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Infinitely many stages of grief – Power Overwhelming

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One of my friends asked me this recently, and I wasn’t sure what to say. In the last ten years, something has changed. If I had to summarize my concerns in one sentence, I would say this: kids these days no longer feel they’re allowed to work on what they’re interested in or excited about. Instead, they feel obligated to work on whatever happens to be considered the most “important” (or “prestigious”) thing possible.1 But let me do a bit of story-telling. When I was kid, math contests were seen as a hobby, or sport, or game. Those were the good old days. Today, that’s no longer true. For example, at the end of MOP since 2011, we run a selection test called the TSTST, which chooses the finalists for the subsequent year’s IMO team. When I took the TSTST as kid, the feeling in the air was “it’s game day, GLHF!”. I didn’t solve any problems at all my first year, and I still had a blast. Whereas in 2023, I remember visiting the testing room on the first day of TSTST to help with setting up

The infinitely many stages of grief Where do all the smart, curious, earnest kids go these days? One of my friends asked me this recently, and I wasn’t sure what to say. In the last ten years, something has changed. If I had to summarize my concerns in one sentence, I would say this: kids these days no longer feel they’re allowed to work on what they’re interested in or excited about . Instead, they feel obligated to work on whatever happens to be considered the most “important” (or “prestigious”) thing possible . It’s for this reason I consider ambition as a double-edged sword. When ambition

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