I had rather very unorthodox methods of studying and an attitude to schooling at all levels from grade school right through to university postgrad. Thankfully I wasnu2019t born in the West or theyu2019d have medicated the shit out of a kid like me!While intending neither disrespect nor any sense of phony modesty (which I simply canu2019t stand), these below may be of limited utility to others. Read on if you are curious anyway. Or careless.The results though delivered for the most part.I ranked as the top student in my class (~ 50u201360 students) for all school grades #2u201310 except for one year. I developed a ruthless appetite and determination to win from an early age, even as a little boy. Winning gets very addictive, itu2019s like a drug once youu2019ve had a taste of it and I was very bitter about losing which persists to this day.Then went on to medical school where for two out of three years I ranked #1 among all five schools in the district/county.A bulls-eye 2400/2400 score on the GRE together with my academic record got me offers of fellowships for Ph.D programs by several prestigious U.S. universities including two Ivy Leagues.I chose one of those two (Pennu2019s School of Medicine) where I studied and researched molecular biophysics. After a hard first semester where my GPA was barely 3.0, I quickly picked pace and aced all of my courses after that.Took the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) exam and aced all of the six sections.My last academic stint was a full-time MBA in finance completed three years ago at the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill). My grades were decidedly poor and I graduated at the bottom 5% of my MBA class. The irony of slaying it in arguably the hardest of all professional schools (medical) and then at the very bottom of the barrel in arguably the easiest of them (business).Okay, now for the way I studied.I wasnu2019t fond of classroom teaching. At all.This was right since I was a child. It wasnu2019t like my teachers were terrible or something, the majority of them at my Jesuit school were both competent and caring. The fault lay within me, how I just cannot focus for more than 15u201320 minutes at a stretch. My attention then starts to wander, I start doodling and all of that. So right the first time when I was able to skip lectures, I started doing it (med school).Donu2019t try it, it wonu2019t work for most. My professor of physiology had said as much in med school while I was skipping yet another lecture and studying by myself in the library. How in the telling by my classmates heu2019d said to the full class of some 100 studentsu201cI know Lobo isnu2019t here in the class, heu2019s sitting somewhere reading on his own. But please, donu2019t try to do what is he doing. You donu2019t understand that he will skip all of these lectures and still ace the exam. But if you try the same, you will flunk out.u201dHe wasnu2019t exaggerating really, I ranked first among all schools that year. My teachers have rarely liked me but I am deeply thankful that they have invariably respected me and a few like him understood me, that I was not skipping class out of disrespect.I started to memorize unusually large amounts of information.I got tired of messing around with this notebook, that list of u2018likely questionsu2024 and what not. Then confused and annoyed in equal parts, I said to myself u201cIu2019ll just memorize the entire textbook end-to-end. Really, why run around drinking from all these multiple small streams when you can just go to the source and gulp down the river supplying them?u201dOnce again, I would be wary of trying it. This was a classic and rather fortuitous case of being able to achieve something others think is near-impossible because youu2019re just too u201cfucking dumbu201d to realize that it canu2019t be done.To say that it was laborious would be an understatement of some proportions! Really, It took me two years of painful repetition to build my ability to memorize entire chapters and textbooks. Iu2019d memorize one sentence, then two, then repeat both, then repeat the paragraph, then the page and so on. You get the idea, it was very slow at the start. But I got very good at it after several thousands of hours of doing it over a couple of years and then it proved to be an enormous advantage. You spend that amount of time and youu2019ll master anything.The irony was that the two subjects which I excelled the most at - math and physics- were also the ones where memorization has little use. But that laborious experiment of excruciatingly developing a prodigious memory still pays off right to this day because its not like I read much more than other voracious readers, its that I retain vastly larger amounts. It gives the illusion that I read much more. I donu2019t, it is that what I see or read sticks like second nature. Itu2019s a gift that keeps giving.I was focused like you simply will not believe.The first two points