A Different Approach

It’s Sunday again and I’m headed back home on the train. Studying isn’t getting any easier and with the pressure going up at work, it’s taking more of a tool on the body which leaves less time for study. I was totally drained Saturday morning and although I meant to begin studying at 8 or 9am, I began somewhere around 12pm. I studied for and hour and took a walk hour off and then studied for another hour. I kept this pace up until 7pm, took an hour off, and then went at it for another hour. Even at this pace, I didn’t finish all of my homework even though I had logged another eight hours during the week.

I woke this morning feeling horrible about where I was with regard to study and about my current work situation. Back in November, there was a 15% raise and another 2.2% raise a few weeks back but the pressure has gone up and the workload has increased. Even though I know it’s not the case, I feel like I’m not pulling my weight and at any moment, I’m going to be found out and they’ll ask me to leave.

This paranoia actually serves me because it makes me work a lot harder than those around me but for whatever the reason, I felt like the wheels were about to fall of this morning. I actually considered not attending my GMAT class and spending the day studying but I thought the beter of it. There are a few things I can control about my GMAT and a few things I can’t. My quant skill set seems to be on the lower end of the range, at least as far as this class unconcerned, and I can’t control the fact that I’m a good 15 years older than anyone in the class and my quant education is much further behind me.

Rather than get all caught up with my struggle with my quant or my current job situation, I looked at the other side of the coin. I’m making more money than I have and a full $25,000 more than when I started at Nice-Pak less than three years ago. I actually looked at my current place in life and gratitude flowed from me. From this position of feeling grateful, I was in a position to make some new choice.

Normally I would have taken out my GMAT materials and studied the whole way down on the train. I felt like I was in a place where I wouldn’t be able to access all of my resources, no matter how deep the pool was. Instead, I listened to the movie The Secret on the way down and I visualized who I wanted to be and what the future had in store for me. With that approach, I felt very different about where I was going and even how I felt about where I was today. When The Secret was over, I loaded Anthony Robbins’ Get The Edge Day 1.

By the time I arrived at Grand Central Station, I was vibrating. I visited the Apple Store right there in the station and then I headed downtown, stopping at Starbucks, and to class. I arrived an hour early and rather than complete the homework I never finished completely, I reviewed my notes from the previous week. Then I took a subject that I’ve been struggling with and I chose one problem problem from the chapter and i reviewed it; then I tried it and, although I needed some help getting through it, I completed it. After it was finished, I tackled it again, and again, and again, and again, until I could do it cold without any assistance. And that’s going to be my approach going forward: a problem that’s tough the first time around and I can’t seem to get through without assistance, I’m going to do over and over again until I get it right; then I’ll come back to it a week later to ensure I’ve got it slam dunked.

With this approach, I attacked class with confidence rather than the apprehension. Now it didn’t help me to answer questions I would’ve had no idea how to answer before; it did help me to think through things a bit better. Although I didn’t have every quant answer, I did have solutions when others were scratching their heads. I was probably the student who participated more than any other and, even when I wasn’t right, it was clear I was thinking a lot better and I’m now moving the momentum in the proper direction.