Josiah

"End of freshman year, I picked up a Rubik’s Cube that had been sitting there for years."

By Students of NYC

November 21^st, 2025

"I like breaking big tasks into smaller parts — finish one step, get that little dopamine boost, move to the next. That’s how I study physics or chemistry, and honestly it’s how I cube. End of freshman year I picked up a Rubik’s Cube that had been sitting there for years. I learned to solve it, then I wanted to be faster. First sub-minute. Then sub-30. This summer I got a sub-20. People see it in movies and think it means you’re a genius, but it’s really pattern recognition and algorithms. You recognize a case, apply the algorithm, finish the layer. The pros can do it without looking, but at its core it’s: Can you see the pattern, and do you know how to fix it?

The brain is this amazing thing. It’s not spoken about enough. If you can understand the brain, you can understand how to improve yourself — how you learn better, how you become a better person. Your brain lets you learn languages, complex topics, communicate with emotion. You remember what’s important to you. If I’m trying to get to know someone, I try to preserve what they tell me —names, hobbies, interests. People say 'I can’t remember,' but ask them about their favorite artist or team and they’ll rattle off facts. It’s not that your brain can’t, it’s what you deem valuable.

My grandfather got brain cancer last year. Watching his motor function deteriorate hit me. You can live without a finger; you can’t live the same without a part of your brain. He lost speech. He couldn’t move the right side of his body. It really showed me how much the basic things — moving your hand, saying what you feel — are all brain. That’s why I’m thinking about neurology. I want to take opportunities now — APs, studying on the side — so college is easier and I can get to helping people sooner.

I’ve memorized about 150 digits of pi — blurry now, but I still have around 50 off the top of my head. I finish work early a lot. Sometimes I work ahead or ask about the next topic; sometimes I just enjoy free time. I’m not really athletic. I do chess, academics, and I like cool science or math facts. Ten, 15 years from now, I see myself finishing my master’s, interning, becoming a proper neurologist —working with any age. Because having a healthy brain really impacts your life. And I want my future kids to have the healthiest brains possible, so they can learn what they want — sports, instruments, whatever — and become who they want to be."