly if they had we wouldn't be quite the studious students we are today. James went to the source of all he was speaking about. We are the women who stay up all night studying before the big test. We are the women who worry too much about how we can meet the world's expectations of us. James was right, we need to relax, but how? If only it could be as simple as he thought to change our habits, but our state of mind is more than simply a habit. It embodies who we are. Like James said, we have been born and raised to be overachievers, that is probably why most us find ourselves here. And I don't think that the institution does much to help us change this pattern. Of course James wouldn't have believed this institution could be the spark that changed its students. I think he truly believed that the women here were the ones who had to change in order for the world to catch on and change itself. I wonder what he would have said about the students here today. We certainly have meet his expectations in the sense that we are not sipping liquid food out of a tin can and only have minds, and we certainly are the American women who feel free to feel and show emotion along with our opinions, but is that woman, as assertive as she may be, but still stuck in the prepared mentality, really what James would have wanted us to be, or would he be disappointed that I prepared for tomorrow's class by writing this post?