I have a cutesy little sticker on my car’s dashboard that reads, “Just try your best, and everything will fall into place.” 

As silly as that sticker may be, it was a nice to read it again when I got back to my Xterra after taking my first precalculus exam. After all, I was convinced that I’d bombed that exam, given its difficulty and my “inability” to memorize even the shortest equations. But, I knew in my heart that I’d tried my absolute best on that test, and that’s all that mattered!

Fast forward to the next morning. I opened up my laptop to check my emails after getting ready for the day, and discovered that my precalculus exam grade had come back. I physically braced myself for the result as I clicked on the notification and instinctively let out a tremendous sigh of relief when I saw that I’d passed with a 77%! 

Turns out, even in stressful environments where no calculators or notes are allowed, I really can do math! 

The next day (Wednesday), the professor went over some statistics. The class average was 71%. Interestingly, I was one of the few “C” students in the class. Most people either got B’s and A’s or D’s and F’s. Upon reviewing the feedback I had on my test, I realized that I could’ve gotten a B or even an A, had I not made silly mistakes in my arithmetic (oh well… I still got partial credit for my work). Good news is, it’s easy to fix mistakes in basic arithmetic. The hard part is coping with my anxiety during a test, so I don’t get distracted and make silly mistakes. 

That, of course, leads me to wonder why I ever doubted myself in the first place. Why I spent the rest of the day after my test convincing myself and everyone else around me that I completely ate shit. Well… as much therapy as I’ve done and as much confidence I’ve gained, I still have a lot of work to do. A lot of work to do...