Have you ever felt completely frustrated and aggravated so you feel like just completely giving up and bailing out on the idea of being successful at what you do?

I sure did. Many times.

There were times where I would check my mock test results and be in tears saying to myself, “Why I am not getting success? What’s wrong with me? How come my friends and everyone around me are making a killing in their mocks and why not me ? ”

My first few attempts at CAT were a complete disaster and utter failure.

Just thinking about it makes me feel sick to my stomach. Even as I write this, those feelings come back.

During the worst of my struggles, I kept thinking about my options.

1. I could go back and get admission into some decent MBA College and simply give up on the idea of cracking CAT and deal with the fact that I can’t get calls from IIMs

Or

2. I could hang in there, continue to work on my speed, knowledge & keep moving forward and continue to seek out answers.

I chose option 2 obviously. Otherwise, I would be sitting at a desk in some mediocre B-school staring out the window regretting the fact that I gave up on my dream.

During my journey of failure, I learnt a lot of valuable lessons.

Some of them I will remember lifelong. You will learn them as you go along with me.

So let’s start by taking baby steps towards my CAT journey.

I gave CAT for three times and I don’t hate to admit that.

My first two attempts at CAT were complete disaster.

When I gave CAT for the first time, it was back in my engineering days. I scored 91.14%ile, so I decided to quit my job to give CAT again and study wholeheartedly.

I studied the whole time but unfortunately I scored meager 83.xx in my second attempt. Even some of my junior friends scored much more than me.

At that point, I felt like a real loser , like in capital letter “L”

I remember, hearing suggestions from people who became overnight advocates on how to crack CAT, so I devised all kind of strategies to avoid that topic that most MBA aspirants would never think of , let alone try.

I labored under a burden of inner agony, maddening frustration and desperation. Sometimes, I wondered to myself how anybody could possibly explain or justify such a long, uninterrupted string of failure.

Despite this I decided to give CAT for the last time in 2011.

At then I was working on some different projects, I really didn’t have time to study, I studied only for last 7 days.

I gave CAT with absolutely no expectations.

I didn’t apply to any B-schools as I was not expecting any calls.

And something unusual happened. I can’t share it just now.

I will talk about it in next instalment.

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