I want to thank @GaneshGaitonde for the 3-hour-long marathon session to guide me for my next attempt. It was primarily about psir but as the session went on he selflessly expanded on GS and essay as well.
In Psir for the majority of the time, I was collecting content and trying to “recall” it for answer writing instead of thinking. This way of preparation was affecting my answers also as instead of understanding the demand of the question as I was just ‘recalling’. Over the messages, he had already shown me what’s the way to think about the questions and how to go about answer building, which he further expanded upon in the session.
He emphasised the importance of keyword-based notes by showing his notes and giving specific e.g.s like “double reading” and how to use it across the various sections. He provided actionable methods to improve the expressions in answers by using topper copies, and articles and how to combine them to even make new and unique expressions. He showed how to interlink across the sections like Hannah Arendt with Panchayati Raj.
As he has highlighted in the post, he showed how topper copies are the gold standard by discussing the copies of Ishita Kishore, showed her thinking process, and how she is able to write good answers even where content is limited. He did this for GS4 copies of Aditya Srivastava also.
He also suggested how GS4 can be prepared in a limited time by focusing on PYQs and identifying 10-15 themes which often keep repeating and come in essay also. Two of these came in this year's essay also. Again he guided how to go about preparing notes on these themes by taking me through his notes.
Now I understand what he means by “capacity building” and how to do it according to my level of preparation and my time availability. After discussion with him, I realised some major blunders I was making which were eating up a lot of my time. Now, I think with practice I would be able to make better notes and utilise topper copies much more efficiently and build better answers with limited time and content.
He also expanded upon newspaper reading, essay, building unique content, and answered many more of my doubts. The best thing is he doesn’t just say do this or that. He shows how he has done it himself through his notes, his topper copies analysis, and how you can adapt it according to your needs. He goes into very micro details which toppers generally miss out on in their talks due to various reasons but often create bottlenecks in one’s preparation.
If anyone is looking for ways to improve I would highly recommend you to have a talk with him or with any other good mentor. After talking with him I realised how much a good mentor can help. You would gain some new perspectives.
Once again, I thank @GaneshGaitonde for this doing this tireless session with such enthusiasm and dedication.