might give off the impression that I was doing all of this effortlessly. Hardly. I was so single-minded that it manifested as hostility to any disturbance or distraction while I was studying. It was well known in my family that you did not want to visit or call upon me when I was at work. I would either dismiss you or get angry. Nobody was exempt, not even my closest ones.My closest friend still remembers how he came to see me one evening, I half opened the door and said u201cIu2019m busy. Go away now and come another time.u201d Then shut the door. I didnu2019t even do it out of spite, it was just routine. How that level of intensity I had was arguably unhealthy to the point that my parents took me to child psychologist to actually get me to turn it down because they feared that I would crash and burn.I didnu2019t dial down the intensity and I did not crash.Everything by the clock.I used to speak to my mother of it as being the u201ctyranny of my watchu201d. I had a time table that controlled every hour of the day, planned every week to the minutest detail. It resulted in a lot of heartburn because you obviously cannot control everything! But I kept at it anyway correctly assessing that if I even hit 80% of my time targets, I would lick the objective.Once again my routine was very unorthodox. The best time of the day for my study was morning. And I donu2019t mean 7 or 8 am. As a school boy I generally woke up at around 5 a.m. But in med school it got to starting at 2 or 3 am during the most intense periods like the couple of months before exams.(Edit: Based on some comments here already, folks seem to be getting the impression that Iu2019m saying I woke up at 2 everyday. That would be batshit crazy. I was unconventional, but not a freak. No. As Iu2019ve qualified it, this was reserved for the most intense periods).But during those last 6u20138 weeks before the big finals, I would get back from school at around 6, then eat dinner right then even earlier than a retiree and go to bed by 8 p.m. Wake up at around 2 or 3 a.m. and then go at it until 8 a.m. 25u201330 minutes at a time, then a five minute break, then resume and so on.Revise, revise, revise.All of the stuff Iu2019ve mentioned until now would be largely useless to most reading it but this one is an exception.I found that rapid reinforcement was very powerful. What I mean by that is whatever you study on weekdays, revise it first on that weekend. Then revise everything done on the three previous weekends on the last weekend of the month. It sticks like glue. Otherwise it wonu2019t matter much what you study if you then donu2019t touch it at all for weeks or even months, you wonu2019t retain much. And focus less on trying to do it all the first time, instead of just trying to finish the beast with one strike, it is much more effective to take several swipes at it at intervals.I know that many reading this probably think that for whatever interesting value, these u201ctechniquesu201d which I used wonu2019t be very replicable or useful. And they would be right.But with all due respect, I didnu2019t go asking anyone on how to do any of the above.And while I can explain even complex concepts elegantly, a man like me makes for a poor teacher due to lack of patience and a virtual inability to empathize or identify with the methods (and hence difficulties associated ) of others.My clueless stupid response used to be u201cWhy just not memorize all those pages?u2024 And what do you mean you canu2019t go on four to five hours of sleep or wake at 3 a.m.?u2024 I did it, and you can and will!u201dAnd I was not above psychologically demoralizing my opponents. In fact I relished in it. It was amusing to me to mess with their heads.I would freely hand them all of my carefully made notes in a sense as to say u201cHere you can have them. Then know that Iu2019ll beat you anyway.u201d In a world where everyone fiercely guarded their shit, this motherfucker openly giving away his stuff was an expression of such arrogance as to baffle them to the point of intimidation.Then to turn up an hour before the exam and do nothing as my competitors were cramming like mad. Walk up to them and ask if they wanted to get a coffee. Itu2019s not nice to watch your opponent look so free as to be plainly bored all while youu2019re sweating bullets in those last minutes.During the finals in the second year of med school one kid from another school said to a friend of mine u201cThis guy fools around so much, heu2019s going to fail.u201dMy buddy had laughed and said to him u201cHeu2019s going to rank first. He did it the last time. And when it happens remember that you heard it from me here first.u201d I did rank first and it was featured in the local paper.From an early stage in life I realized that I was unconventional in more ways than one, how I would have to explore, discover and then forge my own methods.And as quirky or even crazy as my methods might be to many, they worked. For me at least.
