A snapshot of life during MS in the US :

• I arrived at Stony Brook from India early February 2021, right in the middle of the pandemic. Leaving a decent job in Banglore and the comfort of home, thanks to covid, I set a reminder in my phone to ring in March 2022 to glance if the experience has been good. Just a binary answer. Finally, when the reminder flashed up last week, I knew what the answer was.
• I had opted for to pursue a MS degree with simple aspirations of academia and a job. Well, after just a week, I understood that my expectations were wholly unrealistic, because MS was not just studies or research. I was in for learning of a manner of living.
• Though managing assignments and projects was difficult at first, tackling the sense of remoteness was even more difficult. Little did I realise how emotionally taxing it would be to be in a different country away from home. It took a conscious and continual effort to remain at peace in the midst of the quietness and ongoing competition. This is where discipline became a crucial habit for handling self-awareness and growth. In the summers, I decided to follow a proven approach and stick to an eating plan and exercise on a daily basis . After three months of an intense schedule, I not only lost 38 pounds but found a mean to effectively uplift my beliefs. For the first time in months, I had control and the vitality was insane.
• Pushed to the limit, I began to look into ways to better organise my time and be more productive. What better way to learn than from geniuses? I began reading biographies of world-class performers such as Phil Knight (The Shoe Dog), Andre Agassi (Open), and Naval Ravikant (Naval Ravikant) (The Almanac of Naval Ravikant). I also started aggressively following the podcasts by Tim Ferris and his book , Tools of Titans: The Tactics, Routines, and Habits of Billionaires, Icons, and World-Class Performers. As the name suggests, it’s a self-help book allowing you to look into the beliefs of 101 highly successful people of our times like Reid Hoffman, Jamie Fox, and Peter Thiel with the foreword written by Arnold Schwarzenegger. You can read the complete foreword here — https://tim.blog/2016/11/07/tools-of-titans-foreword-arnold-schwarzenegger-i-am-not-a-self-made-man/. Soon after, I began applying Naval Ravikant’s theory to nearly everything:— “All the benefits in life come from compound interest — relationship, money, habits — anything of importance.”.
• My first class in the university was by Prof. Anshul Gandhi teaching Probability and Statistics Course. He didn’t dive straight into the arithmetic since it was the first lecture of the session. He did something much more interesting instead. Considering that we are paying about $3000 USD for his course, which has around 30 lectures per semester, he said that each lecture is worth $100, and it is our responsibility to get as much out of his 60-minute talk. This stunning realisation set the tone for the rest of my stay at university. Before coming to MS, I had heard that it is a fast-paced program where most students would want to skip heavy courses and focus solely on gaining internships and full-time positions. But I was fortunate to be surrounded by a group of colleagues that pushed me to learn, and as a result, I was able to take some terrific courses here. In the end, I feel satisfied that I tried to learn from the best people which tremendously changed my view about education in general.
• Being from India, I quickly realised that social life in the United States is not as excellent as it is in India, or at least not as easy to establish. There were folks who pushed me technically, but there were also people who kept me spiritually intact. Another undervalued ability that you will gain once you arrive here is networking. It’s crucial to surround yourself with positive people, but it’s far more important to avoid situations that weigh you down. The most crucial aspect of internships and full-time jobs follows next. Practice is the only way to get better at this. It’s easy to become stressed in this highly competitive workplace. Nevertheless, it is only a part of the process.
• The location is the most remarkable aspect of MS in the United States. Stony Brook is a town on Long Island in the state of New York. And when it comes to New York City, you can never go wrong. Mumbai is the closest comparable city I can think of. It never lets you sleep. The fact that NYC exists is magic in itself. I believe everyone should visit NYC at least once just to experience the spirit that makes it the greatest city on the earth. Read The Power Broker if you want to learn about the city and its people. It’s a biography of Robert Moses, once known as New York’s most powerful man who literally shaped the city.

It’s been almost a year, and there hasn’t been a single day that I haven’t sensed a change in myself. My beliefs have been challenged, my choices have been challenged and my confidence has taken multiple brutal hits before leveling up. It’s been hard but it’s all worth it!