Procrastination is not just a poor habit, but a mental health issue.

As an aspirant I faced the problem of procrastination in my early preparation days. At that time, I couldn’t exactly pinpoint why I was doing so. But I was able to overcome this through some introspection and actions that helped me.

I would like to share some of those techniques to beat procrastination with aspirants and students. You can follow these techniques, but remember these work only if you commit yourself to truly introspecting and follow it up with actions.

1. Identify your Desire
   • Desire is a powerful emotion. It is what kick starts your journey towards what you want.
   • For example, your desire to be an IAS officer, a pilot, an entrepreneur, a scientist, or becoming CEO of an MNC. Without an inherent desire, it is difficult to find the direction you are moving into.
   • Therefore, introspect and identify your desire. What drives you?
   • Remember, the process to be followed for achieving your desire is going to be tough, very tough. For me, I wanted to be in the IAS, the process was so difficult and full of mental health issues and struggles.
   • But that being said, desire must exist. If your desire is not strong enough, you will not have a goal to move towards.
2. Pleasure and Process go hand in hand — develop them
   • Most great things in life are a marathon, not a sprint. Most memorable cricket innings are those from the Test matches, not T20s!
   • Similarly, most of the desires in life need you to develop a process that you have fun going through.
   • If Sachin Tendulkar just wanted to become a great cricketer (his desire) it wasn’t enough! He had to develop a rigorous physical and mental routine, a very good process to get there. Along the way, he also had fun through the journey.
   • When you are studying for UPSC, develop a strong process — which means, time table, small but achievable goals, check list, dedicated time slots to take tests etc. This is the process.
   • But have fun while doing it. Try to connect with other good aspirants online. Learn from them. Compete with them. Talk with them. Take out time for family and take breaks when you achieve these goals. Make the process worth doing it!
   • I used to do this by taking small breaks every week with an episode of Friends, or a movie, or just going to see a historical site in Delhi — learning with fun!
3. Address your fear of failure early in the journey
   • Procrastination also happens due to fear of failure.
   • You can beat fear of failure by addressing it early in your journey.
   • To do so, remember and remind yourself of two things:
     1. The outcome actually does not matter, the journey does. ‘Karma’ matters, not the ‘Phal’ — this is the most powerful motivation technique. The day you stop worrying about the result and focus on the process, the Karma, you truly have moved 1 step closer to the goal.
     2. Failure is not actually failure — Failure is one step closer to success hidden in many negative emotions. Failure feels horrible, but trust me, if you learn from your failure, you are beating so so many negative emotions and getting there!
4. Where to start, just do it!
   • Procrastination also happens when you don’t know where to start.
   • Let me give you a simple tip, just start. Push yourself to take that extra step. There is no other alternative solution. It doesn’t matter where you start, as long as you do..

I say, just think about the above things. Contemplate on them. Take baby steps. I am sure you can beat your procrastination like I did 🙂

This is a good question. I have personally done this. So, please let me highlight my view on this here. Perhaps it will help some aspirants in a similar dilemma and also provide an understanding of what the civil services (my experience in the IAS) is all about.

At the end of the day, this question is about personal preference:

Whether you want to be rich with money or rich with varied life experiences. What do you value more, a huge bank balance or a huge trail of diverse challenges and life-changing opportunities.

That is what IAS is all about, a medley of rich life experiences, not the money. These experiences will start in training with village visits, heated class discussions, life changing experiences in treks, the incredible Bharat Darshan and continue there after in the career where you will see many ups and downs, fight battles against vested interests, coordinate and work with some of the best minds in the world including our political leadership which has many good people, working for the people towards a vision of our country, deliver justice, create programs and implement them that penetrate every aspect of life in our country.

You will wear many hats, that of an executive magistrate, CEO of smart cities, CEO of District Development Councils, and leadership position pretty much everywhere in the public sector and some in the private sector too, where it really matters. In a nutshell, you will do EVERYTHING my friend.

