7 days to go!!!

Ok here it comes...I have only 7 more days for my D-Day...am already feeling bored with my preps :)...I just keep myself motivated by reading success stories from forums, blogs etc...

I recently took a Kaplan test and was shocked to see 6 SC mistakes..I know its a wrong time to witness so many mistakes but most were careless though...hope I dont do this on the D-Day...God help me here...I realized that more than your 'hard work', 'Luck' plays an important role...Hard work was from my part and I guess I have given justice to that...so hope i have my luck with me on the D-Day...but history witnesses myself being an unlucky guy :(...God help me here as well :)...

Also, I have not started with AWA...so this week would be spent on taking few tests, working on AWA essay formats and practice them, analyzing few quants concepts, glancing through the flash cards and more importantly relaxing(Couple of Lionel Messi's matches would help me here)...

On Sunday am planning to visit my GMAT test center with my Friend...Also, planned to go for a movie just to relax...and have listed out few things to buy before the D-Day...one of them will be Gatorade just to keep me charged up on the test day...ok thats it for now...Will keep you all posted with the result...Fingers crossed...

Did One week pass by already?

I cannot believe if a week has 7 days, a day has 24 hours, a hour has 60 minutes and a minute has 60 seconds :-)...I somehow feel last week passed in one blink of my eye...am witnessing time running past me..

Not sure if it is a good or bad sign..but definitely bad in one way..am lagging behind my so called 'Ultimate plan' by one day...yeah i named my last three weeks plan as 'Ultimate Plan' :-)..

I cannot see the reason because of a unrealistic plan..it is very well achievable with limited hours per day concentrating on 'Quality' and not on 'Quantity'..Maybe i want to blame it on my mind getting distracted or rather wanted to spend some time with friends which I did almost the whole day yesterday(with GMAT always lingering in back of my head posing questions such as - (1) am i doing justice to myself (2) Is this time really worth spent etc..) ...

anyways keeping the past aside will try to cover up my one day..with GMAT nearing very fast this might be my last post before GMAT..all the best for my fellow bloggers who have their test before my gmat date(i guess not many are there)...

CONFIRMATION OF GMAT APPOINTMENT

Yep that's right. I have scheduled my GMAT for July 7th.

The recent Princeton test gave me a 670 with M(47) and V(36). I was pondering over 'what could be the reason for a drop in the score from my GMAT prep 720(a week back) to Princeton 670'.

Couple of reasons I could think of,
(1) Princeton not reflecting the exact scoring standard as that of GMAT prep
(2) me sometimes loosing focus from the GMAT - result - not 100% goes in my preparation.

However, I know the first point above is just a lame excuse for a low score. The real reason may also be that my preparations trying to kick the bucket without any target in mind. So, just as few of my fellow blogger's have done I also decided to have a D-day. I like to live my life a quarter mile at a time :-). So till my D-day everything on my way that affects my GMAT prep routine would be sacrificed for(Few exceptions though).

With July 7th being the D-day, I would have 21 days(3 weeks) solid from today (Two days taken of the actual count of days - reason later). I would sit and carve out a comprehensive plan that would cover till the 'last but one' day.

Also, only thing I would try to guarantee is 100% of my efforts goes in and don't worry about the result whatever i might be. However, am still visualizing myself getting a 740 :-)

and yeah once GMAT is taken, I could watch some of Argentina's and Messi's matches without anything on back of my mind.

What a weekend

I had to go out of town this Friday for some personal reasons. I thought, would study more on Saturday (that's today) to even out for what happened on Friday, but what happened till now really disappointed me. Came back to town today morning around 6.

When I reached home, my brain and my mind were in complete dissonance but finally my body obeyed my brain to go for sleep. With no breakfast, after some sports and business updates I just hit the bed. I woke up to have lunch and hit the bed again - yeah that's true I was completely tired and lack of sleep. Evening - went out with my friend. Just back home sitting in front of my laptop thinking 'what a productive weekend it had been till now' - '0' hours of GMAT for 2 complete days. Wow is this going to land you in top B school. No way. Have to get back to my preps now.

And don't worry about this post. I just wanted a place to vent out what my mind had. so this is it. Now am little relaxed. Could concentrate and study better if at all i do it today.

my first gmat prep

well i should say my first gmatprep score did came in as a surprise. with one month of prep in hand i expected any score above 680 and following that to contrive a way to reach 740+ levels.

i would say LSAT CR's and RC's did really help me. even though sometimes i still hit only 60% success rate in LSAT exercises i strongly believe it really helped me in improving my reasoning and reading skills. also working on the complex and wordy lsat problems made the work easier in gmat..

the scores did really boosted my confidence levels. am really happy for a gain of 120 points from my first powerprep score on April last week. I would try hitting the upper circuit now. btw am aware that improving a score of 720 to 740+ levels is more tougher than improving a score from 600 to 720. It reminds me of 'Do it Nothing is easier'. fingers crossed.

