Closing Thoughts | UPSC Mains Answer Writing: Practice PDF Download

• The intent of this book is to help you write better answers and essays. In the preceding chapters, I’ve written everything I learnt during my preparation about writing answers in the UPSC exam. For some of you, the advice in this book may sound complex and overwhelming. For others, it may seem as though answer writing is very simple and easy and now that they know all about it, marks will inevitably follow. Both these perspectives are misguided.
• The best way to get the maximum out of this book is to apply this advice in your mock tests and perfect the strategy overtime. If you are just starting out, the first answer you write may be the worst answer you’ll ever write. The first essay you write may be the worst essay you'll ever write. But it’s important that you write them. Learning happens through deliberate practice.
• Back in 2017, as I was analysing my reasons for failing in the previous attempts, I realised that Mains part of the exam was my biggest stumbling block. I had to improve my score across subjects if I were to stay in the competition. To achieve it, I focused on one goal: write better answers
• Then came my first mock test. Despite the fact that I prepared very well and took 4 hours to finish the test, I scored very low. Normally, this would have made me quite disheartened. But, I only told myself this: “Let’s try to beat this score in the next test.” When I improved, I had the same goal for the next test. And the next. And the next. Even in tests I did well, I used to look at model answers of others and thought how I could make my answers better. It’s this obsession with improvement that I believe made me give my best in the actual test.
• Continuous improvement. That’s it. That was the only thing I focussed on. My competition was not with the 10 lakh aspirants. It was with my own.I didn’t bother about what others were doing. I didn’t worry about the Top 100 rank. Least of all, I didn’t think about Rank 1. What I was obsessed with were small things: The next chapter I was going to read, the next answer I was going to write, the next mock test I was going to take.
• This way the outcome or the results barely mattered to me. There were tests I did worse than the previous one. But again, instead of getting demoralised, all my effort, my focus and my energy went into doing the smallest possible improvement— no matter how small.
• All this didn’t mean that success wasn’t important to me. Of course, it was. But I felt that success must come as a by-product of the effort I put in, not the time I spent obsessing about it. It’s a paradox that the more we obsess about the outcome, the less we think about the current task. The focus must be on the here and the now.
• Moreover, I stopped caring about things outside my control. If you think about it, there are only things that are purely under your control: your thoughts and your actions. You can change them and do as you plan to work toward your goal. Your accountability is only towards the plans that you make and the goals you set for yourself. No one can take that away from you. The overall superset principle is to worry only about your thoughts and what you can control. It’s not in your control what the result is going to be.
• This was the fundamental mindset with which I persisted throughout my preparation— and continue even today. The reason I talk about the psychological aspect of the exam is to tell you that disappointments are common during preparation as well as in life. It's about the perspective that we develop which determines whether you turn them into opportunities or obstacles. Even after getting into the IAS, it isn’t the case that I have no challenges or problems to deal with. After the exam, there were many projects I took on, both in the LBSNAA academy, and during my district training. I’ve succeeded at some, failed at others.
• Or even this book project. Writing it has been incredibly hard. After gruelling work schedules, it was difficult to put in the hours required to write. Yet, I tried to be consistent. There were days when I had the zeal and wrote more than 1000 words. And, then there were days when I had absolutely no mood to write. I wrote anyway. I didn’t think how many pages it would come up to. I didn’t think about how many sales it would have to make. I didn’t think about how in the world I will write 50,000 words. I only thought about the next 100 words. This thinking helped me get a lot of writing done.
• A peculiar question I get asked about is motivation. It’s a bad question. No one in their right minds is ever motivated to read Laxmikanth or Hindu newspapers. Motivation is fickle. It’s a trap. It presumes the notion that you need an external push factor to accomplish something. But, for most hard things— like running a 5 km stretch or writing a test or staying up late to complete a chapter-- you will never feel motivated. You have to do them anyway. Make motivation redundant.
• Whatever you do, have high standards for the effort you put in, but low expectations for the results. This singular principle has helped me so much in taking up responsibility, being more confident, and overcoming failures. Consistency is more important than intensity.

Below is a concept that I found incredibly helpful during my preparation:

THE FLYWHEEL EFFECT

If you feel you are not improving, this analogy applies to learning answer writing and much of other endeavours in life.

“Picture a huge, heavy flywheel—a massive metal disk mounted horizontally on an axle. Now imagine that your task is to get the flywheel rotating on the axle as fast and long as possible. Pushing with great effort, you get the flywheel to inch forward, moving almost imperceptibly at first. You keep pushing and, after two or three hours of persistent effort, you get the flywheel to complete one entire turn. You keep pushing, and the flywheel begins to move a bit faster, and with continued great effort, you move it around a second rotation… Three turns ... four ... five ... six ... the flywheel builds up speed ... seven ... eight ... you keep pushing ... nine ... ten

... it builds momentum ... Then, at some point—breakthrough! The momentum of the thing kicks in your favor, hurling the flywheel forward, turn after turn, its own weight working for you. You’re pushing no harder than during the first rotation, but the flywheel goes faster and faster.

 “Now suppose someone came along and asked, “What was the one big push that caused this thing to go so fast?” You wouldn’t be able to answer; it’s just a nonsensical question. Was it the first push? The second? The fifth? The hundredth? No! It was all of them added together in an overall accumulation of effort applied in a consistent direction. Some pushes may have been bigger than others, but any single heave—no matter how large

—reflects a small fraction of the entire cumulative effect upon the flywheel..”

• Same with answer writing. If you write enough answers and finally become good at it, can you point to that one answer or one test that made all the difference? You cannot. It’s the cumulative effect of good answers, bad answers, and crappy answers.
• Success is not a matter of overnight transformation but many small steps forged together toward a certain direction. As you write, so shall you improve. It is going to be a slow, painful process but consistent effort is the way towards it.
• So don’t just read this book and be under the impression that it alone is sufficient. Think of it like getting fit. You won’t get fit by reading or strategising about it. You get fit only by exercising. So, start small, write one answer per day and use the advice in this book to improve the answer the next day. The book is merely a guide to help you navigate the territory. To improve, you must first make the journey. And to start the journey, don’t wait for some elusive motivation. Start before you are ready.