Competitive examinations, with their cutthroat competition value, can be seen as a battle. The students, who appear in these examinations, have to prepare as if they are preparing for a battle-an intellectual one. The challenges keep increasing and the time falls short. Hence, the ones, with right understanding of their self, their mind, their body and coordination of their thought process with the same, will be able to achieve the end results.
Therefore, coaching institutions, guides, mentors and experts in the field of competitive examinations play a massive role. They understand how the field functions and they know the ground level strategies. The founders of coaching and guidance in the field of competitive examinations have seen the world evolving and changing. They have encountered the change in policies and examination structures. Above all this, they have made strategies to crack the new barriers and have been successful in doing the same. Therefore, their point of view matters the most in this entire scenario. They are ones, who can foresee the future of competitive plans and draw the strategies accordingly.
These experts have the abilities to draw a path, by walking on which, the aspirants can reach to their desired destinations. These experts share their point of view in terms of preparing a student to prepare for these competitive examinations.
What all the experts have to talk about?
When it comes to have a look at what the experts have to say and suggests to the existing and upcoming aspirants, here a few things they essential have to share:
• Knowing the importance understanding oneself
• Self analysis, self assessment and introspection
• Understanding importance of concentration and mind’s health
• Knowing significance of consistency, persistence and time management
• Importance of self motivation
• Importance of healthy body
• Picking up right habits to become successful
• Learning from the life’s of successful and great people
• Understanding the importance of focus on your goal
• Deciding realistic goals and achieving them to become successful
• Handling adolescent age challenges
• Finding right solutions to frequent crisis
• Prioritizing your goals
• Effective life management
As it is said, to become successful, you don’t just have to change your entire lifestyle but before that you also have to change your mindset. The magic happens in the mind and when the mind (aka thought process) changes, a lot changes. This ensures that newness and excellence enters into your life and prepares you to take on the world. For years, this guidance has been helping the individuals to get required success in the lives. It has affected lives of many students in a positive way and has become a culture. Students, who follow the regime offered by experts in competitive examinations, end up making a major level of difference. This has increased the quality of competition as well. Nowadays, the bars of competition have been set high and the hurdles & challenges on the way have been increased. This adds to the overall performance of the students as well. Without increasing the level of challenges, one cannot expect to get the best out of the brilliant brains.
Understand Competition
Competition is a very tricky concept. You may increase your troubles by getting into the race if you don’t know the purpose of it. Also, competition is healthy and inspires you to do better. It is never with someone else. There may be others in the same race, but always remember that your struggle is with yourself only. If you are better than who you were yesterday, you are on the right path. The best way to deal with competition is to push yourself towards a better version of you tomorrow.
If you see competition has causing harm to others or being jealous of the people who are doing better, then you are on the wrong path. If people, who are weak from you, make you feel superior, then also you are not on the right path. Your idea should be to compare your yesterday’s version with your today’s performance. This is not an easy thing to do and you will not learn it overnight. It will take time to become a part of your thought process. Hence, you will have to practice and practice.
Introspection: Self Analysis
Introspection is the key to success for the students appearing in the competitive examinations. It is one of the most positive qualities one can have. The concept of self-assessment for your weaknesses and strongest points is equally applicable in routine life of every individual.
Every one of us has weak points and strong points. There are times, when the weakness is prevailing and keeps us from doing our job. On the other days, the positive quotient is high and we are able to take on all the challenges coming your way. But, succeeding in competitive exams is similar to swimming against the flow. It would never come easy. It will require the best of your efforts and test your abilities. However, the reward that you receive at the end will be life changing and totally worth the struggle. But, the question is, are you ready for the struggle it demands?
Are you willing to change the flow of your life and streamline it towards your success? Are you willing to do the required efforts? Are you ready to transform you lifestyle, as the time requires? Answering these questions before you get into the struggle is very important. These are the answers that you should give to yourself. It is all about self-analysis and introspection. You should honestly know what do you want and how determined to do things in order to modify your life.
Understanding Introspection in the Context of Olympics
The importance of self-analysis, self-examination and self-improvement can be better understood by taking examples of medalists in Olympics. Every country sends participants in the biggest sports competition of the world. Every country has its contingent fighting for medals and glory on the global front in different games. But, what is the reason that a very few of them end up getting what they were dreaming of and rest return empty handed? Does that mean they did not try enough? Does that mean they were not good enough? Is it about their preparation? What could be the point that one country has multiple medal winners and another country has negligible medal winners?
