Prelims Fears
Role of pain in clearing Prelims
Sir, I wrote XYZ score, I am getting 70-80-90 I feel disappointed. I don’t want to repeat my past failures.
Sir, I am feeling stress, I am unable to sleep or study properly.
Sir, I am doing fine, but I feel that I might mess up in the real exam.
These are the common-repeated questions I get in my telegram ID, now that we are closer to prelims, the frequency will increase.
As a mentor, I have the luxury to observe preparation of all kinds of students, from myriad backgrounds and mindsets. From Beginners to in service aspirants, from academically brilliant profiles to people with backlogs. The diversity is a great, the more I see, the more I understand the idol the grass in always greener on the other side.
A beginner might think topper fellows are gifted at remembering ancient and medieval stuff, which is not their cup of tea. In reality, even those in service, writing prelims again, will feel and think the same as you. Everyone will go through the same agony, anxiety, stress, and pressure.
The truth of UPSC prelims lately is, pain is inevitable, everyone will suffer, randomness will hit every one equally. No one can be 100% safe with average efforts. You have to put in the required work.
But it’s not that easy, too, MR. ASG.
The recommended Mindset
Prelims = High Confidence + Flow * [Confidence + Art of stone throwing] + Luck
High Confidence/Faith/Conviction = 100% sure, the sun rises in the east that sure.
Flow = After attempting questions on High Confidence, or elimination of options with the same mindset, you will be in a state of flow where you will go into positive momentum. [Only when you experience in the exam hall, you will feel it]
Art of stone throwing + Confidence: Once you are in the momentum, you might have already attempted 40–45 questions by now, rest all is carrying that positive flow and guessing with Confidence.
Luck= Opportunity meeting preparation, a tea shop discussion with friend or a random question asked by friend coming in the paper. There is no such thing, a pure dumb luck.
THE Problem.
High Confidence/Faith/Conviction: comes from Mastering static, like rock solid static. Revision of ca + static, learning from mistakes in mocks, revising mocks. 75% of work is done here. It’s the mind set, the learning attitude, the discipline, all the good things you are supposed to do leads to this. Even sleeping at 11 and waking up at 5 every damn thing leads to a faith mindset. Or else you will fall to low confidence zone. [This is a mindset developed from sweat and tears]
Art of stone throwing + Confidence: This is mastered by writing tests without bothering about the score, but about learning. It doesn't matter what your score is in mocks. Are you learning the right areas? Are you learning from your mistakes? Should you attempt from 1-100 or play to your strengths, subject-wise? What is your strategy? Everything, including reading speed, matters. It comes by deliberately observing these in mocks. One institute's sectional and two institutes full-length tests are enough to take you there. This is developed by practicing, not crying or giving up over mock scores.
Luck= Random discussion with a Friend + Reading all 8 Subjects, 1.5 years of ca + newspapers+ writing 50-60 mocks + CSAT practice+ revision of all the above+ having mental balance + sleep + Faith in your efforts + Right mindset.
Exceptions: There will always be brilliant people who won’t do most of the above and still clear prelims, they are outliers, probably have wonderful knowledge from other sources like documentaries, book reading. Outliers cannot be considered as the norm.
TL;DR
Just knowledge alone is not going to help you clear prelims, it takes a lot more than mere knowledge, it requires great effort to apply your knowledge.
High confidence: Doing the obvious, controlling the controllable, 100% sure in the known knows.
Confidence: Is practice through mocks, trying to develop patters, recall mechanism, identifying the weak areas. Getting the ideas on known unknowns, FLTS, are key to this.
Hunch: That random feeling telling you this is C, your first hunch is mostly correct. It comes from the efforts you put into the above two steps. The more efforts you put into steps one and two from now until May 27th, the more proportional your hunches' strength will be on May 28th. Helps in dealing with the unknown unknows.
Whichever image makes sense to you, the message is the same. The grind, tension, stress, tears, pain, and stress are part of the journey. You cannot wish it away. If you want it, you will get it, as Jim Carrey says, "Desperation is a necessary ingredient to learning anything, or creating anything. Period. If you ain't desperate at some point, you ain't interesting."
"When you have a why to live, you can bear almost any how." - Friedrich Nietzsche
Hope this makes sense to you on some level, keep struggling, keep growing.
All the best
Kalyan.
PS: Don’t underestimate or ignore CSAT.