Definition from a singaporean friend: Striving to get full marks in everything is excellence. Beating the entire cohort flat. That is excellence.
Personally, if I have that sort of mindset, might as well I just go suicide since I would be crazy at the end, sacrificing social life and sleep just to achieve that since I would consider myself a slow-learner and need to put in more effort than the rest just to achieve that level. :(
If you do not know, certain people are just born smart. They have a very high level of understanding, eg: play a lot,skip lectures but in the end, still get high marks in exam cause he/she mug last minute (one day before exam).
How does that serve justice especially when you were to compare to someone who mug constantly, but didn't do well in exam? Does doing well in exam (eg beating the entire cohort, getting full marks) really set a benchmark for everything? Or does working consistently (beating ur own record ie yourself, but not the best in your cohort) is more meaningful? Well, sadly, I would say the world or rather the Singaporean society look at your results first. Results is everything in a Singaporean society.
Well, that's probably the Singaporean mentality. Make me wonder why I come to a place that is so competitive. That's another reason why I don't like to join people especially when they are mugging. Cause I would just be too stressed looking at the way they mug, which could lead to me under-performing.
Anyway, should be on a short hiatus since exam is nearing. Well, see whether I can improve my current CGPA. Just hope that my effort pays out since I did sacrifice part of my leisure/sleeping time just to study.
2 comments:
Excellence is the quality to surpass ordinary standards.. In S'pore that standard is very high and with the mentality of "I can always beat the guy next to me," it's no surprise that life is stressful over there..
To me, excellence is beating the bar u have set for yourself.. Because u and only u (apart from God) know your own limitations.. Don't compare yourself with others, compare yourself with your past self..
"Each one should test his own actions. Then he can take pride in himself, without comparing himself to somebody else" Galatians 6:4
Hey...I felt the same way like you too...I've been constantly mugging. but my results are not like superb than those who study like....last minute?? Sigh...And I'm a super slow learner too...Sob...Although I always wanted to find someone to study together, but now I realize that it's better to study alone...cause whenever I study with my NUS friends, I felt more stressed and in the end of the day, nothing really enters my brain...Sighhh....We jia you together ba.,..Btw, not the say the least, it seems inevitable to say that everyone cares about their grades...Sigh...to them, GRADES mean everything to them...sighhh...and we have to put ourselves into these kinda of crazy society cause if we don't, we will be pulled down by the bell curves that all these people created...
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