on HOLD

“Its better to have lived your own destiny imperfectly than to have lived a perfect imitation of someone elses life”
- Bhagvad Gita



A couple of months back I met with a professor of mine, a very dynamic and intelligent lady with whom I had a chance to interact for a few months and then we lost touch. I got in touch with her recently, and after a year, and I was very glad I did. (I think for the first time I put, linkedin/facebook to some productive use)

Anyways, when I met her she told me about a very interesting research she was stumbling upon, she is now using all these networking sites to get in touch with the people she knew when she was 25, when she is almost 40 now, and she is asking them only one question.

Tell me what you did, in all these years?

Unfortunately, not many, infact most of them could not match the enthusiasm with which she asked the question. Most had lived the normal life (and by normal I mean well paid jobs, marriage, kids, loans,friends,drinks and few vacations, the usual), and now when they were 40 and forced to look at how they were when they were 25, they admitted how burnt out they were.

“I feel there was so much energy and enthusiasm that just got lost somewhere in just talking about it and never living it”

Most of them burnt out by the time they reached their mid 30s, most of them never took out time for themselves, time it seems was running out and they were in this race which they wanted to win but had no clue why and what for.

The world/society makes us do funny things, makes us believe we want something we actually don’t, and makes us want to be like someone we think we do but we really don’t.

This information was shared to me by her, on the day I was contemplating the biggest change in my life. I decided to tread the unconventional path, I decided to never talk about salary packages and glance through the catalogues of Prada.

I decided to never look at how much loan would it take for a car, I decided never to think about what money could buy for me and instead think what I could do in my life and with experiences.

This decision was my buffer to that question at 40.
Tell me what did you in all these years.

If I ever woke up to realize I never did anything but live the way the world has made me believe I should, I know I would have regretted it. I would have hated myself.

So I decided, I decided to quit my job, put those papers in and go do what I really believe I want to.

And I did exactly that.

Don’t get me wrong though, we do need that car, and house, we all want kids and will take loans for a better life.

I will do that too. Just….. not now. Its not my time yet. I have something else I want to do. So I will put all these things on HOLD.

(For those who don’t know what I am doing visit : http://www.teachforindia.com/
For those who do : wish me luck!)