Asking these questions and trying to find out the answers is the analysis. This analysis is very important to understand the loopholes and fix them. The countries, which are leading in Olympics, are the ones, which have been engaged in this kind of introspection for years. Their players, gaming strategies, preparation plans, past performances, upcoming ideas, everything is being analyzed and made better in every possible way.
There is a reason why Olympians like Usain Bolt and Michael Phelps have multiple gold medals in their name. They have become legends in their games and they make a great difference into other’s lives by spreading inspiration. They did not become who they are, overnight. It took decades of hard work, self-examination, challenging lifestyle, introspection and hard work to implement all the required changes. Usain Bolt practiced all the techniques of cutting air with his body while running a sprint race, told by his coach. The trainer of Michael Phelps taught him the techniques of right body postures and hand movements of cut through the waters while swimming. He practiced everything with dedication and today he is the biggest and most celebrated Olympics swimming champion.
This means that having a dream and caliber to achieve that dream is just not enough. Dedicated and consistent amount of hard work is very much required to utilize these qualities and move ahead. There are various people with the same qualities, which the winners have; it’s the efforts and hard work that makes the difference. The ones, who work hard to hone their skills, turn their dreams into reality. It goes with competitive examinations. Many students have the knowledge, caliber and ability to crack the most difficult competitive examinations, but they never are able to do so, because they lack the required efforts and following elements:
• Dedicated efforts
• Practice
• Hard work
• Discipline
• Regular introspection and self improvement
• Self-motivation and faith in oneself
• Visionary attitude
• Ability to sacrifice second important things for the primary goals.
Goals are goals. They can be for sports, academics or anything else that you want to conquer in your life. If you have settled and goal and you want to achieve it, there is a mechanism to it. Without doing a certain things and without adding the required efforts, you may never be able to see that dream transforming into reality. Discipline, hard work, focus on the goal and determination towards self-improvement are some of the key points.
Life Management Beyond Academics
If you want to do great in academics, you cannot do it without managing your entire life beyond academics. If you think you are putting required efforts in preparing for a competitive exam and rest of your life is a haphazard, then you may never get successful. People, who succeed in their lives, against the ruthless competition are the ones who manage their entire life, decide priorities, allocate their time accordingly and turn down all the distractions that lure them in wasting time. This is not an easy task and requires dedicated efforts and complete guidance from the experts. The premier coaching institutes have life coaches and trainers, who guide the students to manage their lives. It totally depends on the students to take the guidance and implement it. Therefore, self-assessment and watching your each step closely becomes the most important factor in your success.
Prioritizing Your Goals
Everyone has a lot of things to do in life. All of the things are important and have their own value. The only trick here is to understand the priority. What is most important should be kept on top priority and done accordingly. Without this, it is impossible to achieve anything in life in streamlined way. Everyone has his or her own ways of handling things in life. Stuck amidst myriad things, people often forget to work according to priorities and end up doing nothing.
If you have a apriority list and allocate your energy and efforts according to that, it is logical and scientifically proven that you will be able to accomplish your goals more effectively. For example, if you are a student, appearing for national level medical entrance test and you also like to dance. You should know that for that particular year, your priority is medical entrance examination. Hence, your focus should be on that. This does not mean that you should give up on dancing. It just indicates that you can keep aside dancing for a while and taking it on once you have accomplished your goal of getting into a good medical college, you can take on dancing again. Hence, your second priorities can be kept on halt for a while to accomplish your most important priority. All the successful people use this formula only.
Putting Second Most Important Things on Hold
There is a long list of things, which fall on the second most important step of your life. They seem equally important and hence distract you now and then. Some people keep accessing to these things in the name of mind refreshment. But, actually, this is nothing but wastage of time. Everything that deviates your focus from your prime goal is a distraction. You may love it and find important in your life but you must learn to avoid it until your goal is reached successfully. Your second important things, hobbies, plans and ideas can wait until you achieve your first goal.
Love your dream, its challenges and difficulties
You cannot achieve your dreams until you love them. It is important to love your dream, its vision and its difficulties. You cannot spend your life chasing a dream until and unless you really love it. If you are doing it without love and passion, you will lose interest eventually. It is important to understand that you are wasting your time, if you do not whole-heartedly accept your dream along with the challenges, difficulties and pain it brings. You can only stay motivated about the things you love.
