Fail? What fail?

“There is no substitute for hard work.” As I see a poster of this quote by Thomas Edison hanging on the backdrop of my study table, I am forced to think of whether it actually stands true to its meaning. Recently, we all had to go through hell (aka EXAMS), for us mere mortals at least. Before they arrived, I had set my mind on one thing- that I will put in every bit of effort that I possibly can because if the input is strong, chances are that the rewards will be great. Among all the courses that I am taking this semester, Calculus is, hands down, my most difficult course. So, going with logic, I decided that it would make most sense if I started off with Calculus and then worked my way up the other subjects. Going through all the chapters one by one and taking a note of every little detail while clarifying my doubts took me a total of 5 days. I was math-saturated to the core. In fact, many of my friends confirmed the fact that I was approaching the stage of being titled clinically insane. Nonetheless, I was satisfied with all the effort that I put in. I kept telling myself that I have done my part by putting in all the hard work. I couldn’t care less about the result because I was so content with all of the calculus that I had learnt. As I confidently opened my exam paper, I was greeted with shock. In simpler terms, the questions got the better of me. They were not like the questions that came in the past exam papers. Nevertheless, I somehow managed to maintain a smile after coming out of the exam. The fact that I completely bombed the paper didn’t seem to have any effect on me. At the end of the day, what mattered to me was that I gave it my best shot. I feel that in college, failure will knock our doors every now and then. So whenever it does, keep this quote in mind: “You cannot tailor make your situation in life, but you can tailor make your attitudes to fit those situations.”