Training and People in the Civil Services. Many of the best minds continue to join the IAS and that too with amazing backgrounds. It is a diverse batch of some of the smartest people I have worked with (and yes, I have worked with some really smart people). They are doctors, engineers, ex-military personnel, individuals with foreign degrees and work experiences, scientists, and so on.

The training of the IAS at LBSNAA is world class. Specialists in education, health, social sector, infrastructure development and law (from universities like Harvard, Wharton etc.) teach us. The modules are a combination of both theoretical and practical experiences in the field. I believe no private sector company in the world today can match the kind of intensive training IAS get.

Salaries: You will start with about Rs. 6–7 lakh per annum and the apex salary today is around 28–32 lakh per annum. It increases gradually over the career, however it cannot match the salaries offered by most private companies at the middle-higher end of the spectrum.

For the same reason you will mostly end up retiring considerably richer in the private sector.

As I explained earlier, the debate is Salaries vs. Intangibles. You decide. You want a lot of money, please do not join the civil services.

Political Interference and Quality of Political Leaders: Yes it is there. Vested interests are present everywhere, and more so in civil services. However, let’s not paint the picture with one colour. A large number of political leaders in our country are working with good intentions, and working very hard for the people. It is a mix bag, just like in everything there is.

Even in the private sector a ton of corruption exists. It is very easy to get disillusioned with such instances. After all, we are humans! We fight, quarrel and commit mistakes. Let us be more open minded about nature of these things.

Service of the nation: Everyone of us is serving the nation in one way or the other. We are all contributing in bits and pieces.

The political leadership and civil servants have a more direct responsibility to do so, since it is their duty (just like another citizen) but more importantly it is also their job. Therefore, I proudly say that I have joined the IAS because I want to serve my nation. It is one of the most important reasons to be in the service. To be able to remember Gandhiji’s talisman and work for the people.

The supreme leaders in our democracy are not politicians. It is the people. They are the ones we are all accountable to. Regardless of what come maybe, civil servants work tirelessly for the people. Like all of us, some burn out, some have other events in their lives that cause their attention to be diverted, but the larger goal is something we all are working hard towards, all the citizens I mean.

And therefore I say, civil Services has been and remains as one of the BEST way to serve our nation. Over the past few months, I traveled across India and saw the amazing work being done by so many SDMs, CEOs of ZPs, and DMs in their respective districts. I had a chance to live with the Armed Forces and they are doing equally amazing work too. I met farmers, nurses, doctors, NGO workers and many other people who are transforming their villages and cities working side by side with the civil servants. And so are other institutions. Both in rural areas and in cities, a new approach to administration and public service delivery has emerged and people and civil society have become an important part of it.

IAS is not just a DM. As an IAS, the idea is not to just limit our ability at the post of DM and we do not. DM is just one of the many exciting positions. The SDM and CEO Zila Parishad, which you are for first 6–7 years are cutting edge leadership positions that no other job in the world offers at such a young age. Would you be sitting at a laptop for 15 hours a day for that 50 lacs or hustling and bustling across and working with 100s of people to improve the lives of lakhs in your sub-division, alas only with 50k a month? The choice is yours 🙂

After the role of a DM, which in many cases lasts for as much as 4–6 years, you will be posted at higher Commissioner positions and then later policy making and implementation levels in the most important institutions of our country.

IAS has the most unique job content in the world. As an IAS, you will work with the people, governance councils, political leadership, media, NGOs and handle a variety of portfolios. You will a high amount of discretion and independence to truly change lives of a large number of people (as much as 5 lac – 2 million in a district, which is more than populations of many countries).

I have said enough 🙂

The world cannot be seen in black and white. And more than that, it cannot be seen only with the colour green, that is money. It is a complicated world out there and even more complicated are the choices that we have to make in our careers.

My only advice is, don’t make your choice on the basis of only money. If that’s what you want go for it, join Microsoft and become the next Nadella …oh wait, his dad was an IAS, so I guess this IAS did something right 🙂 Make the best of whatever you have and make yourself, your family and your country proud. And be happy!