I’m finally done with my GMAT journey after 9 months, 17 mock tests, one retake, 310 hours, and $$$ spent. I got a 680 and eventually landed at a 710.
Shoutout to Scott from TTP for his inspirational videos! Inspired by his wisdom that many 750+ posts online are overinflated and out of reach for most, I'm here to offer some encouragement to those feeling down about their 650+ scores.
I started reviewing last January, and spent my first few weeks going through the OG guide lessons. I bought the OG books but mostly used them for the online access to question banks. My attention span has gone from reading a 300+ page book in a day to watching tiktoks at 2x speed, so I had a hard time retaining what I’d read. I’d instead rewrite all the lessons word for word, which honestly is kind of a waste of time but hey, you gotta do what you gotta do.
By around March, I stumbled across a few Reddit posts singing the praises of GMATNinja videos so I finished all SC and Quant playlists, and watched a few RC and CR videos here and there. I’d do the practice questions alongside and made sure I’d note pertinent items, like why I got certain things wrong.
I finally took my first take in July. I had already been averaging an hour of study a day (mostly 4-8 hour sessions on the weekends) while doing 10-12 hour work days and going to the gym 3x a week, which was only possible by heavily limiting other social activities. I took the last week before my exam off and did 2 mocks a day for 3 days, blocking off the day before my exam to relax and play GTA V (coincidentally, my Xbox broke down so I got really frustrated, which caused some anxiety).
On the day off, I thought I was ready since I had already studied 180 hours by then, and I even went to the exam site a week before to scope out the place, including checking the bathrooms and talking to the examiner to ask what I could/needed to bring. I did V-Q-I-A since my engineering background made math relaxing for me in comparison to Verbal. I thought I did okay in Verbal, but totally panicked and spaced in Quant. I ended up with a 680 (47Q, 36V, 7IR) which was really disappointing since my last few mocks were ranging from 710 to 740 (Q 50/51, V 37-40).
I was really heartbroken since I didn’t think I’d have to do a retake, and was a bit conflicted if I even wanted to since my safety school (in Canada)’s average was exactly a 680. I eventually decided to schedule a retake in September to give me a better chance for scholarships and for US schools.
I took the rest of July off to rest and recharge, and began fresh in August. I made a previous post about retaking and a lot of people suggested TTP, so despite the hefty price I subscribed to the monthly access and was diligently using it for an average of 3 hours a day. A back injury forced me to take a pause from the gym and my workload was relatively light, so that helped me study my ass off.
TTP helped a lot since I didn’t realize that I still had a lot of knowledge gaps. Having a study plan also made me study more systematically, so I was able to encounter a wider range of questions and have a set approach each time, versus before when I’d encounter a problem, learn how to solve that, then move on.
I realized though that aside from the missing knowledge base, I also had to fix my anxiety. I started seeing my therapist again and it definitely helped.
My mocks were slight improved, ranging from 720-760 (Q 50/51, V 40/41). Come test day, I mostly treated it like any other day. Instead of going for a comfy but dumpy outfit, I went for a cute fit like I was going to the mall; I also listened to my girlboss playlist, and these two things definitely helped boost my confidence. Whenever I felt a bit nervous, I’d tell myself it’s just a glorified mock practice, and that I was already happy with my 680. Both things weren’t true of course, but it definitely calmed my nerves.
During breaks, I’d go to the bathroom then pace around the hallway a bit to have my energy levels at the right level (not at fight or flight, but also not sluggish). The examiner didn’t notice me during my first break so 4 minutes were shaved off from my break, but I pushed that aside and it didn’t rattle me thankfully. I was sure I made a few Verbal mistakes, but surprisingly I didn’t encounter any Quant problems I didn’t know how to approach (thanks to Charles, Harry, and Bransen from GMATNinja and Scott from TTP!). I was a bit frazzled during my AWA since the keyboard was shitty and I had medium-length acrylic nails which made typing unnecessarily difficult. What saved me though is I had memorized the essay template from chineseburned so I didn’t need to think too hard, and that the major components to the big score were already done with.
All these boiled down to a 710 (Q48, V38, IR8). If I have to be honest, I’m still a little unsatisfied with this, but I don’t have it in me anymore to do another take haha. These 9 months have been grueling and I can’t justify putting myself through putting off outings with friends and family, not watching movies since those hours could be better spent studying, even making an errands list for after I take the exam for a chance of a 20-50 point increase when I could live with a 710.
It still hasn’t sunk in that I’m done, kind of like when your laptop’s lagging even after quitting your Chrome window with over 50 tabs, but I know I have apps to work on next. For tonight though, I’m binge-watching Bojack Horseman and hugging my cat a little tighter.
A few opinions I haven’t seen in other posts, or a few tips I think helped: - Half an hour a day is better than zero hours of studying. You really have to invest time into this, but you can do bite-size pieces if that helps you get moving - GMATNinja and TTP 👌🏻 - TTP access I think grants you GMATClub mocks access (never got a chance to try it out though) - The actual verbal questions differ ever so slightly from the mocks, even the OG ones, that it might sometimes throw you off - It helps when you get to a point that you go through so many questions that you understand what they’re trying to test (i.e. if that SC question is trying to see if you noticed that wrong modifier, or quant Qs that gave you 2 formulas to solve for 3 variables, which you’d think is insufficient unless you look at it in a different angle that makes it solvable) - Therapy helps, whether in the context of gmat or in general - You need to turn off your own intuition and learn to play the GMAT’s game, kind of like when Iron Man had his AI study Captain America’s fighting moves rather than using his own moves
That’s it. Here’s my semi-victory post. I hope to see more posts like mine so people don’t get too disillusioned by the “I got a 750+ after just two weeks of studying” posts here.
Edit: sorry for the word vomit. My therapist costs about $$$ an hour but ranting here was free.
Submitted by scarnovax | #Specialdealer Special Offer Online Shopping Store 2016
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