Do not chase a dream because someone else has told you to do it. Find your passion, love for the dream and find a logical reason to do it. Always remember, if you love something, it becomes easier to do it.
Questioning Yourself
This is one of the highly ignored phenomena. The practice of questioning oneself is not very common amongst people. They find it awkward to introspect their conduct and raise questions on their own decisions. They are rather defensive and want to portray themselves in good light only. But, if someone were not happily accepting the flaws and trying to correct them, how would improvement take place? Always remember, to be successful, you continuously need to improve yourself. This improvement may not be a very pleasant experience but it is important. It is difficult to take negative comments, accept them and make modifications. However, in self-analysis you should judge yourself in the light of your goal and things you need to do for the same.
Focus is the Key
When you sit in the competitive examination for three hours, it is important that your mind is sorted to perform to its best capacity in the given three hours. Everyone has the caliber to solve the most difficult entrance examination too. But, what matters the most, is the ability of individuals to solve it in the given time. Someone, who manages to solve the exam in given three hours, wins the race. To make it happen, you have to follow the strategy of focus. Always remember, focus is the key to success. You need not to learn, read and remember everything. You just have to read and remember the things, which are relevant and will get you good score in the examinations. If you are a student of medical entrance examination, you have a huge syllabus to cover. Rather than struggling to read the whole syllabus in incomplete manner, it is advised to study 75 percent of the study material, but in complete manner.
Think Positive
Positivity has become such a common term nowadays that people have started taking it for granted. People are asked to be positive and they listen to this term quite often. Too much of information in their minds makes them feel that they have been practicing it. This is a wrong notion though. By hearting about positivity or merely talking about it will not make you positive. It will definitely show you the path, but the destination is yet so far away. One has to understand that being positive is a routine practice. If you tell your mind to practicing being positive all the time and follow the good habits that lead to positivity, you will see the difference.
A positive person is likely to be more successful. It saves you from stress and empowers you to make better strategies rather than the ones, who are too tensed all the time. Negative emotions are full of energy. If they are prevalent, they will make sure that you do not succeed at all. Positive emotions are equally powerful. They will ensure that you succeed, if you practice them perfectly.
Be carefree but not careless
Students appearing for competitive examination often build of habit of being under stress. They are always on a mission to clear their examination that they stop living every day. This clogs their brain and also affects their performance in the long run. Studying is very much required to succeed in examination but it is also required to have clear strategy and healthy mind to study further. To become successful in highly difficult competitive exam, it is very important that you build a carefree attitude.
Carefree attitude does not mean that you should become careless and stop studying at all. Carefree approach towards life means that you do not stress on useless things. You keep your mind away from unnecessary stress. This ensures that your mind is more active and responsive towards learning more.
Every Individual is Unique, so are you!
When you are preparing for competitive examination and entrance tests, the one common thing is high level of competition. It is okay to have competition and one should prepare accordingly. But, this does not mean that you do exactly what your competitor is doing. Every individual has his or her own way of preparing for a particular test. If you are preparing for medical entrance examination or engineering entrance examination, you might be good at one subject say physics. On the other hand, your competitor might be good at chemistry. Comparing you two basis on that might create unnecessary stress. You should understand that every individual is unique and so are you. Therefore, your preparation strategies should go according to your own weaknesses and strengths. Always remember, your biggest competition is you only. Your only aim should be to get better with every step that you take ahead.
Clarity of Goals
The most common mistake competitive examination aspirants make is to get confused with their goals. They do not understand how should they proceed ahead with their goals and divide them in small little milestones, which are easily achievable. Your goal should encourage you to have a memorable journey full of struggle and happiness, rather than scaring you off. Your everyday goal should be to study as per the plan that you have achieved to conquer the final entrance examination. You should be able to apply all the strategies your teachers have mentioned and assess yourself on the basis of that.
Do not do self-harm
There is a common concept of self-punishment in human life, which people practice to rectify their mistakes or teach them a lesson. However, sometimes, it grows to that extent that they might start causing self-harm. You should never indulge in any of such activities. Your overall focus should be on treating yourself right and ensuring that you do not mistreat yourself under any circumstances. It is very common amongst students to hurt themselves. To extreme level, they try and attempt suicide. These cases are serious and should be avoided. You should always keep in mind that nothing is more important than a healthy life. Maintain a health life, eat properly on time, and do not curse yourself for little failures. Keep going and achieve success.
