The past two weeks have been a nightmare of final exams. I still have two left, but at last I can breathe a little.
In that brief pause, a few thoughts came to me that I wanted to share. Looking back on my first two years at university, perhaps there is something here for students who have just finished the gaokao and are about to begin university themselves.
First, some context: my gaokao score was nothing remarkable. It was only just enough to get me into an ordinary undergraduate university outside China’s elite tiers.
1. From “I’m Doing Pretty Well” to “I Barely Made the Cut”
The summer before university, I had planned to learn to drive and find a part-time job. Neither happened. Instead, I spent much of that time reflecting on my years in school.
As a child, I had always been one of the students people noticed. I ranked near the top of my class throughout primary school and won awards almost every year. In middle school, I even made it into an advanced class. Then remote learning arrived during the pandemic, and I learned a brutal lesson about myself. I lost momentum and eventually ended up at a relatively weak general high school.
My first two years there were easy and carefree. After dinner, I would always head back to the dorm to play video games, and honestly, I had a great time. The school did not send many students to university, yet I could stay somewhere around the top ten. That made it easy to fall under an illusion: perhaps I was doing pretty well.
That was precisely the danger.
When you stay in a low-competition environment and keep hearing that you are “doing fine,” it is easy not to notice how slowly you are falling behind.
I did not begin pushing myself seriously until the final stretch of my last year. In the end, I barely crossed the undergraduate admission line.
When my score came out, my parents kept reassuring me that it was good enough and that everything would be fine. But I could see a faint disappointment in their eyes.
It hit me hard. I began asking myself: if I had always looked like a “good student” to everyone else, why was this the result I had produced?
I considered repeating my final year and taking the gaokao again, but ultimately decided against it. Looking back, that was the right decision. I cannot imagine reliving that year under even greater pressure. More importantly, a question kept returning to me: was the gaokao really the only road available?
2. Rediscovering Reading—and Refreshing the Way I Saw the World
In the summer of 2024, I signed up for a few paid learning programs and began rebuilding a reading habit.
That was when I realized I had never hated reading. I simply struggled with the fiction I had been required to read. Once I turned to nonfiction, books about thinking, and books about business, I found reading genuinely exciting.
My perspective changed quickly during that period. It felt as if I wanted to refresh my entire operating system.
But that excitement brought a different kind of frustration. Understanding more principles did not mean my life improved overnight. Knowing more methods did not mean I could immediately put them into practice. Learning can be exhilarating, but it can also create anxiety, because suddenly you can see the enormous distance between who you are and who you want to become.
3. Trying Everything—and “Failing” at Almost Everything
As soon as my first year began, I threw myself into trying things.
I introduced myself to professors, joined a research project, reached out to students ahead of me, explored campus activities, and entered competitions such as the Challenge Cup.
It sounds impressively proactive, doesn’t it?
The actual results were far less impressive.
I worked with a professor on research and a paper, then quit halfway through. The reason was simple: I discovered that academic research did not interest me very much. Having tried it myself, however, I came away with much more respect for people who can devote years to papers, research, and experiments.
Most of the older students I reached out to became contacts on WeChat, exchanged messages with me for a day or two, and then gradually disappeared from my life.
I went from eagerly joining campus activities to avoiding them whenever I could.
My team prepared for the Challenge Cup for a while, then gave up. In the end, we did not make it through the selection.
None of these were attractive outcomes, but they mattered to me. There are many things you can only learn by doing: whether you like something, whether it suits you, and whether you can stay with it over time.
Perhaps this is one of the most valuable things about university: it gives you room to make mistakes.
Not every attempt ended badly. In my first year, I passed both the CET-4 and CET-6 English exams, won third prize in a university English competition, pushed hard for strong grades, and earned a second-class scholarship. And through one accidental opportunity, I discovered the field of operations—a path I have continued pursuing ever since.
4. AI: The Thread Running Through Both Years
There is one central thread I have to mention: AI.
I first encountered AI tools during the summer after the gaokao and quickly became obsessed. I used ChatGPT almost every day. From 4o to o1, from o3 to today’s GPT-5.5, I have followed the changes closely enough to feel the speed of progress firsthand.
