Reflecting on my essays

I'm not really confident and proud of the last three essays I did. I tried choosing topics that I thought I would struggle with and took different sides than I would normally would side with. I did this because I know on the exam that there is a big possibility of getting prompts that would be harder to tackle.  I also gave myself a time limit for each essay (including the pre-writes I did last week) and I felt that if I had more time I would have done better. Since I was worrying about beating the time, I kept repeating myself and not bringing up much new information. Even writing a pre-write is so pressuring because I kept thinking how I need to finish it fast so I can get on with the actual essay. I think I might look at the prompts and try a few more so I can get used to being timed. Overall, I'm not that happy about any of the essays I did.