GMATprep 1 split
Quants - 47 this was a real surprise - since i didnt start my quants prep till now :-)
verbal - 41
agg - 720
I guess this is the first time in any test i made less mistakes in verbal compared to quants.

Reliance Dhirubhai Fellowship

Quick update before i hit the bed. yeah as the title says completed with the Reliance Dhirubhai Fellowship application. I know its a last minute submission. Somehow this habit of mine is not been changed. I guess may be a B school of my dream would change it or the process of B school application would change it. But do i really want to change it??? its fun working on a deadline on the last day of it :)...

anyway about the gmat preps - was working on some CR and RC lsat problems today. I see the main problem with me is the concentration. If i have it completely with me sometimes the success rate hits 100% - thats true. have to work on improving the concentration stuff..

also something happened with my blog today, was not able to access it. it showed no blog was found at this address or something..i guess something got changed in the settings..now it seems to be fine after some tuning...

thats it for now..happy on completion of the Stanford GSB scholarship application..ciao later.bfn.

The Blog Tool

I was searching this link to find if any widgets would be of use to me and my blog readers. I found this 'Feed Scroll Bar' to be of interest. This could show some really cool B-School or GMAT or other business related information at a single place. I/we might come across really important info which we cannot afford to miss at any cost.

Quick update on GMAT prep - As expected, this weekend witnessed a dull lackluster gmat prep from me. Reason - same as was given. I guess its always 'now is the right time'. so let me watch 'how much of me is making use of the now':). ciya soon.

whats troubling me?

Today Ive been having this sick feeling which keeps returning back, irrespective of whatever i do to get rid of it. but whats troubling me? - have no idea. thought a movie would make me better. but i don't think that also did its job. Result - fell short of my study plan for today, no gym(ended up just working abs in home), no proper food. I guess I should go back to sleep soon to make a better tomorrow.
Also, I had this nice 'high profile plan' for the week(from last Monday till coming Monday) to boost up CR, RC and SC success rates. The plan includes some assignments from kap800 and LSAT. But today being Friday and if i see the progress, I goto my mirror and start shouting/laughing at me. I have hardly covered 50% of the plan.
Also, unlike others(i guess) I study more on weekdays rather on weekends. Because I loose 4-5 hours each day on weekend in playing and tiredness as a result of it. So dont know how much of the plan would be covered. Anyway lets see how it goes till Monday, because I have my much awaited GMAT prep coming on Tuesday - yes June 1st - start of the month. fingers crossed.
Ah and yes not yet completed my 'Reliance Dhirubhai Fellowship Program application'. Have to spend sometime tomorrow to complete the same. Cant drag it till the last day.

New is good

I guess the old blogger template i had was taken from free website. The pictures in the blog got moved or deleted. It gave me just the text with no background pictures. So, I had to change the template and here it is.

This looks better than the previous. Exactly the same feeling i had when i changed the template to the older one from the default. That's because our human mind likes anything new? maybe. Or is it only for me? maybe :).

Anyways, New is always good. keeping the same thought am diving into the preps, which can give me a 'new' life(MBA) . I hardly did any preparations today. too bad. am afraid am loosing focus. No i shouldn't. Getting back to studies. bfn.

Is it getting tougher every day

My one week comprehensive plan to attack CR, SC(95 % accuracy) and RC (attain consistency) was completed yesterday. What I should really say is its getting tougher day by day. I also started to fall in love with my GMAT (Only way to give your 100%) though I realized it little late. yeah i know better late than never :-).

Am totally out of touch with Quants since the focus is completely on verbal to maximize my score there. The reasons being, me basically strong in quants and week in verbal grammar. I hope the prep has given advantage in verbal. This would be proved tommorrow since am planning to take a GMAT prep(after so much deliberation).

Plan for next week would be laid out today evening. Again the focus would be on verbal trying to solve more complex questions. Maybe Kaplan 800 would help me here. Lets wait and watch.

Yeah and BTW I have this long shot picture of a student reading a book under a tree in NorthWestern University with student communities bicycle in the background. It really helps me when my mind tries to loose focus :-)

Long way to go...