Eliminate Self Doubt by Hard Work
Self-doubt is a very common feeling. It surrounds human mind quite often. If you are working hard for something, it means you want to achieve it at any cost. But, when you realize that there are competitors, working for the same, you being to doubt if you are doing enough. Do not let this seed spread in your mind because it is not a healthy feeling. The more you begin to see yourself as someone, who is not doing enough; your performance level will fall. You should definitely focus on increasing your capabilities, but not by condemning what you are doing right now. Growth should always be driven by positive emotions. This will have long term and positive impact on your performance.
Install Good Qualities
Competitive examinations are aced by those, who are successful in establishing a disciplined self-conduct. The ones, who do not panic and begin to proceed towards accomplishing their dreams step by step, achieve long lasting success. Here are some of the common good qualities, which all successful people have. If you are aiming to become a successful person in your future, you should start installing following qualities in you right away:
• Speed & accuracy
• Revision and repetition
• Consistent efforts
• Thankfulness and gratitude
• Self confidence
• Self compassion
• Self belief
• Positive attitude
Without these good qualities, you will not be able to accomplish your vision. If you pick up and read the biographies of the most successful and inspirational people in their lives, you will notice one thing common in them-struggle. None of them got it along with their birth. They had to pave their way through, the hard and tough times. They were tested by life and uncertainties. They were the ones, who did not give up to the troubles. Rather they focused on the solutions and made a difference to their lives as well as lives of their loved ones. Their life stories are still powerful enough to bring about a positive change in your life. You just have to follow the right people and see what best from the life stories you can take as morale and apply it to advance your career, life and dreams.
Be Self Centered
Being selfish may seem a negative thing to do. We all are taught to be kind and help others. But, as far as competitive examinations are concerned, you have to change the way you think. The competition is ruthless and everyone out there is a threat to your success. However, you don’t have to be afraid from anyone. But, you have to be careful how you use your time and intellect. You don’t have to waste your time just for random things. You have to make sure that you are selfish enough to study hard and make the most of your time. Being self-centered here does not mean that you do not waste someone else’s time. Rather, it is about you training yourself to save your time and use it in the wisest possible way. Always remember, you should be self centered enough to take care of your physical and mental health. You should eat right and ensure that you are healthy enough to take up every day challenges. These little things will lead you to great success.
Concentration: Attentiveness
Concentration is a very tricky concept. To understand concentration, one has to understand the most complex structure ever known to mankind-mind. Rather than understanding concentration, your focus should be on practicing concentration. When you are in class, discussion sessions, and practice sessions or self-studying, you have to make sure that you are paying one hundred percent attention. Try switching off your brain’s unnecessary windows, turn off the unnecessary thoughts to focus more on your work. Here are some of the tips you can apply to increase your concentration level:
• Meditate every morning for at least 10-15 minutes
• Meditate every night before going to bed
• Practice yoga
• Eat healthy food for mind-almonds, fresh vegetables
• Avoid junk food
• Complete 6-8 hours of sleep at least
• Practice concentrating in class
• Practice concentrating in self study sessions
• Do not indulge in eating, entertainment or any other distractions simultaneously
• Drink enough water
• Do breathing exercises
• Keep your phone on silent mode while studying
• Seek help of your counselors if need be
By doing these things every day, you will be able to streamline your mind’s energy towards right direction. As a student of competitive examination, you must remember that having a healthy mind with highest possible concentration ability is the key to success. Without that, the battle is half won only. It is recommended to start practicing of your brain’s concentration level right away. This is what is going to prepare you for grand success in the examinations.
Cut Down on Distractions
The point of concentrating on the right things and cutting down on distractions has been already taken up in this article. Then what is the need to re-discuss the same? Well, this emphasizes again on the importance of concentration level, by highlighting the most important factor that affects the overall structure of concentration.
Distraction is the key reason people have to struggle too much to get their own work done. The mind gets so influenced by little things around that it stops focusing towards the most important thing. Little and big distractions lead to breakdown of concentration pattern, causing major harm to your study plans. In today’s time, there are multiple kinds of distractions including:
• Mobile Phones
• Entertainment options-films, series, gaming etc.
• Outdoor activities
• Indulging in discussions with the groups
• Overthinking
• Day dreaming
• Over sleeping
• Worrying too much etc.
These are common things, which lead to distractions and reduced concentration. A healthy and dedicated mind can create wonders. Without a wonderful mind, one can never achieve required results. To make sure that your mind is refreshed and ready to meet the challenges, you can accomplish better results. Let your mind experience ventilation, meditate and increase your concentration, go out to get some fresh air but do not waste extra time. Always remember time is very precious thing and you should use it towards your betterment.
