Few inputs from my end.
1. Whatever you are doing, do it well. Developing poor study ethics / habits in foundational year is what gets most people stuck in exam loop, or exhaust attempts. In short, try to excel academically. You need not be topping, but be robust with what you are doing. This is not going to be easy.
2. Focus on finishing your MGP tests. About 30% questions in the commission may have questions on which you may not be aware of all dimensions or even the major dimensions. Hitting them now, and geting demotivated is not going to help. Answer the PYQs which you can answer and note down the ones you cannnot, if at all.
3. Do not do any Mains prep in Feb, if you have not cleared Prelims before. Give prelims 5 months time. You will have people saying, I gave 5 months and cleared prelims, but my mains was not prepared, and its my 3rd attempt. What lesson you pick up from this line is important. The person is finding mains tough not because he gave 5 months to prelims, but because he didn't give mains the time it needed in the 3 years. This was easy to understand in the hindsight but sometimes difficult to fathome when seen from the windscreen.
Thankyou for the response, consider this as an accountability/seeking reform measure (post 12 days of progress)
Background - Final year student at IIT Delhi (B.Tech in Biotechnology), 8 months into the prep done with : -Polity, Economy, Geography (World Map, Indian, Physical, Human), (Morden, World, PI) History.
Optional - Philosophy (about 60% done), test series starts from 13th Oct.
Enviorment 33% done - mostly pre centric mapping (national parks TR,BR etc.) (10/30)
Mains centric topics - governance (3/12), DM(3/7), Society and SJ (2/19), IR (2/21)
Topics Remaining
A&C, Ancient and Medivieal Hist, IS, and Ethics.
Done includes watching lectures, making notes for revision (and pre centric mapping in geo), weekly pre tests and daily Prelims - PYQs/Practise MCQs, and a few answers written (each)
- Using MGP as Revision and for reading the books (more on that in the problems section)
1) Goals and Tracking -I try for
Bi weekly tests - on for Prelims (usually weds evening) and one for mains (sunday)
Prelims mock - only to identify the weak areas and write it on the notebook cover for better revision later.about 2 lectures daily - one optional (philosophy) and one GS (about 5hrs a day - mostly watch the lectures in 2x/1.5x, but making notes, and sometimes thinking within the lectures consumes about the same time as of the duration)
Newspaper - a signature for consistency - have been following daily since June (after 4 months into the prep) and started with forum CA quiz recently (2-3 weeks)
Answer writing - did a DAW program with Sunya for GS2 in July, and started with MGP in August.reading before sleep is for self - helps me sleep better. Spill over of targets is allowed (other than read before sleep)
i) a good/decent week -
ii) a below average week due to college work (733/732 are course codes)
2) Ended up analysing the questions because came across some very oddly specific questions - (Cite four examples of NGOs, Briefly discuss any three such technologies, etc.) To better accommodate value addition from news papers such as : -
The antimony example. (Have divided the keywords from the syllabus to collect unique points, form any source i get outside of course material.)
3) In the best case scenario - syllabus (watching lectures) gets over by jan 26 and attempting a full length mains test (most prolly the 2024 mains) in a time and place bound manner GS on 1st weekend (31 jan, 1 and 2 of Feb) and optional and compulsory language on (8th and 9th of Feb) and then shift to pre centric mindset (revise all the weak topics written on the notebook covers), start revising current affairs from the magzines, and daily pre tests, etc. (i am not sure what all is included but will try to do all that i can)
Problems ArisingPrep Related :-
1) Books - Haven't read any books from cover to cover (hoping to read a few topics (if not all) with MGP and pre centric books such as Laxmikant and Spectrum for revision before pre (Having trust on my teachers that they have taught me all the important stuff and the books are for revision and reference)
2) Mains PYQs - haven't exclusively alloted time to solve Mains PYQs rn (in the pre to mains period the plan is to only do PYQs, Tests, Value addition and Revision.)
3) Syllabus v/s Frequency of tests - Almost every week have to make a choice between completing the syllabus (lectures) or revise notes/ read a new topic to give MGP tests - mostly end up watching the lectures (because the are easy), and convince myself to give tests the next day with full energy.
Have attempted 3 HLTs till now (September was a college exam and assignments month thereby the tests have piled up)
HLT1 - 45.5/125 (rank 250/1500 ig) - couldn't give it in one go (did 5+3+3) had to look up notes for specific article numbers etc.
HLT2 - 42.5/125 (rank 600/1500 ig) - gave it in one go too 2hrs and 20 mins to complete.
HLT4 - yet to submit. (Also coudnt complete in one go had some new topics that i had to read up)
Prelims objective tests don't give me much sweat - can consistently score about 50-60% in revision tests and 70-80% in freshly read topics.
