the quintessential quagmirish quandary

by oBelIX

Saturday

Gre approaching near. Very few wordlists done. I was kinda worried. So, in the morning, I began with a fresh resolve to do a few wordlists (bhatti a lot of words). Did not help at all. All that was happening was that I was unable to focus. Unable to concentrate. My mind kept shifting from topic to topic. I was wondering why the bloody **** am I doing this. Do I really want to do an MS / PhD? I got 10 days to GRE and am nowhere close to knowing the wordlists. Manish is already done with all of them and in revision mode. Mostly, I felt extremely discouraged. The whole morning went thinking like this.

Then in the afternoon I tried again. Again the same frigging problem. I was so screwed up that I was even wandering about the hostel, aimlessy, wondering why the f**k am I even bothered. So I went down to Peesu Wing. The plan was simple. I was going to use a technique I’ve often used to make me do something I dont like. I do something totally useless (like play games, do bc, orkut, blogging, in general waste time) so that I can guilt myself into doing something I dislike. After two hours of FIFA, when I came back, I was still in the same fucked up state. Unable to focus / remember. Always wondering, what is the point of giving GRE. That was when I posted the rap on The Quintessential Quagmirish Quandary.

Anyway, the most interesting part of the day was coming up. I went swimming. Had fun. Then went to canteen to eat. PKV was there. There was a “discussion” on a certain Dharmpajji (no offence meant) who had come to campus. I came back to the room. Went up to Sriram wing to find Tipo / Manish doing the entire gre bit, asking each other questions. Was feeling reasonably dejected at this point (more at not knowing why I was studying for GRE rather than that I had not done anything useful the entire day).

Despondent, I came back to the room. Saw cars again (FYI – I really like the race in Cars). Was actually empathizing with Lightning McQueen when he is unable to focus during the big race. Then Mac said the “Find the groove that works for you kid and lets win this race” dialog. And I figure that kinda changed everything. I tried to read again and this time it fit. And goodness gracious me, I was able to read. I finished P, R, S.

Now, I am not the guy who would be able to bhatti / mug up very well (the guy you are looking for is Aziz who is the best at rattofication). Honestly, I have never been good at it. And yet I found myself memorizing mesmerizing words. All the doubts about why I was giving GRE and all, were pushed back – unanswered. All I was doing was remembering the stupid ass words. Went to sleep feeling happy. Was actually slightly worried that I may relapse into the old early morning state of feeling like crap. Oh and FYI, the feeling of thinking about a word, thinking that you have forgotten the meaning, then just getting the meaning before you look it up is like wow. (Yeah, the effect of remembering all those words is not clearly visible here).

Sunday

Woke up. Felt like, lets do this. Also felt a little aware that I may not have the same streak as yesterday. May just go back to the constant wondering. So, started off with I. Manish calls and says lets study together. On his advice did C. Then I. Now I finished M. Looking to do E before dinner. So far so good. I have a reasonable plan now.

This is a parable. There is a moral here. Its very simple. Its on the tip of my tongue. (Yeah, i figure you have noticed the hedging and are like “Out with it already”. Actually I was sure of the moral when I started the post. Cant recall it now). BTW, I just realized that I am starting to forget some of the words. Mostly I guess thats coz you cant push too much into the brain. Its kinda like, you keep pushing from one end and stuff will come out of the other. (No pun intended).

Any-hoo, the plan now is to do E and T. Revise the rest before sleeping. And revise again tomorrow in the morning. And see how many I have forgotten. (Already am afraid of inordinate, peremptory, portend etc…). And see how long this streak continues.

Just 9 more days to freedom
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PS – one of the most profound posts on this blog. So if you have any sarcastic / cynical / strident / stritcturish comments please do go ahead and post them.

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