CPA Regulation Exam – Thoughts and Reflections

Here is my reflection after I finished my CPA Regulation exam about a year ago:

I started at around 1pm and got done a little after 4pm. How did I feel about it? Great! [;-)] It was tough but very passable. I got stuck on the very first question, so I had to regroup quickly. I made my educated “choice”, and moved on. I was about 5 minutes ahead of schedule after testlet one, 2 minutes behind schedule after testlet two, 15 minutes behind schedule after testlet three, 25 minutes behind schedule after testlet 4, so I had 20 minutes to do my last simulation [I had planned 35 minutes per testlet with 5 to spare]. All I can say is, I was able to do the communication, research, one of the three other tabs… and sort of scrape through two other tabs. I don’t think I have had a simulation that was that “long”. So, I am done for another 3 weeks, and hopefully, forever.

What was I up a month before the test?

Well, other than working, I was studying. It was hard to be motivated at times, but I finally got my act together and worked my tail off. This time around, I can say, even though I was not doing as well as I wanted to, I was much more calmer and confident when studying than I was before. I was joking with my GF the other day, that I don’t understand how I could be so calm and confident when I was not doing great in my practice exams. Would I rather suck and be calm, or be freaked out and acing stuff left and right? I would rather be calm and ace stuff left and right!

While studying and trying to be motivated, I tracked my efforts in many different places. Here are some of them:

• Nothing Gets Things Done Like Doing Them (at timesnowball.com)
• The Power of Less Challenge (you can create an account and then track your new habit(s) and report on a daily basis)
• Habit Tracker  (A spreadsheet that I used to track things I needed to do daily, from cleaning dishes to studying for the CPA exam. On the other tab, REG – TOC, was tracking when I started a study unit and when I finished it. I didn’t track much during this past week. I wonder why!]
• My old Critical Success Activities Tracker saw some updating. Updating everything took about 3-5 minutes. It was, “login”, “punch in numbers or type quickly”, “logout”, especially when I was very tired or I was running out of time to study/sleep.

I wrote “99″ on every page I studied, even though I felt it was a far-fetched dream.

I wrote down a bunch of “insights” as I was studying on how to think about the CPA exam, what to watch for, etc. most of it was just for me, as is the case with the things on this blog, but I will share it when I get the time (- mental, emotional, and actual time -) to flip through my notes again.

What’s next?

I think I will take a break from this studying and next week, sometime, I will order the Ethics course and study for that and get it out of the way. I have to believe that I have passed this Regulation exam and act like I have passed it! I will be praying for success. A few times during the exam, I said a quick prayer or two.

To those who will be taking the exam, good luck! To those who are waiting for the results, good luck and I hope you passed! To those who are studying and will take or retake the exam, do your best, and good luck!