Do Not Procrastinate
Another setback to your success is procrastination. It is one of the most difficult things to manage once it gets hold of you. The art of procrastination is the easiest to master and the most difficult to get rid of. This is the art of wasting time at highly unproductive things. If you are not busy studying and doing productive things but still you are busy all day, you are basically procrastinating. It is a lot more than just being lazy. One has to make sure that they are not putting things on tomorrow. The simplest way of getting out of the whirlpool of procrastination is to complete today’s task today only. If you shift today’s task on tomorrow, you will end up locking yourself up in a never-ending loop of zero efficiency. If you wish to increase your efficiency, you will have to manage your mind, regulate it, meditate and control its functioning. Your mind should be able to use all its power, energy and concentration towards productive thing.
Time Management
Time is one of the precious gems for all the human beings. But, for the students appearing in the competitive examinations, it is the thing of utmost importance. If you want to become a winner in the ruthlessly competitive world, you need to learn allocating your time smartly. Some of the world-class ways to allocate your time for important things is to make a timetable and stick to it. However, most of the students make timetables and forget to follow it eventually. Therefore, you have to make sure that plans are not limited till papers and they are executed well. This may take a lot of practice but it will be worth it at the end of the day.
Biggest Challenge for Competitive Examination Aspirants
Everyone who wants to appear in competitive examinations and clear them has to face a lot of challenges and deal with them during the course. There are multiple hurdles that test you on your way to success. However, you need to identify the biggest ones and sort them out first. There are a few, which can just be ignored and they will be disappeared. Hence, you should be smart enough to identify the real challenges and fix them. It is very important to understand how to allocate your energy and how to fix the troubles. If your hurdles are fixed, no one can stop you from reaching where you wish to be.
Talking about the biggest challenges, there are many and they keep fluctuating depending on the situation. Students often have to shift to a new place to attend the coaching classes. This brings in a major lifestyle change. You are staying away from your family and undergo major emotional shift. On the other hand, they also undergo major stress because of change in food quality, excessive pressure of studies and expectations. This shift is very difficult to handle and creates struggle, which is invisible to people around them. Hence, no one even understands that they require any sort of help; as a result, they cannot get any help. This entire thing, most likely leads to depression and lack of confidence. This explains that if people were to perform well in their studies, they first have to have a healthy mind. In such scenario, a healthy mind is taken away from them and they cannot achieve excellent growth, which they were supposed to.
Another important thing that often parents, counselors and society miss out about students is their struggle with adolescence. When an aspirant decides to undergo a competitive examination challenge, he or she is similarly dealing with challenges of teen age. This is the age, where people are often surrounded by a lot of distractions, frustrations and daydreaming. This causes trouble for their growth and they are unable to focus on their challenges and end up wasting a lot of time.
These factors are common for all the aspirants but how come some manage to ace the competitive examinations? Well, they are the ones, who go against the flow and swim through the difficult waves to win the challenges. They deal with all of the troubles and focus on their goal. They take right guidance, right support and assist them to keep walking towards their goals. They understand the difficulties, troubles and things, which are holding them down. But, they also understand their potential and their mind’s ability to control itself towards the right cause. Hence, if you are appearing for competitive examination and are facing the same problem, it is important that you look for the right solutions and utilize the most important time of your life. If you are able to pull it off right now, you will be able to turn your entire life into a beautiful reality of the most beautiful dream. Therefore, the efforts you put in are going to be totally worth it. Here are a few points, mentioned by experts to resolve the problems and build the capacity to face the challenges.
Appropriate Solution for this Biggest Challenge
Adolescence, distractions, homesickness and improper nutrition together affect your brain in negative sense. If you are trying to find a way to triumph over all the things, you will have to find the right ways to do it. Here are some of the points, which expert counselors, researchers and academicians serving the competitive examination coaching industry have shared. There points are cumulated to offer you a great support against all the challenges that you are going to witness on your way towards success in competitive examinations. Take a look:
• The challenges are going to be there. They cannot be eliminated; they can only be conquered!
• A good aspirant is the one, who focuses on the goal as the top priority and works towards it.
• You have to see the hurdles as temporary things and choose your battles wisely.
• You do not need to find solution to each and every problem. Your focus should only be on dealing with the biggest problems. The little ones can be ignored, as they are not worth your attention.