4) Current Affair magsines - not reading any now (relying solely on newspapers) plan to read them in pre prep period.
Strategic issues
1) Unplanned college interventions - Usually the reason for spillover of goals (MGP tests and pilling up of lectures which makes me watch lectures on sunday the dedicated day for Tests) (and 2nd)
2) Sleep routine - no consistent sleep routine - usually try to follow a biphasic (4am - 8am and 2pm-6pm) sleep routine (works good for the productivity) but somedays due to extra work the cycle keeps changing and it becomes tough to be accountable on what goals are achieved for which day.
any feedback/suggestions (any red or green flags) that you can spot or anything that i shall incorporate to omit out the unnecessary or prioritise doing (mostly between completing the syllabus v/s the frequency of tests)
any advice from the experienced peeps (not limited to) @Neyawn @tedmosby @GaneshGaitonde @Rashmirathi would be really helpful. Thanks in advance.
You seems to be sorted from your post .Just keep going with respect to advise i am not good at writing so very difficult to write long post ,but if you need any help you can dm me i will try my best to help you in whatever capacity i can 🙏🏻
@Neyawn I was exploring the possibility of changing my optional after my 2023 attempt but I had to make some amends because I knew that there were certain blunders I had been committing in my optional prep. I remember you had written a post about it. This time I did everything possible and I am completely satisfied with my personal efforts for Maths but again 2024 has shook me and I had to rethink on the aspect of optional.
I always had this aim of breaching the 300+ barrier in 2024 which "I" don't think would be possible for me if the present marking pattern persists. What plays out in reality is a different thing. "Few" silly mistakes in the real exam can pull your score down to below 200 (That's how extreme results are in Maths. I personally know a lot of brilliant people whose score have ranged from 140s to 300s).
Why did I choose Maths? When I started prep in Dec 2017, I was in the 3rd semester of BTech. I had a CGPA of 9.97 (till my 4th sem) and I had a near perfect score in Maths-based courses. Also to back it, I had several gold medals in Maths Olympiad. I used to think that UPSC Maths is something which is based "just" on knowledge (A perception I didn't shake off till after seeing my 2023 Marksheet). I had tremendous knowledge about the physical significance of the concepts (Thanks to 3Blue1Brown and other such YouTube channels) but Maths in UPSC is all about following SOP as the questions had been standard till 2023. In addition to this, the 2017 results were out in 2018 and Anubhav Singh had secured AIR of 8 with 375/500 in Maths. Next year, even Kanishak Kataria scored 361 in Maths. I was naïve back then and I didn't know the dark side of this optional. Some of the brightest minds in India have wasted attempts after attempts because of this optional.
Reason for continuing with it: If I changed my optional without doing PYQs and mocks properly, I would have committed the same blunders in my other optional as well. So to make amends, I solved PYQs from 1992 onwards (for CSE) and 2000 onwards (for IFoS) since Dec 2023. I identified important concepts and practiced the standard questions in this attempt. I gave my mocks and I scored decently under strict conditions.
How 2024 changed my perspective: Mostly non-standard questions were asked in 2024. A person who has done "only" Maths this attempt would have scored more. Balancing it with GS was extremely difficult. Now the sunk cost fallacy has sinked in and I am finding it tough to switch.
In this limited time since my Mains, I analysed my Maths attempt and yes, I have been in self-doubt because of variables like scaling, relative performance and so on. I would not like to comment on these variables because I am not competent enough to do that. For now, I have shortlisted Philosophy and Anthropology as "possible" substitute to Maths for now but I do not know how to go about humanities optional from scratch.
For that purpose, I would need suggestion from people who have written multiple Mains- @GaneshGaitonde @Rashmirathi @Steph_Curry and others in this regard.
dm karta hu
Those living in Patel Nagar, female aspirants especially (but all insights appreciated):
Is the area safe, especially if I have to go to the center possibly alone on winter mornings to write 7 am tests? How much travel time would I have to set aside?
What would you choose between ORN/NRN and Patel Nagar? (Saraswati Vihar GGN is not an option for me).
Go for orn
@Rashmirathi Thanks for your reply. What makes you recommend ORN?
Just pavolian conditioning
You had me in splits!
And I am not supposed to laugh or speak due to a throat exertion. ( Part of occupational hazard exacerbated by the Delhi Pollution )
Why haven;t I seen you since Mains? How is IFoS prep going?
Not writing Ifos this time so just enjoying life outside books but continuously thinking 🤔
जिधर भी देखिए इक रास्ता बना हुआ है
सफ़र हमारे लिए मसअला बना हुआ है
