Neeltalks

There is always a certain moment in a man’s life when he realises that he can no longer merely be a boy, he can no longer relish in the pool of mediocrity and he can no longer be his current self. This defining moment in my life came in Dec 2021, when I decided to transform myself after an incident in my life. My goal became improving consistently through hard-work & dedication. I started to find different ways to do so, in terms of health, spirituality and in terms of my career and education. That’s when I decided I need to study for the GMAT and take my first step towards higher education. Little did I know what was in store for me!

One late night after having the last cigarette of my life, I gave the official mock test 1 and scored 440. I knew I had not studied for more than 1.5 years and I lacked the aptitude to score good but I was still sad about the result. Nevertheless, I decided to pursue this further and started preparing using Wizako’s online course. I studied everyday, took no breaks, not even sparing Sundays. Wizako’s course was good in quant but a disappointment in verbal and it also lacked any good practice material. I improved my score to 580 but it took me 5 months to do so. The preparation was based on collecting information from peers & Youtube, the entire 5 months lacked a coherent structure despite my attempt to design the prep plan flawlessly.

I have lost count of how many times I felt under confident in my GMAT journey, I was alone, battling something way out of my league. But the thing about underdogs is that they never ever give up. I always picked myself up and went at it again. I chose the e-gmat course and started studying again, unfortunately missed R1. Until now, I was working from home & stayed with my parents but due to WFO policy adopted by my firm, I had to return to Gurgaon to join my office back and with a heavy heart, I had to leave my family and emotional support behind and venture on an unknown path.

Life became a bit difficult. Managing work and gmat prep demanded a lot of hard-work & dedication. But despite giving my all and draining myself physically-emotionally, I was left with a mere 640( after scoring a 710 in official mock 2 days before test day). I was broken after looking at my screen. Fortunately, I was lucky enough to meet my parents the next day on eve of Diwali, leave Gurgaon and celebrate the festival with them. Next 2 months in my life were spent in getting a AWS certification, exploring a few places in North India and garnering the courage to give the GMAT again.

After consulting from my parents, I quit my job at the turn of 2023 to prepare solely for Gmat. However, my company offered me a sabbatical to study and then come back to join office, I accepted the offer and started studying. Those times were honestly hard and it made me slip into depression, where I would not eat for hours or not sleep properly for days. I was clueless, lonely & crippled in life. It became hard for me to believe that I could ever score a 700+ score in gmat or join a good business school. Once again, I got the chance to visit my parents and this time for 3 good months( sabbatical period).

Determined to get back on track and save myself from the downward spiral, I started working one day at a time, taking little baby steps. I started eating healthy again, studying daily and focusing on positive things. The 3 months were full of it’s ups and downs. I felt lost and woke up next day to study again. My family was there to support me but each day seemed as if I was further from my goal. I stuck to e-gmat’s plan, kept reading debriefs on Gmatclub to keep moving forward. I worked hard and scored a 680 this time despite better mock scores( 720 & 730). After scoring 680, I had to return to Gurgaon( back to office) the very same night. Ah, the tragedy of life.

I came to Gurgaon, and found things way more difficult than I imagined them to be. Every single day in the month of June was a different story, filled with unexpected events , hard-work and dedication. Still, I persevered, I kept moving forward. I kept pushing. And finally scored a 710. This is not a story of success or failure. This is a celebration of hard-work, honesty & discipline. A journey which transformed a boy into a Man, a journey which shaped his character & soul. More than anything, this is the story of an underdog who refused to give up & won!