• Seek guidance from your expert counselors and ask for queries related to adolescence, physical changes in your body and emotional troubles that you are going through.
• Take care of nutrition and prefer to eat fruit and juices. Along with that, you can always consider to avoid junk food. This will help your mind to run faster and help you prepare better for the examination.
• Do not indulge in talking more and expanding friendship with strangers in the city. As you are new to the place and for a purpose, your focus should be on studying. However, it feels lonely and difficult to stay away from the friends, but still, you should do what is right and accept the wonderful life, which is waiting out there for you.
• Do not share your contact number and residence information with the strangers as this may bring uninvited trouble for you.
• Always remember, you do not have time to deal with unwanted problems. Therefore, you should rather avoid inviting any more problems towards yourself.
• Be strict with yourself. If you are busy wasting time, then you will suffer at the end. It is your duty to take strict actions towards your studies and avoid everything that may become a reason for you to leave your dreams.
Competition Examination Aspirant: Handling Adolescence Challenges
Always remember that you as a teenager, have a lot of power-both physical and mental. This is the transformative age, when your energy level is the highest and you have the power to conquer the world. But, this energy is destructive also. Hence, you are highly sensitive, emotional about almost everything and you get angry and stressed very easily. This is the reason that everyone has to understand this difficult and tricky age of adolescence and use the energy towards right direction. Here are a few things that experts of psychology recommend for the students aspiring to appear in the most difficult, national level competitive examinations:
• Practice meditation and yoga on frequent basis to keep your mind calm and focused.
• Avoid overreacting on anything that troubles you.
• Learn to take life easy and focus on your goals.
• Do not give away your power and energy for random things.
• Do not trust anything that anyone says to you.
• Confide only in those, who are your near and dear ones.
• Seek counseling when need be.
• Avoid bad company as it may result in serious negative impacts.
• Be very disciplined and do not let backlog burden you.
• Talk about your problems with your parents. Be open about the issues that you are facing, but only to the people you confide in. For example, your parents, siblings, guardians, teachers or counselors and be of great help.
• Avoid excessive interaction with strangers.
• Avoid staying late in the night. Follow a routine of sleeping early and waking up early.
• Do not indulge in drugs or any other random negative activities.
• Do not strike such friendships, which waste your time and take you away from your goal.
• Seek positive motivation and support your dreams by believing in them.
• Hard work is the key to channelize your adolescence energy in positive energy.
• Establish clear boundaries in your life. Make sure that no one crosses them and protect your life against all sorts of negative things.
• Talk about your challenges. Be very clear, assertive and effective in the communication.
• If someone has been bullying you or troubling you, report about the same to the concerned people. Do not suffer in silence.
• Avoid your sexual fantasies. Focus on meditation and work towards your studies for the competitive examinations.
• Divide your time wisely plan your each day in the favor of your dreams.
• Be calm and do not be hypersensitive about anything.
• Always focus on solving problems rather than crying over them.
• Focus on developing good habits. Avoid being with people or being in situation, which may entice you to develop bad habits.
• Do not be over dependent on people emotionally. Seek emotional help and support only from family and close friends, who are trustworthy.
• Always remember that all the problems in adolescence are not permanent and they will disappear with time. You just have to have faith and keep working towards your goal.
Always remember that adolescence age is just a phase. You do not have to suffer through it all your life. Hence, it is also a time that ends, just like your childhood. The only thing is that it is one of the most important times of your life in terms of shaping up your career. This is the time when you take the most important decisions about your life and career and work towards fulfilling them. Therefore, you don’t have to be afraid of this phase but you also don’t have to take it very easy. It is one of the most significant times, which should be utilized very well and handled nicely.
All the physical transformations, all the pimples on your face and change of blood flow in your body are just a part of a temporary phase, causing permanent transformation. Your area of focus should be to use all the right methods, which take you to the next level and accomplish your dreams. Rest everything can be managed on its own. If you are not able to handle the same, seek help rather than wasting your time. You cannot afford to do trial and error at this very delicate phase of your life.
Handling Adolescence Challenges in Competitive Examination Aspirants: Suggestions for Parents & Counselors
When a student is passing through the slow, long and challenging phase of adolescence, that too when that student is aspiring to appear in national level competitive examinations, it is a challenge. And, the challenge is not just for that student, but also for his/her counselors and parents. When the student undergoes the given challenges, he or she also becomes the responsibility of their parents as well the teachers and counselors guiding them in their career, life and studies.
