Issue 01 · 2026
The Karma Yogi Journal. Field notes for the long grind.
- Essays
- 90
- Exam tracks
- 5
- Topics
- 59
The Lead
The essay we keep coming back to.
The Archive
Everything else worth reading, ordered by date.
Page 3 / 9 · 89 entries
GATE Negative Marking: The Expected-Value Guessing Rules
GATE runs three different marking regimes in one paper - MCQs punish a wrong guess, MSQ and NAT do not - and the guessing math is not the same question asked three times. Here is the expected-value arithmetic behind each one, worked from GATE's own published marking scheme.
CAT Vocabulary List: 500 Words, and Why Lists Alone Fail
A real list of CAT-relevant advanced words, plus the honest research on why memorising an isolated list transfers weakly to VARC - CAT tests usage in context, not synonym recall - and what actually builds working vocabulary: retrieval, not scanning.
CAT Mock Analysis Excel Template: What It Can and Cannot Do
A spreadsheet can log a CAT mock score in ten seconds. It cannot, without real maintenance, tell you which mock is due for its next revision pass, flag a section that has silently plateaued, or keep a session linked to the specific mock it was about. Here is the column schema to use if you build one anyway, and the three specific jobs where it breaks.
Best Study Tracker Apps for Competitive Exams, Compared
There is no single best study tracker - there are three genuinely different categories, and each one can represent some data and structurally cannot represent the rest. A fair comparison of generic habit trackers, spreadsheets, and exam-specific tools, by what each can and cannot store, not by marketing claims.
Best Time to Take a Mock Test: Match Your Exam Slot
This is not "when is the best time to study" - it is a narrower, testable claim: schedule your mocks at the same clock hour as your actual exam slot. The direct experiment that would prove this has never been run. Here is the real evidence that exists next to it, and why the recommendation still holds up anyway.
Why Mock Scores Plateau: 10 Weeks Flat in My Own Log
My overall mock score averaged 61.8, then 59.8, then 62.0 across three consecutive blocks of five - ten weeks of nothing. Underneath it VARC was gaining 7.8 marks and Quant was losing 3.4. The plateau was two real trends cancelling, which is also what the learning-curve research says a plateau usually is.
When to Start JEE Preparation: Class 9, 11 or Drop Year
There is no single right age to start JEE preparation, but the three real options - Class 9, Class 11, and a post-Class-12 drop year - trade off in ways that can actually be measured: total hours, calendar time, board-exam overlap, and how much of that time is spent on material JEE does not even examine yet.
Study Tracker Excel Template vs App: Where Sheets Break
A spreadsheet is genuinely the right tool for a short, low-volume tracking need, and it is the wrong one for a twelve-month exam cycle. Here are the five specific places mine broke, measured against my own log of 340 sessions and 20 mocks - plus the column schema to use if you build one anyway.
The 1-3-7 Revision Rule vs What Spaced Repetition Shows
"Revise after 1 day, 3 days and 7 days" is repeated across Indian exam-prep content with no cited source, and I could not find one either. Here is what the real spaced-repetition evidence says about a schedule that stops at day 7, and where it happens to be right anyway.
How Many Hours to Study for CAT? 20 Mocks, One Honest Answer
I logged 335 hours and sat 20 CAT mocks in the same three months, so I can check the question directly instead of guessing at it. The relationship is much weaker than the advice implies: elapsed preparation time explains 14% of the variation in any single mock, and the days available between two mocks predict the score change at r = 0.04, which is nothing.
Colophon
Written between mocks. Edited between sits.
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