Let’s put an end to this.

Hi there! This blog is aimed particularly at people who plagiarise their codes, and people who raise their pitchforks at these “alleged cheaters”. Which is worse?

Before you cheat, think about why you’re doing this. It’s all just virtual rating, my friend. I know things can be tough, especially with CP, it can be frustrating when you don’t see a visible rating improvement after hours of grinding those pesky algorithms. But that’s life. You don’t look at your life and try to think of hacks to avoid your life. You live it, and endure the hardships that life throws at you. Perseverance is vital for success. Hang in there. In due time, you’ll get the colour you always wished for, and when you do, you’ll feel euphoric and looking back on your years on this platform, you’d be grateful to your past self for not taking the easy way out.

Also, for those of you who take such great pride in calling themselves “cheat busters”, “plag hunters”, and other fancy names, I have two things to say to you. Firstly, find a hobby. You’re wasting your time on CF blogs with your detective work. And secondly, Plagiarising code isn’t something to be proud of, and that’s precisely why we have plagiarism checks after every contest ends. But cheating doesn’t make a person bad per se. You don’t know the other end of things. Maybe they want to look good in their friend circle, or just are tired of putting in the hours to no “virtual” avail. I urge you to look into the humanitarian aspect of things.

Take this as a plea if you may, but let’s just learn and make the world a better place for it.

Well, now that the clickbait-ish title has done it's wonder, I'd like to draw your attention towards the fact that my rating has had a +28 aggregate difference over the course of 3 months.

This perturbs me during the middle of the night and with a slight hint of melancholy, I ask myself this. Has my performance/ mental capacity reached it's zenith? What am I doing wrong?

For the former question, I'd like to believe otherwise. About the second one, this graph should be the answer.

Some wise words: If you're currently rated X, you should be focusing more on problems rated [max(X, 800), min(X + 200, 3500].
Now the question arises, why should you be bothered? Well, in all truth, you shouldn't. This is kind of a plea, to put it correctly, not just for me, but for others who might face similar issues. Lately, I've been having an awful lot of trouble solving problems rated 1800+, while problems rated 1600 are a breeze. The transition from 1600 to 1800 seems to be a herculean task for me. Am I lacking some prerequisite? Should I take a break from actively participating in contests and transition to classical problems?
I've been following A2OJ ladders and CSES hitherto.

TL; DR — What should be my course of action to have a reasonable chance of making it to CM?

Here, you'll find links to some useful blogs that may help your case.
https://codeforces.me/blog/entry/66909
https://codeforces.me/blog/entry/75662
https://codeforces.me/blog/entry/83267

PS — Apologies if the blog isn't in accordance with the title.

Problem Link: 439C - Devu and Partitioning of the Array
My Latest Submission: 110975767

Verdict: WA on tc#60

My approach: Create first (k - p) parts using a single odd element in each of them. For the next p parts, treat the first (p - 1) parts separately using odd elements in pairs first, and if we run out of odd elements, use a single even element afterwards. For the last part, display everything that's left.

PS: I know CF blogs aren't the best place for query resolution but it's the only one I've got!