A few years back, I was in the hospital cafeteria having breakfast with a plastic surgeon I work with. We’d have breakfast from time to time when we did a breast reconstruction case.
We were talking about buying kids expensive sports equipment. Bats range anywhere from $30 up to $300. You can get a $25 glove, or you can get a $200 glove. Then there are helmets, batting gloves, etc. and both my kids are catchers for goodness sakes.
I was arguing that the difference between a $30 bat and $300 bat could not be that significant to an eight-year-old hitter. If he is swinging and missing half the time, what would it matter? How much further could the ball go?
He didn’t argue the physical value of the bat. He changed the argument completely. He argued in favor of the psychological value of the bat. If a kid thought the bat would make him hit farther, it probably would. Confidence in the bat would translate into confidence in your ability to hit.
Hmmm…
Baseball is all about confidence. That’s why it’s so streaky. Guys hit the cover off the ball for a month and then can’t hit a thing for the following month. It’s about failure and bouncing back. It’s about confidence. It’s about getting in there without doubts circling like sharks.
How does this apply to you, my fickle friend? Your ability to take tests is exactly the same. It’s all about confidence. If you have it, you’re crushing it. If you’re sweating and second guessing, you’re finished.
Does it matter if it’s real or if we only believe it’s real? In the end, the results are the only thing that matter.
You can use the Fancy Bat principle for school. Pay attention to how using a certain book or study material makes you feel. Do you FEEL smarter, more confident? Do you feel lost and confused?
I knew after graduation that I had plenty of content knowledge rolling around in my head. I signed up for the Live Rutgers PANCE Review Course anyway. Do you know why? Because I was buying confidence. I knew it and I did it for that one reason. Confidence is a tough thing to conjure out of thin air. One philosophy I’ve started subscribing to is, any time I can pay for confidence, it’s worth it.
Here’s a cheap way to buy confidence. Get the fanciest notebooks you can find for your notes. You can get a standard one-subject notebook for about a dollar. Maybe less, if you really look, but the high-end Black n’ Red notebooks go for about $12 apiece.
Maybe use that one for your study journal. It makes you feel amazing and smart. That one notebook will make you want to sit down and write in it. All that good feeling and confidence comes for the very reasonable price of just $11.
It’s not the paper you’re buying. It’s the feeling.
How about another example of a cheap way to buy confidence? The Final Step has helped thousands of PA students build confidence and become PA-C’s
I got this email just a few days ago:
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Just a note of thanks for your vision and obedience as it pertains to Final Step. It was a game changer for me in my prep. It helped me identify what I knew for sure and boosted my confidence on exam day.
Thanks again, Pat M PA-C
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You can get your copy here
Brian Wallace