710 to 730 in a month (Q46 to Q49)

Just retook the GMAT last weekend, just over a month (33 days) since my first attempt. Boosted my score by 20 points from 710 (Q46/V42/IR8/AW5) to 730 (Q49/V41/IR8). A little disappointed in the verbal drop, but I was a history major with minors in other humanities, so I'm hoping my academic record to speak to my verbal ability. I have a pretty weak record on math, so I'm glad that my quant is above where I was hoping it would be. Order was quantitative, verbal, IR, writing.

For the first attempt, I'd taken about 3 months to study through the MGMAT quant books, including about 3 weeks of going through the quant section of the 2018 OG with the MGMAT Navigator. I studied for verbal for about 3 hours, total. Took the test, had some test center issues (don't take the GMAT on a military base, go to a real testing center, even if the drive is longer. Seriously, it's worth it), so I decided to retake it. Figured I may as well study more.

Found out about TTP, so I worked through most of their curriculum. I did it the "right" way through about half of it, then started getting crunched for time, so I basically skimmed the second half, and ended up reading through the equation guide for geometry for the first time in the test center parking lot (glad I saw the hexagon area equation, saved me on a question). 100% worth it, but the company is absolutely right when it says that its order is better than skipping around. I have no doubt I would have gotten a 50 had I absorbed the later material more effectively. I got through about 55% of the questions according to the analytics page.

For verbal, I spent about an hour a day, rotating between CR/RC/SC questions in the 2018 and 2019 OGs. I thought it was effective. I was clearly wrong. I was pretty disappointed in the score drop, but also have no plans to retake it because I need to shift into application mode. Other people can probably recommend better verbal strategies.

I did not touch IR because I had never had any issues with any of the IR questions I'd seen in practice tests. I read a couple example 6 AWA essays from the OGs, we'll see how that worked out in a few days/weeks.

I was pretty much just studying for the GMAT for the month - I'd wake up, study notes/flash cards for 30-45 minutes, go to work, take a few quizzes at lunch, go home, and study through 930pm or so. Weekends were pretty much 10-12 hours of studying a day. Don't do this to yourself. Seriously, take some time off. It's worth it. You'll learn more. You won't be tired all the time. You won't hate yourself. This has been the first time I've been glad that I'm in a long-distance relationship, because my fiance would probably have murdered me after a week.

I only took one official practice test during the month, but had previously taken 2 officials and 6 MGMAT ones, all under test conditions, so I was used to the time and stress of the test itself.

I also started meditating after the first test, roughly 20 minutes a day. Not sure if it helped on the second test, but it's made me a bit less anxious overall, so it likely did not hurt.

Bottom line: Do the entire TTP curriculum and give yourself enough time to do it. You probably need at a bare minimum 3 months if you're going to be studying verbal at the same time, giving yourself an actual day off (of both work and GMAT) each week, and generally having normal social interactions with people.