I Failed to Get into Medical School, and That Changed My Life.

How A Year of Discipline Accelerated My Growth by Five.

2019: The Year I Thought My Life Was Over

You know that quiet girl in class—the one who never fit in, always buried in books, excelling in exams, but invisible outside of them?

That was me.

I wasn’t the girl people invited to parties. I wasn’t the one with the biggest friend group. But I was the one people turned to when exam season hit.

The combination of my love for science and human behavior, my solitude, and the immense societal pressure in my country to pursue medicine led me to choose empirical sciences in high school.

I was determined to become a doctor.

I thought that if I worked hard enough—if I gave up everything else—I’d make it.

And then, in the summer of 2019, my world shattered.

I opened my entrance exam results…

And I failed.

I remember that moment in painful clarity. The room spinning. The hollow feeling in my chest. The months of 5 AM study sessions, the sacrifices, the dreams—gone.

For weeks, I was a ghost. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t eat. My self-worth, my future—everything felt like it had collapsed.

And then, one night at 2 AM in August, my eight-year-old brother walked into my room. He saw me crying, sat beside me, and just hugged me without saying a word.

Something inside me shifted.

I wasn’t alone. And I had a choice.

Would I keep drowning in failure? Or would I rise?

That night, I picked up my journal and wrote something that would guide me for an entire year:

“One year from now, I will get into one of the best medical schools in the country.”

And I did.

But not in the way I expected.

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What’s YOUR Version of This?

Forget my story for a second. This is about you.

Right now, there’s something in your life you know you want to accomplish.

You’ve tried. You’ve put in effort. Maybe you’ve even obsessed over it.

And yet—you’re still not there.

Maybe it’s:

• Building a business that actually takes off.

• Breaking through in your career.

• Becoming the kind of person you know you can be.

Whatever it is—you feel stuck. Like there’s a wall between you and the life you want.

That’s exactly where I was in 2019.

And what I learned that year is the same thing that can get you closer to where you want to be now.

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The Hard Truth About Why You’re feeling Stuck

There are three main reasons:

1. You’re using the wrong strategy.

   • Hard work alone won’t save you. If you’re working hard in the wrong way, you’re just reinforcing failure.

2. You’re not adapting fast enough.

   • Success isn’t about who’s smartest. It’s about who learns and adjusts the fastest.

3. You haven’t fully committed.

   • You think you have, but deep down, you’re holding back—out of fear, doubt, or excuses.

Once I understood these truths, a lot of things changed.

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How I Broke Through—And How You Can Too

I didn’t just pass the exam a year later—I ranked in the top 1% in my country.

Here’s what made the difference:

1. I Treated Every Setback as Data—Not Defeat

Most people move on from failures. I studied them.

For every struggle, I asked:

• What’s the real reason I’m stuck?

• What do the top 1% in this field do differently?

• How do I make sure I never get stuck here again? ( by categorizing my mistakes, finding the root cause, and taking action accordingly)

Mistakes weren’t obstacles anymore. They became my greatest teachers.

2. I Rebuilt My Life to Make Success Inevitable

• I exercised.

• I played the violin again.

• I spent weekends outdoors.

• I studied the highest performers and copied-then adapted their strategies.

The result? My energy increased, and I stopped feeling trapped.

3. I Became a Learning Sponge—The Right Way

In Hidden Potential, Adam Grant talks about how the most successful learners don’t just passively absorb knowledge—they test, challenge, and refine it constantly.

Instead of just consuming information, I treated every day like an experiment:

• What’s working?

• What’s slowing me down?

• What needs to change?

That one shift accelerated my growth by years.

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Now It’s Your Turn

There’s something you say you want.

But here’s the real question:

Are you willing to do what it actually takes?

Your challenge:

1. Write down the #1 goal you want to achieve—but haven’t.

2. Identify what’s actually stopping you. Be honest.

3. Decide on one action you’ll take today to move forward.

Drop your answers in the comments. Let’s break through—together.

Because the only difference between staying stuck and making it?

Is what you do next.