These examinations are among the most competitive in the world, and the pressure around them has cost lives. A rank is a measure of one performance on one morning. It is not a measure of a person, and no seat is worth a life. This section says so more than once, on purpose.
These exams select a tiny number of candidates for a tiny number of seats. Failing to be among them says something about the number of seats, not about your intelligence, your worth or your future. Most successful people in every field, including engineering and medicine, did not get the rank they first wanted.
Repeating a year works for some students and damages others. Decide it when the result has stopped stinging, not in the first week; decide it with someone who knows you; and decide it on evidence — whether your mocks were improving — rather than on hope alone. Remember that JEE Advanced allows only two attempts in consecutive years.
Sleep that has broken down for weeks, eating far less or far more, no pleasure in anything at all, withdrawing from everyone, or thoughts that you would be better off gone. These are not weakness and not a lack of discipline. They are signals that you need help, exactly as a fever is.
Tele-MANAS, the national mental health helpline, is free and available in many languages at 14416 or 1-800-891-4416, at any hour. A school counsellor, a doctor or any adult you trust is also a legitimate first step. If you are in immediate danger, tell someone who is physically with you, now.
The pressure a child feels is usually far greater than the pressure you think you are applying. Ask about their day rather than their marks; say out loud, more than once, that you will be fine with them whatever the result. Students consistently report that this single sentence made the largest difference.
Private and state engineering colleges, BITS, IIITs, IISERs, NITs, foreign universities, design, research, the armed forces, or a different field entirely. A medical career can also begin abroad, through AYUSH, or through allied health, nursing, biotechnology or public health. The one path that is genuinely closed is the one where a student loses their health or their life to a competitive examination.
He keeps a Life & Wisdom library on the mind, on pressure and on studying without breaking — and nothing you type leaves your device.
Ask GuruAcharya Samayeshwar
