I recently participated in ETSR (Egyptian Team Selection Rounds) which is basically qualifications for qualifications for qualifications for the IOI team for Egypt.

I thought I did well in the online qualifications and thought that I'd easily qualify for the onsite qualifications, but sadly, 47 people qualified, and I was not there...

So, I decided that, something needed to change, I got a hit of reality and realized I was no where near begin the best, even at something like a qualifications for qualifications for qualifications for the IOI team, I failed.

So, shortly, I decided that I need to improve at a higher rate, and I chose master.
However, you may ask, why am I posting this? For two reasons actually:

1. To be more accountable, that'd help me stick more to my goal
   
2. To ask: Am I even doing this right? I'm doing this the casual way, solving problems that are outside of my "comfort zone" (aka problems that are slightly harder than my level) and learning and practicing new algorithms along the way, is there something I'm missing?