Two things that come to mind: * I met a girl at a party a year before I started uni. We had a 15 minute conversation in which she told me that studying 2 degre

Two things that come to mind: * I met a girl at a party a year before I started uni. We had a 15 minute conversation in which she told me that studying 2 degrees is possible, I never met her again, I don't even remember her face. Because of that I entertained the possibility. The madness that unfolded [1] is all thanks to that conversation since it opened my eyes to look at the world differently. Differently how? Simple, people tell you as if certain things are true, but they are merely social guidelines at best. What you need to do is to test if this social guideline is applicable to you (sometimes intensively, sometimes on a surface level). * I once overheard one sentence accidentally of a fellow student that I passed by in the hallway while he was talking to another student. He said "I study mathematics not because it's fun per se but because it teaches a certain way of thinking." That sentence didn't do much back then, but at the moment that insignifcant memory/sentence has produced a multi-week inquiry to see how this may or may not be true. And I think I have my answer, and I daresay that he was right. The way of thinking that it teaches is that it forces you to think very precise, only to learn that your precise thinking still has 10 holes according to your teacher and you correct those holes until that doesn't happen often anymore (i.e. writing proofs). [1] Studying a degree in 2 years instead of 3, negotiating cum laude instead of properly qualifying for it, teaching other people how to study faster, studying 6 months worth of courses in 2 months. Note: with the cum laude, while I did not have the formal requirements, I was the only person in my program ever to publish a paper that came out of a homework assignment. That's the reason why I decided to negotiate since there were a few high ranking faculty members that made it known that they felt a published paper on its own (+ decent grades but not cum laude grades) deserved a cum laude.