Open Letter #2
Setting poor standards for yourself.
So, I met this young man, from an IIT last to last week. He was curious as to what mistake he had made as we was getting 90+ by almost all keys. he almost blamed the unofficial keys for the varaiation.
IMO 90+ is a safe score for this year. But he did not make it.
"How many questions did you attempt in CSAT?"
"Around 45-48 questions". Should qualify.
Now out of 80 questions, if you are setting the bar so low for yourself, and being a Maths background student , and that too from IIT, it is completely you to blame.
If you are writing the exam - allegedly one of the toughest and the most unpredictable, we do not play russian roulette with different parts of the exam.
Why not attemp at least 55-60 questions. If you dont know how to solve that much, practice, solve, take coaching, whatever you need to do.
But trying to crack the exam with a razor thin margin by doing 45 questions and saying - "But I am God Like accurate in CSAT and I will clear the cut off" is not how people who top exams behave.
Even if you get 10 questions wrong, you are at 35, and then with negative marks you are at 32, andout of the game.
The said person, a brilliant student otherwise, did come back saying that he finally checked the CSAT, and it must be CSAT.
He is not alone. For those of you who cant do CSAT, try to finish it off in Dec-Jan-feb. If you are the genius who will pick up the CSAT paper in March April, you are signing up for a stupid avoidable failure.
There is no point wasting your youth and your parents money if you have such study and preparation ethics.
If I am not able to carck an exam, what should I do?
Plain simple truth is, I should give it more time.
We are not created equal honestly. Some of us maths skills, some of us have good language skills, some of us are brilliang with self study, some of us are complete teacher taught , coaching fed students.
Next week, I am going to meet an old friend, a District Collector now. We even did a small talk last year in an online webinar at IIT Kanpur, ( she was from IIT D, Electrical ). I still remember that while the smart people flunked prelims year after year, she was complete ghissu, doing her classes diligently, both at IIT and at CSE , and made it with an under 40 rank.
In the end we have to find what works for us, and what does not. We may have to try and see and sometimes , the utility of doing something is in knowing that it does not work.
I did tell Harsh the story of Lord Buddha when he came next day saying he didnt clear CSAT and it was pure stupidity.
The story goes that Prince Siddharth went to the jungle leaving behind his wife and child seeking peace. Many years later, his wife, who lived in the palace, heard a knock at the door. When she opened the door, she saw Gautam Buddha.
She asked him, why did you leave us?
"To seek peace", Buddha said.
"Did you find it in the jungle?"
"No"
"Then?" asks a bewildered Yasodhara." What was the point of it?"
"Knowing that I wont find peace even in the jungle".
In your civils journey, you will have to try out a few things. You must learn from whatever you try. You will find few things useful and other things less useful. You will have to learn to extract the best from many places, including this wonderful forum.
Things that has pros, will not be without cons.
That is a settled debate.
Do not afraid, take risks, and if you are putting in 8 hours of studies 6 days a week, you will not flunk prelims.
And do not ask stupid questions.
I often meet people who say - If I do laxmikant, will I be able to solve all Polity questions?"
The correct answer is - No, you will not. But you will probably know what to do, if you have done it that well.
Sometimes people ask if book X or Y could be done. A good way to find out, often is , by doing it.
And we are here to study. There is no harm in reading a new book or taking some class., if you feel your knowledge base is not improving with passing days.
Also, last but not the least, a little bit of madness to needed to achieve anything worthwhile.
