UPSC :: Pause and Think :: Thinking is required the most in this exam.

If anything which is going to help you the most in the UPSC exam , your art of thinking.

Obviously when you are a beginner,your mind gets stuck in market news that there is a lot to read , get these notes , start reading the book fast , read as much as you can.

But all these initially are going to burn you a lot.obviosuly there is huge and lot to read , but there is a process which you need to learn first.If you learn the correct process initially, further preparation journey will be smooth.

If you can simply remember one Mantra from day 1 of your Start of preparation , whatever happens , you will stay calm and think first and then proceed to the Next.

Whether you are reading the syllabus or the previous year’s question to understand this exam.Always remember to think.

Do not fear or do not doubt yourself, your thinking is very much personal and hidden inside your mind.No body is going to see there , when you are thinking.

Your courage to take pause and think will save a lot of time in your preparation.Because there are lots of opinions or strategies floating in the market.Might be just by listening to some recommendations,you end up reading a book for 2 months, which may not be required.And another 15 days you will waste time to regret for your blind decision.

Even let’s say some issue is floating in the news and you are mindlessly following every editorial and analysis of that news for 10 days .But you have this habit of pause and think,you will control your rushing mind to stop and read as much which is required.So that you can cover other parts of syallabus and exam requirements.

Now come to the most important challenge in this exam , how to hold this much knowledge and produce this knowledge in limited time in exam.Either through taking quick decisions in prelims and writing mains answers under limited time pressure.

Again here your practice and giving extra effort to pause and think will help you more.Because thinking creates neural pathways in your brain.This neural pathways help you to recall or recreate the context faster when you reproduce the concept for the second time.recalling , thinking, writing become more faster on every iteration.

So when you have done enough thinking of concepts,that enough thinking is going to help you to write answers in less time and solve MCQ in less time.

Thinking is also a process of knowing what is right or wrong.When you indulge yourself in thinking,your emotions, intuition, consciousness – all get activated.So with more imagination you learn the art of finding the right reasons.This trains your mind to think right in the exam preparation situation.

Now come to some wrong processes which will kill your thinking.

As a human being we are a bit impulsive and willing to find a solution as fast as we can .This impulsive behaviour in real life also makes us make very wrong decisions.

This happens with aspirants also ,in impulse,they just pick up notes , strategy of someone and start mugging up or rote learning.you do not give enough time to your brain to think.

That’s when students who finish all syllabus by mugging up notes and think they can now perform their best.Their confidence gets shattered when they first attempt to solve mca or write an answer.

When they get so many questions wrong and are not even able to write a few lines , they then start panicking and question himself, what is happening? I have real all but not able to perform.

Then after making a mistake and wasting time for 1-2 years , students understand it was not an exam of finishing syallabus..It is the exam of thinking, understanding, conceptualising and then presenting.

So all the Aspirants, those who are putting your heart in this preparation.Embrace the habit of thinking from the beginning.

Kumud Kishore

Teaches History & Answer Writing | UPSC Mentor

Zenstudy IAS

📞 9831078729