One Human’s GRE Experience — Brainwashing my mind for success (Part 4)
Get Rishi Karri’s stories in your inbox
Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.
I enjoy taking long walks in the woods and listening to the sonorous sounds of nature. Sometimes I trade the notes of nature for the frequencies of audiobooks. One afternoon, I took a stroll through an outdoor trail and listened to “Think and Grow Rich” by Napoleon Hill — a book highly recommended to me by my future father in law. In the book, the author galvanizes the reader to write down his / her / their goals. I took this piece of advice to heart. I knew I wanted to score a 320something on the GRE so I forced myself to dream even bigger. I told myself that I was capable of a 330. That a 330 was completely within my grasp. I imagined 330 flashing on the screen after I clicked submit at the end of the test. I envisioned myself as being excited but not surprised. As I rode the train to work in the mornings, I would write phrases like the below:
- “I can score a 330 on the GRE.”
- “I will score a 330 on the GRE.”
- “I can score a 333 on the GRE if I want to. All I have to do is grind, be patient, and never give up.”
- “I can move mountains with my mind. The GRE is just a test. It’s not even a mountain. I can score a 330 on it.”
- “I can’t wait to score a 330 on the GRE.”
- “After I score a 330 on the GRE, I’m going to write a blog post about it.”
- “I’m excited to share what I’ve learned on reddit about how to get a 330.”
- “I will accept nothing less than a 320.”
- “I’m not taking the test until I score in the mid 320s on a practice test.”
- “The GRE is destroyable.”
- “I can score a 330 on the GRE, it’s possible.”
While I told no one except my GRE tutor of my ambitions, I would write statements like this over and over and over and over again. On little scrawls in my pocket notebook. On flashcards I made. In my study notebook. Next to my to-do lists in my work notebooks. It soon became so ingrained in my mind that a high score was plausible. After a high score seemed within my grasp, I couldn’t help but aggressively pursue it. It seemed reckless to not pursue it. It would be a travesty to not see something through that was so within reach. I distinctly remember my sister asking me what I was trying to score on the GRE. As I paused to answer the question, a thought sprung into my mind like a cat upon a kitchen counter: ”Oh I’m going to score a 330 or somewhere around there.” I was surprised by how second nature my belief had become. Since I generally try to share completed goals rather than in-progress goals, I ended up deflecting and not naming a specific number.
Once I cultivated the mindset and absorbed enough subject matter, I was ready to take the test. Read on to learn about my “calm creating” test day routine.