It is astonishingly fast. A problem that was extremely difficult only a few months ago may become something AI can handle directly a few months later. Things that once demanded specialist skills are now within reach for ordinary people working with AI.
That interest led me to explore in many directions.
Before coding agents became widely popular, I started a WeChat public account in November 2024 to document and share what I was learning from AI. The account is only semi-active now, but it was an important starting point.
By 2026, tools such as Claude Code and Codex had become much more capable, and I began using them to build websites, apps, and small scripts. I had assumed I was not interested in programming. Instead, the more I built, the more absorbed I became.
Eventually, I released my first app: FreeGrid. If you are interested, I wrote about it in some of my earlier posts.
From building the app from zero to navigating the entire store-release process, AI helped me at nearly every step. To me, it really does feel like having Jarvis at my side.
Many people worry about whether AI will replace their jobs. My experience is that instead of remaining trapped in that anxiety, you should begin by using it. Bring it the problems you encounter in daily life. Ask, experiment, and try to solve them. Only after you have truly used AI can you form a judgment of your own.
5. Operations: Reliability Is the Most Fundamental Skill
Alongside AI, there has been another thread in my university life: operations.
It began with an accidental opportunity to help run an online community. That led to several more online projects and opportunities, and this summer I secured a product operations internship at an education company. Along the way, my understanding of operations has become increasingly concrete.
If I had to reduce it to one sentence, it would be this: be someone people can rely on.
Many opportunities begin with very small things. You execute one minor task properly. You handle something unglamorous with care. The other person sees that you are reliable, easy to work with, and able to deliver. Then, when another opportunity appears, they are more likely to think of you—and more willing to recommend you.
Capability grows by accumulation. You begin with the most basic work, even when it feels miscellaneous, exhausting, or like pure grunt work. That, too, is part of your training for the real world.
Do not dismiss foundational work too early. Too many people have not yet earned the ability to choose only the work they want, yet they are already talking themselves out of opportunities by saying, “This isn’t worth it” or “This is a waste of time.”
6. University Has No Standard Answer—but You Should Know What You Are Choosing
Now, back to university itself.
Why did I care so much about final exams and a high GPA in my first year, only to adopt a “just don’t fail” attitude in my second?
The answer is simple: I found directions that deserved more of my time and energy.
Attention is finite. You cannot pursue everything, hold on to everything, and excel at everything at once. Trying to balance too many priorities is difficult in itself.
My current strategy is to spend the first seventeen weeks of a semester focusing on my own projects, internships, operations work, and AI experiments. Then, during the final week or two, I concentrate on exams—enough to avoid failing and keep my academic foundation intact.
That choice will not suit everyone, but for now, it suits me.
There is no universal right answer at university. Some people should compete for the highest GPA and pursue postgraduate recommendations or entrance exams. Others are better served by internships, projects, or entrepreneurship. Some belong in research and competitions. Others need to experiment broadly before they can find a direction.
What matters is that you know what you are choosing and that you are willing to accept the consequences.
If you choose a high GPA, you must accept that it will consume a great deal of time.
If you choose internships and projects, you must accept that your transcript may be less impressive.
If you choose broad experimentation, you must accept that many attempts will appear to have produced “nothing.”
But if those attempts help you understand yourself more clearly, they were not wasted.
To Those Who Have Just Finished the Gaokao
If you have just completed the gaokao, this is what I want to tell you:
The exam matters, but it is only one point along the way.
The university you enter will certainly influence your starting position. But how you spend the next four years will do much more to determine how the road unfolds from there.
Do not give up the moment you arrive on campus. And do not assume that missing out on an elite university has already fixed the course of your life.
Go and try things. Meet people. Build projects. Join activities. Find internships. Read, write, use AI, and engage with the real world. Then, through repeated attempts, slowly discover the threads you want your life to follow.
Some paths will turn out not to suit you; when you discover that, stop in time. Other pursuits will make you more excited the deeper you go; keep following those.
Perhaps the most important thing about university is not succeeding on every possible path. It is gradually learning what deserves your commitment—and what does not deserve to consume you.
I will end with a thought I have found myself agreeing with more and more:
University offers many roads to explore. The choice is yours. More importantly, you must remain true to the choice you make.