I appreciate the following snippet that Cal Newport mentioned in his podcast Deep Dive, Episode 310:
Who to talk to is the person who just had their first success and try to understand what it was like right before they made progress from it.
Cal Newport
And usually, that success comes from a lot of hard work and even a myriad of failures. Too many people praise those who have had their successes and overlook those who are still trying and struggling. But when you look at someone who just succeeded, it’s probably they’ve been through tough times to get there.
I got my ACT scores back, and I’m not here to tell you that I’m qualified. In fact, I’m still nowhere close to an expert when it comes to literacy skills. If what I say seems immature or imprecise and you don’t like what I say, feel free to click off. But I’m here to tell you that success, for me and probably for most people, does not come easily. It is only through hardships that we learn, grow, and become better selves.
So today, instead of listening to someone who’s just succeeded, you’re reading the words of someone who just failed. This may be a waste, but everyone is bound to fail at some point, and we don’t talk about failing, messing up, and making mistakes enough in society that we tend to fear it. I’ve certainly failed countless times before achieving that 5 on the AP English exam. And if I didn’t get a 5, I’ll accept it, because these experiences make me stronger.
Take a look (I scored high on the writing and math):
Context: I’ve gotten straight A’s and also gotten a 5 on several AP’s. This is a low score for an academic like me. I would’ve liked at least a 34 on Science and maybe 33 to 34 in Reading, since I want to submit scores competitive enough for top institutions.
Look. You’ve experienced this before. We’ve all experienced this before – whether it’s bombing that math final you’ve spent weeks preparing for, failing the timed writing assignment that determined half of your grade, or even making a single mistake on that computer science quiz that ruined your score. We’ve been taught to draw back from failure, neglect it, and put it in a corner in our minds. We don’t dare to look back on our embarrassments and even think of them again.
But what are you going to do now?
You’ve spent all that time preparing (for “nothing”), wasting time on countless hours of grinding, devouring every single possible resource you’ve gotten and spent an insane amount of time. You don’t remember what you’ve learned, and you’ve gotten a “bad” score. Thus, it doesn’t seem worth it to keep going.
And so you give up. You don’t want to bother with it anymore. You’ll just accept you failed and carry on, because you’re “bad” or just not the “right fit”.
If you frequently have this mindset, you’ll lose a lot. It doesn’t mean you shouldn’t give up everything; there are some things in life that we have to acknowledge and move on from, because it’s not worth our own efforts to spend time on (e.g my 3 on AP Spanish; I decided it wasn’t worth it to retake it). But since you’ve spent a lot of time on it, success would’ve meant a lot to you, so it’s better to reflect.
What worked? What didn’t work? What could you do better next time? Did I cram too much during the last minute? How can I space out my studying?
Give precise answers to these questions, rather than saying stupid things like “I’m dumb” or “I’m just not capable of this”. It doesn’t make you better, and all it does is destroy your confidence and self-esteem. If the task or goal matters to you, keep going. Don’t give up This failure just means something went wrong in your process. Inspect, adjust, and make yourself better. Learn from it before you move on. Store this experience in your vast bank of memories – use it to make yourself stronger.
We all glamorize success and achievements too much. That’s why we tend to think skilled people have some sort of innate talent. But talent is a lot rarer than you think, and most of us don’t have it. If you’re reading this post, there’s a big chance you don’t have the natural ability to solve IMO problems. And we have no idea how much struggle, toil, and failure people who can solve IMO problems went through.
So what’s the conclusion from my 27 and 30?
For one, I will say I improved. When I just started, I scored a 21 in reading. I made a six-point jump within a few weeks, both from taking mock tests and reading (although I went from 25 to 27 by solely reading more, which I wasn’t doing much of before).
I still guessed five or six questions during the exam, which meant that I ran out of time. I also got a couple wrong on some questions I answered. How can I fix this? More practice with tests, and more reading. Especially the latter; reading increased my score by over a hundred points between my first and second (paper) SATs, and it helped me with AP English, so I’ll keep doing it. Additionally, I was frantically spamming mock tests until the week before my ACT exam, the point I started reading for pleasure. I broke my stagnation at 25 to the 27-29 range just by maintaining a reading habit. Reading is the only natural way to improve reading, so I’ll keep doing it.
I didn’t prepare much for science, but I learned to keep up my habit of reading science material, even after standardized tests are over.
As for this past July ACT, it was a good preparation and test-taking experience. I’m still training my standardized testing muscles, but not necessarily on the ACT track. And also, when my mom asked for advice on a group, I was annoyed by this bullsh*t first phrase:
If I want to do well on a test that seems impossible for me to do well on, I will do it. I don’t care if the whole world doesn’t think it makes sense. I’ll push through and surprise you.
However, given time constraints and budgeting, I may not be taking ACTs in the near future, even if I want to continue. I’m signed up for the August SAT, so while I’m still honing my literacy skills, the practice questions I do will be geared towards the SAT. However, I believe ACT reading passages and questions are good material for standardized test practice, so I’ll probably use them.
Remember: when you fail, it’s one time that doesn’t work. But once you give up, you lose the battle.
If time doesn’t allow for multiple retakes, pick another challenge and embrace it. It will make you into a stronger person, a relentless person with inexorable grit.
So you fail. Now what?
Keep going.