Should I sit the ACEM Written Fellowship Exam or wait until I’m absolutely ready?

That is a greater stressor, than failing, because your brain goes into a future that doesn’t exist yet and creates an outcome that may not occur, but could and with that causes doubt and fear.

Here are my thoughts:

• If you fail the written exam the first time, it could just be bad luck, if you fail a second time, it’s a knowledge issue, hands down. Don’t sit until you are ready.
• Answer the question “Should I sit?” by being honest with yourself.
• If you honestly believe that you are prepared and I don’t mean know everything…..because you can’t, but you feel confident that your knowledge is good enough to get you a good score….and it’s your first time….. sit.
  • What does being prepared mean?
    • It means that if I asked you a question right now, you wouldn’t embarrass yourself.
    • It means that you have strategy for answering- the strategy we teach.
• Why do I say sit?
  • Because you can be well prepared and fail.
  • You will never be perfectly prepared
  • You can know a lot of stuff and have a horrible set of questions come up
  • The things you can’t control will be the things that will get in your way
  • Because the experience of the exam itself, in terms of showing you just how well you have to be prepared and what a pure marathon effort is needed, will be invaluable to you. If you pass..fantastic. If you don’t and you were fooling yourself…….you will know. It will help you for the next attempt.