GMAT timer that I downloaded really did improve my timing for the verbal section. It’s a nice app to keep track of your pace.
However I noticed that my success rate reduced with the addition of timer. One of the reasons could be I was more conscious about finishing every question within 1 min 50 seconds benchmark?
I guess more time based practice would help me with both accuracy and adherence to time
For Day 13(May 12) Completed with verbal sets 9, 10 and analyzed. Was surprised to see more wrong answers in SC (mostly silly mistakes).
Also, once I have reached 95% success rate in both CR and SC, have to work on the RC. I sometimes see 50% error rate for RC. Not good at all. Long way to go and fingers crossed.

Day 12(May 11):

• Worked on Verbal set 7 and 8 – 7 analyzed, 8 yet to be
• Took GMAT prep but stopped after the quants section. The concentration was not 100 %. Will start it again some time soon to know my status
• Also have to work on my timing. I feel am working out 30-45 minutes late for the verbal sections.

Progress Till now

Day 1(April 26):

· Started with Princeton Review ‘Manual for the GMAT’ Completed till assignment 3

· Planning to complete the book tomorrow

Day 2(April 27):

· Princeton Review ‘Manual for the GMAT’ Completed till assignment 5

· I know its slow progress. Will complete the verbal tomorrow

· POWER PREP test – got 600. Analyzed the wrong answers

Day 3(April 28):

· Princeton Review ‘Manual for the GMAT’ completed all the assignments and the lessons related to verbal

· Worked 14 questions from Verbal Set 1 from system

· Worked 60 SC questions from OG11

Day 4(April 29):

· Completed remaining questions from Verbal Set1 and analyzed

· Completed Verbal Set 2 and analyzed

· Completed 12 questions from Verbal Set3

Day 5(April 30):

· Completed Verbal Set 4 and analyzed

May 01 and 02 – Break for my cousin’s marriage

Day 6(May 03):

· Worked out 21 questions from Verbal Set 5 – yet to analyze

· Planning to complete CR bible tomorrow since many answers go wrong in CR

· Also tired after the Marriage trip, so will sleep in sometime.

Day 7(May 04):

· Started with CR bible

· Great book with great information

· Completed some 85 pages

Day 8(May 05):

· Progressing with CR bible

· Am sure of CR performance improvement upon completion of this book – fingers crossed

· Completed 171 pages in this book

Day 9(May 06):

· Still progressing with CR bible (I know it’s very slow)

· I will be leaving to my Friends marriage tonight. Will ramp up the preps after coming back from it

· Completed till 234 pages (Assumption Questions – yet to be analyzed)

· Also planning to blog all the information – Larger audience (more brains more ideas)

May 07 and 08 – Break for my best friend’s marriage (Yeah I know 2 weeks two marriage :-), but cant afford to miss both )

Day 10(May 09):

· Completed the CR bible – Excellent book. Am sure it will help me see an improved CR score.

· Planning to start of with one GMAT prep test tomorrow, to see where I stand with ten days of preparation passing by. All I would need is concentration and focus to crack the test. God give me the power.

· Ok. One glance on the CR bible notes and am heading to bed.

Day 11(May 10):

· CR bible did help in the CR section.

· Worked on Verbal set 5 and 6 – analyzed.

· Don’t know why but scared to take the full length. I have to do it tomorrow for sure.

Walking thru my plan

This time it is serious stuff ..I sat one fine day to decide on my mba plans and how am going to achieve the same...till now i see good progress..am preparing for GMAT..yeah my real dream and passion(MBA)...i have a log of every day happenings from April 26th (day I started) till today, which i would be posting in my next blog..also to keep up with other MBA and GMAT enthusiasts around the world, am planning to request 'Beat the GMAT' to add my blog with their pre-mba link...have to find out the way to do that...
Also, I would keep this place to track down my progress in GMAT and for other shouts...Catch you soon...

What do i do?

Wishing you all a happy new year. Wishing everyone including me :-) for their dream to come true this year.

Regarding my previous blog plan.As usual this plan busted as well. not that this plan was a flop without any actions taken on it. This just didnt seem to be what I wanted. thats it. I know am going to be sitting and studying in my dream B-School someday. but when and how am going to make that - am really not aware of. am a strong believer of CANI - Continous and Never Ending Inprovement - 'Kaizen' as the Japanese call it. there is something in my mind which always says this is the stuff you have to believe in. for that I need to take control of my mind somehow and not let my mind control me. am just smiling thinking who instructed the previous statement to be written..anyway one of the option is pranayama (deep breathing) and books..lets wait and see..