The #1 mistake people make when CPA studying

I passed all four of my CPA exams first try, which is relatively uncommon. We all hear stories of people failing over and over again and I want to share with you why I think that is. Taking the CPA is literally a game. I can't stress this enough. It is a game of pacing. People do not fail these exams because they're not smart. You cannot get an accredited accounting degree and not be a relatively intelligent individual. It is the fact that accountants are very detail oriented in nature and perfectionistic. Why is this important? Because there's a very fine line when you're taking the CPA between studying enough detail to know what you need to know versus over studying and forgetting the prior material because there is so much of it. Additionally, the multiple choice questions when going through the backer modules are extremely difficult. But they're supposed to be, but it's not talked about. Just for context, I got an 87 on audit and reg and I would get at least half of the questions in the multiple choice modules when I was going through them on Becker. But you know what? I didn't really get stressed out. I just moved on and kept chugging along. Whereas if I kept ruminating on the material, which I don't blame people for doing, it makes sense to do that. By the time I got to unit 5, I would have forgotten everything from unit 1. If you are studying for any one exam longer than three months in totality, you are putting yourself at risk of having to overexert yourself to remember information that you learnt way back. That being said, you absolutely do need to understand the concepts and the high level detail. I know what you're thinking. Well, how the hell do I know? You thought your girl wouldn't give a solution? Oh, don't sleep on me. Use the mini exams and the simulated exams as your best friend. And the reason for this, these questions are actually similar to the level of detail that you'll see on the real exam. So if you are completely botching these, you know, you just need to refresh yourself and learn the material more. My overall strategy for studying everything, I would watch all of the lecture videos, take the multiple choice at the end of those modules, skip the sims, but then do everything when I got to the mini exams. And if I botched the mini exam, I knew I didn't learn to the extent I needed to. Once I got through everything, I would shift to the final review section of Becker, do all that, refresh myself, especially on the stuff that was older from units 1, 2, etc. After getting through everything, I would take a simulated exam and on most of them I got about a 70 and that's how I knew I was ready because of what's called the Becker Bump. I'm sure you've heard of it. But I got freaked out. So I did the other two simulated exams and I reviewed the shit out of them because that's the level of detail you're gonna see on the exam. And then I took them, and then I did great. So I really hope this helps.