Daily Human – Ego – 7/9/21
Yesterday as I was killing time on a long flights, I realised something very important about myself.
I changed schools in class 8. The standard of Hindi in the new school was very high and I struggled. I got around 50 marks out of 100 in the first two exams. Then I realised something ( I don’t remember how I figured this out).
I was focusing on the literature part and ignoring the essay and grammar part. You never get full marks for literature questions. The extra effort I spent on preparing for them was not giving much in terms of extra marks. And because I spent most of my time preparing for them, I was also sending most of the time in the exam answering those questions. On the other hand, you could get full marks for grammar. I was generally good at writing essays but I ran out of time before I could write a proper essay.
You are likely to ask – why didn’t I just do both? I wasn’t very studious and most of preparation was last moment. So there was never any time to do both.
I don’t know why, but I was conditioned to prioritise the literature part. Partly, I think, because of my own interest in reading stories. It was difficult for me to prioritise grammar over literature.
But after struggling twice, I decided to make this change for the third and final term exams.
It was a super success. I scored 65. For perspective, the highest in class used to be around 75. After that I became a good Hindi student. A small change in approach had made all the difference.
Fast forward to plus 2, when I was writing the IIT JEE exams. I enjoyed solving the concept based problems in maths and physics. I hated chemistry because it involved a lot of memorisation of equations etc. Each subject was worth 100 marks. 40 marks for multiple choice questions and 60 for concept based questions. I spent all my energy on the concept based part in maths and physics. Did the bare minimum in chemistry. Solving a hard problem used to give me a high.
Scoring marks in chemistry and multiple choice questions was purely a factor of time and effort. Most people who did well in JEE put in the effort to maximise their marks in this area. I knew many such people. I knew they were scoring well in all the proactive exams by maximising this opportunity.
Inspite of knowing all of this, I never changed my approach. I had changed my tactics for Hindi when I was younger and less wise. It was exactly the same situation for IIT JEE. My penchant for stories was similar to my interest in the concept based problems in maths and physics. I had managed to keep my interests aside to objectively focus on a better opportunity to score marks in Hindi. A similar opportunity lay in multiple choice and chemistry. But I couldn’t do the same for an exam which was much more important in my life and for my future. I realised it would increase my chances of clearing the exam but still couldn’t bring myself to change my methods.
In my head, the memorising of theory and chemistry equations was for losers who couldn’t solve the harder conceptual problems. I was obsessed with the notion that I was very intelligent and therefore I should be doing what an intelligent person should do.
This self- labelling was extremely harmful and eventually I paid the price. I didn’t make the main list. I only qualified for the extended list. My rank was 3425 ( only the top 3200 made the main list). Getting 10–15 marks more could have made a world of difference.
My EGO was just too big.
P.S – For the next few years, I considered myself a failure for not making the main list. It meant that I wasn’t SMART enough. Getting a decent JEE rank was the only way to prove myself. Every time I met someone from IIT, I used to feel a little inferior.
Luckily for me, I finally realised why my thought process was all wrong. I made peace with my failure.
But in all these years, I hadn’t realised the connection between Hindi and JEE. I do now. I hope I never let my EGO get the better of me again again.