The community of parents, teachers and guides should come together and understand that adolescent age is difficult to handle for every individual. Hence, it is normal to see difference in the behavior of the students. The distractions will also be common amongst them. One has to realize it for the fact that students undergo through following challenges when they pass through the adolescent age:
• Physical changes: acne, periods in girls, hormonal changes and growth related changes.
• Emotional changes: Stress, emotional vulnerability increases, reactionary attitude is quite common etc.
• Behavioral changes: Angry behavior, hyperactive behavior, and high energy in expressing themselves or lack of confidence.
Based on these changes, most of the students encounter issues related to drug abuse, indulgence in consuming substance, which leads them to temporary relief. The cases of misbehavior with elders and peers also increase. Also, the adolescent kids end up in a mess most of the times because they do not think realistic and end up planning things in a very haphazard manner. At this age, almost every kid is confused and does not know about clarity of life. Hence, they are easily distracted a deviated. There are some of the students, who follow instructions of their guides and teachers. Hence, there are chances that they will end up on the right path. On the other hand, there are some of the students, who do not take any suggestions or guidance from experts. Rather, they focus on finding their own enigmatic and dreamy ways of living life. This often takes them away from reality and lands them up in big mess. These issues are challenging and cannot be handled as long as the parents, guides and counselors are not patient enough to understand the behavioral complexities one is dealing with.
Students face challenges in deciding on the strategies for their success and sticking to them. Nowadays, they have access to a lot of entertainment options that their interest level has already gone down. With the arrival of personal entertainment devices in the form of smartphones, bombardment of social media websites and application, it is very common for the students to stay distracted. This continuous distraction leads them to choosing negative paths in life. They end up ruining their career and wasting the most important time of their life.
To handle these issues, the parents, guides and teachers have to understand their role in dealing with their entire situation in a systematic manner. Here are a few ways through which these key people help an adolescent entrance examinations aspirant to be on the right path:
• Pay attention on the behavior changes of the kid. Keep a note of all the activities to plan accordingly.
• Read more about the adolescent age, behavior, and emotional and physical changes to be prepared to help the students.
• Keep an eye on the content the kid is consuming as the content has a lot of impact on an adolescent mind.
• Guide the student through the right path.
• Be patient with the student as guidance and installation of right approach is a time taking process.
• Help your kid to engage in outdoor recreational activity rather than being surrounded by gadgets.
• Be the personal counselor of your kid. Listen to their problems carefully and try to help them through the process.
• Encourage and motivate the students. You can make them believe in themselves.
• Encourage the kids to participate in creative things so that their life can be routed towards positive direction.
• Spend time with the students, guide them, express your love to them and try to understand their point of you.
• As parents or guides of adolescent age students, you have to be very empathetic and patient. The kids struggling with challenges of this age may be very difficult to handle sometimes. Hence, it is significant for you to understand your role and work accordingly.
• Take them to psychologists or psychiatrists if need be.
Awareness a Competitive Examination Aspirant Must Have:
Apart from having examination related knowledge for the competitive exams, you have many more responsibilities as an aspirant. You need to have awareness about various other things, which are going to make you a winner. Always keep this in mind that competitive examinations are very demanding and they require your complete attention and dedication. You have to know that each of your abilities are tested against difficult and different examinations. Without being prepared to knock them all down, you may lose the chance of becoming the winner.
There are hundred thousands of aspirants, fighting for limited seats of entrance examinations. Then what are the factors, which make the winners the winners and losers the losers? You need to have understanding of the same things to become amongst the winners. Apart from having a brilliant mind and serious study under strict discipline, you also will have to change your overall lifestyle and habits. You will have to adopt the habits of successful people and start behaving like them. This will empower you to grow further and never look back in your life. Here are a few things, which a competitive examination aspirant must be aware of:
• The competition is ruthless but you stand the equal chance to win the game.
• Your mind, your body and your heart together are going to help in achieving you success. Use them in coordination.
• Time management is the key. The student, who can manage his time well in studying the right subjects, will ace the examinations.
• Consistency is very important to ensure that nothing is left behind when you are preparing for exams. Loopholes in the preparation process, may cost you your selection.
• Your thought process should be in sync towards growth of your candidature for the entrance examination seats.
• Right guidance is very important. Hence, you should choose the best mentors and stay away from negative people.
