25 May 2026, I appeared in API round of one of the best companies of college placement. I had always been nervous about my vibecoding skills, so i had practised past year's project, but what was asked this year was obviously different, with an additional layer of deployment this time.
I had created local projects but never deployed any before, and i instantly panicked seeing the deadline off only half hour. I panick instantly under such small time constraints, and it was one of starting companies of college placement that too with highest package that our college offers. I was already very demotivated, i knew it wasn't my cup of tea and whatever i practised couldn't be enough.
The round ended, i was able to submit just close to the deadline. With the anxiety I had regarding had to first understand the problem and deliverable, vibe code as well as deploy the backend all in half hour that too when i hadn't tried deploying anything before, i thought i'd already be out from the first round itself, but somehow i managed to do it and saw chances of clearing the round.
Then around evening when i was discussing the random things with my friends, i came across a BIG Blunder i had made in deployment, i panicked again and thought i was done for the round, but then i realised the submission portal was still open and so i fixed what i could and wished i would've done better. I had completely lost hopes because even though i did what i thought could that's not how things work, for getting a job.
After few hours the results were announced, and my name wasn't in the list, i had already lost any expectations before anything, so i just accepted everything, that i was unprepared, i made a blunder, most of my friends cleared the round, even the classmates whom i thought i was better than, and i even moved on from these thoughts, trying to be optimistic, to learn from what i did.
And then around 8:30 at night, when i had gotten myself out of the placement zone compeletely, college released a list of remaining students, with my name in it. I did'nt believe it, i had just accepted my failure and suddenly i was called with selected student just the next day for the Assessment round. Before i could process it, i was seated in the lab infront of computer screen, giving my first DSA and SQL Assessment round.
I had only recently started DSA practice, some of my classmates had been preparing since 3rd semester, when i was still unsure which domain to pick. Again this time i knew for sure, there was no room for me in the upcoming rounds, i had just started my DSA journey just like 2 months ago and was sitting with people who had been doing it for year.
I was still someone with just handson arrays, string, hashing, collection framework and mathematical logics, didn't even know how to create a tree. But all i knew was i had 90 minutes, to stare at the screen and try to make whatever logic i can and that's exactly what i did. The question were, to be honest, quite tricky and hard, i had never witnessed question to implement LRU, all i knew about LRU was the theory i skimmed for OS semester exam, but i tried whatever i could with my array-string logic brain and somehow managed to pass almost test cases of a question and few test cases of another out of i guess 3 DSA questions and some SQL queries.
When my friends and I went to the auditorium for assessment round's results, I was almmost prepared to leave for home, when my name was announced among the shortlisted students, with the announcement that our interviews would begin in next 5 minutes, so we must get ready with our resume and portfolio, and just like i usually turn, instead of being happy about clearing the round all i felt was panick, that i dont know enough to sit in an interview, what will i do, i'm not prepared, this was among top companies that come to our college and it was going to be my very first interview experience and i wasn't prepared. I had just compeleted learning springboot and building a project in it and didn't feel quite proficient in anything.
I am someone who had been studying Java for preferrably long period of time and am actually quite proficient in it now, but at that moment all i felt was i had just finished the framework and though i knew the fundamentals i still wasn't ready for the interview. And that my dear friends was what itself proved me right and ended up making me the do silliest mistakes possible. I panicked so much, that when i sat infront of the interviewer i forgot all and everything i knew, i couldn't answer polymorphism without stuttering, and , as i thought, i ruined the beginning of the interview, rest of the interview went on me trying to not appear as stupid, cuz i actually knew everything they were asking, i knew i had practised, studied and implemented it all but just couldn't present myself as much. And it was a very bad experience, remembering how i sat infornt of the interviewer with no words forming for concepts i knew better than anything, though i did answer questions after initial ones, wrote the asked query, solved dsa, but my first impression had created image of someone with weak fundamentals, definitely not something recruiters would like to consider. And then i spent these past 3 months ruminating about how it all went so wrong, i tried to focus but things came up and i demotivated myself with the lingering interview experience, and wasted all this precious time.
So today almost 3 months after my first interview experience, i am restarting my journey. I would try to do public learning if that helps me build consistency, post my insights and understanding here, and accept my mistakes and learn from them. Sharing this commitment with you all.
And maybe this journey isn't even about how unprepared I was.
It's about how many times I convinced myself that I wasn't capable of going any further—and yet, somehow, I did.
I panicked during the API round.
I thought I had ruined the assessment.
I thought I had no business sitting in that interview.
And even when I got the opportunity, I spent more time worrying about not being good enough than trusting the work I had already put in.
Looking back, I don't want to romanticize that experience. I made mistakes. I was underprepared in some areas. I wasted the last few months ruminating over an interview instead of using it as feedback.
But I also learned something important:
Being unprepared is a problem. Believing that being unprepared means you shouldn't even try is an even bigger one.
So I'm starting again.
Not with the expectation that I'll suddenly become great at DSA, backend development, system design, or interviews.
Just with the commitment to show up, learn, build, make mistakes, and keep going.
I'll be sharing what I learn here—not because I have everything figured out, but because I don't.
Maybe documenting the journey will help me stay accountable.
And maybe, a few months from now, I'll look back at this post the same way I'm looking back at that interview today—not with regret, but with gratitude that I started again.
Day 1 starts here.
I participated in Fossee internship by IIT Bombay selection round and tried to build a secure registration and file access system, coded, debugged, failed and submitted whatever i could before deadline, but at least tried. This post is getting really long so would share project's detail in next post.
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