It's exam season. You’re sitting at your desk with a laptop opened in front of you, notes strewn across the area. You look at the seemingly endless content from multiple modules that you have yet to revise. You despair at the hopelessness of it all, thinking to yourself, “I don’t know what I don’t know.” At the back of your mind, one question lingers.
"What if I don’t do well?"
Sounds familiar? Regardless of the level of education, this is the perennial question that students end up facing whether they consciously know it or not. I was no exception.
Back when I was a student in SP, I failed two mid-semester tests in my first semester. This probably would not have been too big a problem if I was doing well in my other modules, but I was not. Needless to say, my GPA was badly affected. Where did I go wrong? How am I to face my parents, who paid so much to put me in Poly? Will I have a chance of even graduating with a good GPA now? Am I just stupid? It’s not as if I didn’t put in any effort though - I listened in class, I did my tutorials, I studied hard. How could things have ended up like this?
Maybe some of you can relate to what I went through, and perhaps some of you will never have to experience this at all in life. Whatever the case, I would like to share some thoughts that I had as I worked through my setback.
Students usually define success as “passing my module” or “getting an A” because this seems to be the first of many rungs in the ladder of life. Good grades may lead us to a reputable university that opens doors of opportunities. These opportunities will then pave the way of having a good, comfortable life, filled with luxuries that we desire. Failure now could essentially ruin all the carefully laid out plans for our future.
Take the late Steve Jobs for example. He dropped out from college because he had no idea what he wanted to do. Fast forward a few years later, he became the founder of Apple, one of the greatest tech companies of our time.
Then there’s Macaulay Culkin. The name might not be as familiar, but you would know him as the lead actor from Home Alone who played Kevin McCallister. As a child actor, he had an extremely bright future and what was looking to be the start of a very successful career. But at the age of 24, he was arrested on drug charges in the US.
In both these cases, no one could have known the outcome. Jobs could have worked his whole life without breakthroughs. Culkin could’ve led the next big movie franchise or even landed a coveted role as one of Marvel’s many characters. My point is this, no one is certain of the future.
So now what? Well, coming back to my personal example of my academic journey, I put in the effort, but I still failed. I was upset, lost and unsure of my next step; that is completely ok. That’s just life. With its ups and downs, and sudden, unexpected 180s. But what mattered the most then, was the next step to take in the present. I picked myself up, and tried again. I eventually graduated with a decent GPA which landed me in university.
But it wasn’t a smooth ride in University, either. I flunked two modules in my first year and had to retake them. The fear of failing was so great after that. Everything from quizzes, to tests, to examinations, I feared that I would fail. I feared that I wouldn’t graduate in time and get a job. I had days when I was filled with so much dread, I couldn’t get out of bed. I dealt with my first two mental breakdowns, both times of which I was a sobbing mess. But after all that, I still managed to graduate.
At the time of writing, I’ve been a fresh graduate for about 2 months now. My friends found themselves in well paying jobs while I’m still on the job hunt. I worry that if I don’t get a job soon, I won’t be able to save up for the future that I long to have and that I will be left behind as my peers move forward. I don’t know when I will land a job, but I spend a few hours each day without fail looking for job opportunities.
We don’t know the future, so why fear it? Look at the present. What’s the next step you can take? It could be something as simple as getting yourself out of bed. It could be having to ask your friends for help. I’m not saying the fear of failure is going to be completely gone.
There will be days when we feel perfectly fine, and days when we’re paralysed with dread. We will do well for some tests and do badly for others. But instead of letting it cripple us from moving forward, let’s reflect on the fear and find out where it stems from. Embrace it. It’s what makes us human. And let us find a community to share it with. Cry if we have to.
It's exam season. You’re sitting at your desk with a laptop opened in front of you, notes strewn across the area. You look at the seemingly endless content from multiple modules that you have yet to revise. You despair at the hopelessness of it all, thinking to yourself, “I don’t know what I don’t know.” At the back of your mind, one question lingers:
"What if I don’t do well?"
To which you answer with fear and courage:
"I take the next step."
