I still remember the day before my CAT Exam. With every corner of my heart filled with anxiousness, I coaxed myself, “One challenge and thereafter, the beginning of my transformation!”. I’d been waiting for this day for as long as I can remember. My CAT preparation journey had been nothing less than a rollercoaster ride. But this journey was one, that taught me the most.
A challenge, a term I often used for CAT, made me realize my strengths, my weaknesses, and changed me in a way, I could never have imagined. All the superpowers used by me, to overcome this challenge, were inculcated in me since childhood. My Alma Mater, my school, which laid the building blocks of my personality, has made me the person I am today. I feel powerful when I say that I had learnt some of the most important life values while I was a kid at school.
‘Discipline’, the value that made me find comfort in chaos, also taught me the importance of being consistent with my commitments. Late night studies were never an excuse for skipping a single class at 6 in the morning. ‘Persistence’ made me balance my college chores like exams and submissions, parallel with Cat preparation. ‘Determination’ to overcome this challenge and discover what lay ahead, was the key motivation throughout this enriching learning experience. The fear of failure constantly haunted me, gave me a number of sleepless nights, but my firm resolve of ‘never giving up’, kept me going. I kept fighting back with all the strength I had to realize my ambition- 'Admission in a prestigious B-school'.
Every experience is orchestrated in life to teach us something. This experience taught me that, even when you try to escape challenges, you never really can because life and challenges are intertwined. What you can do is, face challenges head on, grow with them and learn from them. So from now on, my only objective is to learn.
And here I am at TAPMI, ‘where learning is for life’.