The Change which is FELT and not SEEN

Our family and our extended family used to get together for every festival. All of my cousins, including me, were relatively young. Our parents used to tease us for not sharing the same level of bonding and openness that my dad and their cousins shared. I was very shy during that period. I was always being referred to as a balloon by the elders. I got this name as I spoke very little, used to get upset on small things, and then occupy some corner of the house with my chubby cheeks. These get-togethers were the breaking point where I realized that I had to be outspoken. I need to learn to speak up, I need to have an opinion and be ready to share it no matter what others think. I had known that if I don’t work on this, this is going to limit my success and stop me from reaching my full potential.

Every intention that I have set for myself is with the thought that one day I reach a state where I no longer have to think or plan any action. Take care of all my personal and professional responsibilities in an extremely sound manner. I’d rather just flow. I’ve always wanted my thoughts to flow, my words to flow, my actions to flow, my life to flow, every aspect of my life to flow. Probably this is what I perceived life to be. All my childhood I thought that I was the only child that struggled with execution, jealousy, overthinking, fear of speech, etc. until proven otherwise… I wish that my life is like a river. I’d flow, carve out my path, obstacles making my flow beautiful.

Due to the childhood experience which I shared above, I very much hesitated in sharing personal things. I mostly kept them to myself. Not sharing with anyone at all. This was because these experiences had a deep impact on me. But I had also started to realize patterns where I couldn’t make my friendships stronger, relationships deeper because whatever we discussed and whatever we did was very much on a basic level. There was hesitancy in being vulnerable. I then realized that

1) For people to know who I am on the inside,
2) To connect with them more on a personal level and share a good bond,

I had to be vulnerable, shed off whatever doubts, fear of judgment, fear of losing out people(this I still have) and I did so.
I was watching Steve Jobs address the Stanford graduates at their convocation ceremony and he mentions that getting fired from his own company was the best thing that could have happened to him. I could relate to this because when I look back now, failure in achieving the desired results was the best thing that happened to me then.

I say so because 

• My very basic flaws came to the forefront which if left untreated would have hampered my journey in the long run.
• I understood what it is like to fail, the emotions you go through, the internal battle of emotions that takes place, the importance of finding out the reasons that led you where you are right now.
• I could do Enterprise, be amongst the people with the mindset that I had always wanted to. I thought of doing all this  but couldn’t before because I just lacked the will to do it all on my own.
• It set me up for life and made me understand at a very young age how real life works and is not what we think it is really.

I worked on 6+ projects, wrote blogs, hosted events, pushed myself like crazy, was vulnerable and I made sure that when I look back at this journey 5/10 years down the line, I shouldn’t have one single regret. I developed bonds like no other which carry great importance in my life. I became a part of something whose culture was in sync with what I always had dreamt of. Confidence does not come from birth but you rather have to create it and I have done it. My mom always says that whatever you do, always do it with a good intention in mind no matter what. It reflects in the work I have done and the bond I share with everyone in the Enterprise community.

Enterprise has been a journey of transformation for me. I have been through tons of changes, which might not be visible because they were mental changes but I’m sure they’ll be game-changing in the long term. I move on to the next chapter of my life with confidence that when I was going through a rough phase in my life, I analyzed myself, made a note of my flaws, worked on them extensively, made them a part and parcel of my life and now these flaws have converted into some strongest personality traits of mine. Any problem, any change, any difficult phase, anything whatsoever that might happen, one thing I know for sure is I have the right mindset, right people around me, and strong will to come out on top no matter what.