• A healthy mind and a healthy body together form the right candidature for success. You should focus on your overall health, inside out.
• There are hundred thousands of students, who are fighting for the same seat that you are fighting for. Hence to win, your performance and your dedicated hard work is the key to get successful. You should prepare accordingly.
• Do not lose faith in yourself. Do not give in to difficulties that easily.
• Do not be afraid and choose negative path. Seek for help in case you are stuck amongst any difficult situation.
• Daydreaming about success seems very interesting specially when you are preparing for these exams. But, you have to stop daydreaming and start working.
• You will have to keep a stronghold on your hormones and control physical attraction. If you indulge in physical relations, you end up wasting a lot of time and energy. It also wastes a lot of time also.
• The preparation time is limited hence the struggle is limited. Therefore, you should focus on giving your best in that time and cut down on rest of the distractions.
What Guides Have to Say?
Guides, experts, competitive examination trainers and mentors, who have dedicated their lifetime in building foundation for doctors, engineers and administrative professionals, share their experience and knowledge with the students. They, from time to time, keep sharing the key points with the students and help them through the process.
As per these experts, students, who win the race, are no different than the ones who don’t, in terms of mind’s ability and learning capabilities. Rather, they are equal in terms of potential. The difference arises the way they utilize their potential. The winners use the potential to the optimum level, whereas, the losers often miss out on doing that. They end up becoming victim to little distractions, negative emotions, silly attractions and a lot more.
Experts suggest that being successful in the competitive examination depends on the consistency in the studies, studying the right content, cutting down the distractions, eating properly and exercising. Your brain and body should be healthy to help you win any kind of race. Just in case you miss out on your health, you may miss out on the greatest of opportunities.
The trainers in the field of competitive examinations share that one should learn to develop a strategy to handle difficult subjects, rather than running away from them. In the same way, they should also ensure that they are not wasting their entire time being stubborn against one topic, which is their weakness. It is a good idea to convert your weakness into your strength, but at the same time, it is even smarter to choose to strengthen the subjects that you are already good in. It will help you grow beyond the expectations. If you work on strong subjects in optimum way, you will turn stronger and will be able to spare time to work on the weak ones also. It is all about keeping your motivation level up, lifting your spirits up and chasing the dream until you achieve it.
What Successful Students Have to Say?
The students, who have aced entrance examinations and received colleges of their choice, have various key points to share. They talk about their own experiences, their life-story and the points, which help them become successful. For each and every successful student, there may be different strategies, but here are some common points, which emerge as the common ground of forming brilliant and successful students:
• Self discipline
• Self motivation
• Self mentoring
• Hard work
• Consistency and persistence
• Continuity
• Systematic planning and action
• Right eating habits
• Effective time management
• Honesty with self
• Passion
• Visionary attitude
There is no option of honesty and hard work. If you think you can win wars with life without being dedicated and passionate, you may end up facing the adverse of the same for sure. All the students are able enough to achieve what they dream of, but they will be able to do the same, if only they are dedicated, disciplined and working hard to do the same.
Conclusion:
To conclude, it can be said that you transform your life and become successful if only you bring about a lot of lifestyle changes. It includes changing your thought process, the way you lead your life, what you eat and how you divide your time towards your day-to-day activities. It is not an easy process and requires a lot of efforts. However, all these efforts are going to be totally worth it once you achieve the desired results.
You will not be able to do it alone but you will have to put the maximum efforts. The support that you will be requiring is from your teachers, guides, mentors and parents. Their support, understanding, motivation and support will keep you going. But, at the same time, you will have to be self-inspired and ready to take on the challenges that come your way.
Adolescence may be one challenge, but it is something, which can be handled if you are smart and intelligent enough, you will rather focus on the behavior, attitudes and means that counter the negative effects of this age. You will be able to utilize the energy and positive manner and that’s what winners do. To channelize your energy, you will have to synch your mind, body and heart to perform in a excellent way.
People have always been finding a way out towards the success. Having a desire to achieve success is basically a part of human nature. That is why struggling for a successful life is a matter associated to each mankind. All of us are well familiar with a popular saying “survival of the fittest” and in fact, the concept of survival and struggle for a successful life are closely associated to each other. But a lot of questions may arise that what are the parameters of the success? Every person has the ability to get success according to his own choice and right according to his desire? Is there any hard and fast rule to be successful? Struggle is for a limited time period or it is the phenomena that is part of our life until we get died? These are a few but, list of such questions is very extensive.
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