Last year, I coached my oldest son’s in-house baseball team. We finished with 3 wins, 4 losses, and 3 ties.
We wound up in 5th place out of 7 teams.
Not too good. Or was it?
Maybe it was good “from a certain point of view.”
Coming in 1st wasn’t our primary goal. Our goals for that season (in order) were:
- Get better at baseball
- Have fun
- Win games
We accomplished all three of those things. We got much better. We had a ton of fun, and we even won a few games.
We hit every objective. Nowhere in our goals was there anything about winning every game or coming in first place. That season was a complete success from my point of view.
(Every team makes the playoffs, regardless of their record during the season.)
What are your goals?
Is getting a 100% on the exam in there. No? Then why are you trying to get a 100%? I see people work on minutia and overwork on crazy things just for that 1 point that (probably) won’t be on the exam. Be smarter. Set your goals somewhere less insane. I know you like getting high marks. High marks do nothing for you. NOTHING. No one wants your scores. No one has ever seen your scores. No one cares what the number is. All anyone cares about is- did you pass or did you fail?
Set the right goals. Set the right expectations.
Getting a 100% on the exam is like those guys who are crazy good at darts. You know. You walk into a bar and there are these dudes hitting bullseye after bullseye. And at first, you’re like “wow, that is sooo cool. Those guys are amazing!” Then a few minutes go by and you’re like… “What a waste of time. Those guys must have spent 1000s of hours to get that good. Can you imagine if they were working on something useful?”
The same goes for getting a 100%. It makes no sense as a goal and is a complete waste of time and energy. Study. Do your best, but if you miss a question or two, there are 298 more to get right.
If you’re looking for just the most relevant, most-likely-tested material, and you’ll be happy with an 85%, get a copy of The Final Step and it’ll be a breeze.
Brian Wallace
