Mathematics is all about understanding concepts, practicing them on regular basis and relating them with real life incidences. As you practice various questions from your textbook or from any other resources, you come across questions with varied challenges. Your best friends are those problems which you are not able to solve easily.  If you solve a problem on your own in the first attempt, it’s good. It adds to your confidence and validates that whatever you know works in solving such problems. In the beginning you may need this. If you can solve all the problems without much difficulty, then you are just validating your knowledge. These problems are not helping you to expand your understanding of the concepts. You must look for other sources of questions because your brain is not getting challenged enough. A conceptual and non-tricky problem, which doesn’t get solved by you easily, helps you in many ways. As you try solving such problems in different ways, you deve...

  There are different ways of getting what you want. One way is obviously by developing merit to such a level that you deserve what you want and then get it. Another way is in which someone else gifts it to you. And yet another set of ways may be in which the desired object is obtained by using unfair means. In the beginning, it may look as if the ways other than developing merit are easier. It may look very nice if someone gifts you something that you need very much. Or by using unfair means and by taking help in unfair way from others you may obtain the desirable in somewhat easy way. But if you don’t have the required merit to get that you will feel uncomfortable holding that for long. You cannot target to develop yourself like that. And once again it’s matter of making one’s habit. If you develop the tendency of getting what you desire in easy way without deserving that, then you will get it once or twice. In the long run you will be the looser because of a wrong ...

  In the 1960's and then in the 1970's, an experiment was conducted at Stanford University, which is now famously called the  Marshmallow Experiment .    Quoting Wikipedia:  They presented four-year-olds with a marshmallow and told the children that they had two options: (1) ring a bell at any point to summon the experimenter and eat the marshmallow, or (2) wait until the experimenter returned about 15 minutes later, and earn two marshmallows instead. The message was: "small reward now, bigger reward later." Many kids gave in to the temptation and ate the marshmallow and others waited for 15 minutes and earned two. The kids that participated in the experiment were monitored for the rest of their lives (and in fact are being monitored even now) and it was found that the kids that did manage to wait for 15 minutes have been consistently doing better than the ones that didn't in almost all aspects of life.  Quoting Wikipedia again: The children w...

  Many students have the habit of making careless mistakes at the time when it matters most. They feel that it happens due to nervousness. But, you will notice people doing so even when they are confident, peaceful and in full control. If left unattended, it becomes a habit. It harms much more than making forced error. Kaumon (an imaginary name of a student) is brilliant in his studies, does smart study, understands concepts and is quick in applying them. His relatives, friends and he himself feel that he is a good candidate to excel in his studies and clear some of the toughest competitions  like IIT-JEE. While practicing at home or in his schools, he has been able to solve all the questions correctly. In the examination too he answers all the questions in time. But, when the results are declared, or when he compares his answers with correct answers, he finds that quite a few answers given by him are wrong due to carelessness in his part. It damages his prospects of e...