After failing the last two modules needed for my degree, I thought I’d have to “work” through 6 more months of agony. Then an opportunity was emailed to me. I was provided with the chance to write the module exams earlier (similar to having supplementary exams) seeing as I only needed two for the degree. Not entirely sure of what to expect, I googled what this would entail.

There was no doubt in my mind that I would take this opportunity – if I failed the re-writes I could still do the exam at the end of the 6 months and if I passed the re-writes then even better for me! And given that the re-writes were open book exams it made even more sense to at least try it. All logical to me really.

But…after reading some comments I was surprised to read that some people didn’t take up the opportunity and it really boggled my mind. Why would you not take it? Their reasoning didn’t make sense to me and I was and am still confused. There is no monetary implications; you have to study anyway and you could potentially finish earlier. The worst thing that could happen is that you fail…again. But then again, you could fail at the end of 6 months too. And yet, the people who didn’t make use of this opportunity obviously felt that they were making the right choices for themselves. They didn’t see this as an opportunity in the same way I did.

And who was I to judge?

In a way, the same thinking can be applied to all aspects of life and the opportunities it throws us. Either we can ignore them flatly and stay fixated on an end goal, not realising what we missed (and therefore not knowing any better) or we leap at the opportunity, not knowing what to expect; just knowing that it could be for the better and that at the very least we learnt something about ourselves, a process or even more about life.