pressure
Growing up, I was lead to believe academically a B was as good as an F. Couple this with a fear of failure and you have a recipe for disaster.
Picture this:
You’re sitting a Math mock exam.
Things are going well until you get to the Calculus paper. And your mind goes blank.
For the next 30 minutes, you shift your focus between the questions in front of you and clock to the right.
Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.
There’s now five minutes separating you from an unsavoury conversation with your parents. But what can you do? Smuggle your failure outside, of course.
You grab your jacket, put it on top of your desk and make your Calculus paper disappear with sleight of hand Penn & Teller would be proud of.
You drive to a nearby forest and try setting your failure on fire. But you can’t get the match to light.
So you drop to your knees, dig a shallow grave, rip your paper to shreds and bury your failure.
Pressure.
Looking back, I’m glad I had this (hilarious) experience. It taught me that pressure never goes away. So don’t fight it.
Plan for it. Turn pressure into motivation to do your best and feed off it.
It will lead to success. Trust me — I got an A+ in the end-of-year exam.
“Mistakes and pressure are inevitable; the secret to getting past them is to stay calm.”