Carry On...

“Though I've never been through hell like that

I've closed enough windows to know you can never look back

If you're lost and alone 
Or you're sinking like a stone. 
Carry on. 
May your past be the sound 
Of your feet upon the ground. 
Carry on.”

We live in self-righteous worlds of our own… Fair Enough!! How can you blame it when on the other turn of the face you will tell us to be confident of ourselves and be who we really are!! So imagine a world with multiple worlds of each individuals, each with its own beliefs, virtues of right and wrong, opportunities and challenges, excitements and hardships. Imagine a conflict in such a world where you feel you are always right in your own world and hardly care to make people understand because after all, they wouldn’t understand because they they are submerged in their own worlds while nodding their heads and smiling at your face!!

Life is cruel. Life is a challenge. Emotions are dying and people refrain to either accept it or drown in their busy and melancholic lives and would go, “Do I need to cry to show you, asshole!!” No, of course not! All you need to do is this: You need to care to come out of your “world” and see the other “worlds” because this is why we are essentially born for… To give a chance for the other “worlds” to smile, to bring some excitement to other “worlds”, care to listen to the hardships of other “worlds” and be mature enough the accept the deviation of these “worlds” from your own. Well.. This is not it. There is more. Finally, you need to let go of these “worlds”!!

We miss some people.. We miss them so bad that you hardly feel like doing anything, eating, sleeping or talking. We have all these silent conversations in our heads with the people we miss and just wish that they somehow magically are able to hear these silent conversations. In these conversations, we laugh with them, we fight with them, we calm each other down, and this cycle goes on. You read previous chats and see photos in vain. And later, you end up realizing that all these things were utter waste of time and feel like a nail hammered down your heart. Aren’t these relations so weird? We don’t even know how we end up being so close and yet so far. We prioritize relations and then choose one over the other. And before long, you have to let go. 

It’s isn’t so easy to let go… to “Carry On”!! Their names come in daily conversations with your friends and family. They grow up to ignore you and call themselves “mature” and you fight with your own thoughts of “immaturity”. You always think about how they were when they first met you and how you wish that things are always like those times. You think about the time when you cared for each other, smiled with each other and made up after fighting a numerous times. You start to question the very genuineness of the relationship but later feel that it could not have been wrong after all. So, now you are confused, helpless and on the verge on doing something which is not so clever and strong. There you go.. The sweet recipe of Disaster!!

This is not the end. Because people come and go.. But memories don’t! They stay strong with you and trust me, after this short phase is done and dusted, these memories will stay in your head and there would be lots that you have learnt from each relationship.  Maybe it’s not the end of your relationship even. You never know. You can just hope!! Anyways, Life moves on… Life is magical. Let the dice keep rolling.

The Great B-School Hoopla

Placements – The dream for which an MBA student spends lots of sleepless nights. HUL, ITC, P&G, Nestle, Citi Bank, GeP, Amozon,… These are the names that he thinks in his mind and tightens his grip in his tight fist. Yeah, of course there would be those superladies and supergentlemen who get through PPOs in their Summer Internship with a bit of talent, a bit of hard work and a bit… No, a lot of networking!! Be it as it may be, if I were to give you just one advice for Final Placements friends… It has to be – DO NOT BE A PART OF IT. Get out with a PPO in your Summers with an effort of your lifetime and enjoy your B School Life.

Well, there has to be many others like me who would not have been ripe enough to be plucked during the Summers. Well, it shouldn’t matter to you if you know the reason you couldn’t make it all the way and the aspects you need to improve yourself in the next one year. For instance, for me it was to improve my technical knowledge and developing a practical and thorough insight of my Domain – Supply Chain. After all, it isn’t your end of life. Move on and say to yourself, “So what?” Enjoy the fact that the best in the Campus are getting a PPO and it’s your competition that reduces for the finale - Final Placements!! And if you are on the greener side, beware of the complacency.

Being in Placement Committee taught me various lessons. Time Management, Understanding of requirements of the recruiters, Leadership Qualities, Crisis Management, blah blah… Sorry I got driven by the bullshit answers you got to give during interviews. Well you know what’s the biggest asset of being a Placecommer?? Here it is – You are undoubtedly a part of the best minds of the Campus, some awesomely gifted self-committed, self-driven and creative people who pushes you each minute to newer limits which you never even expected out of yourself!!

Handling the various processes, organizing major events and involved in a lot of placement-related activities throughout the year never gave me the freedom to concentrate full-fledged on my studies. Frankly, I never wanted to anyways.. Or neither did I ever do though out my career. So as the days closed down to my Finals Placements, I started to keep myself in seclusion more and more. I started spending more time in my room with Supply Chain books or at gym. You always need a special company to keep you going and letting your fears and emotions out. Frankly, there is nothing you can be told back that can pacify you but it’s just about someone you care listening to you and saying, “It’s Okay”. I have been lucky in this way as I can thinking about not just one but many close friends.

The first day was a nightmare. I started with an IT profile, got to the last round, rejected… then a SCM profile, again got to final round, rejected… then a Marketing profile, selected for the first round and my dilemma with it cost me the opportunity. For once, I realized that being on the other side and wearing your name tag on your suit is very different from wearing the Placecommer Tag. On the second morning all I did is brush up my Summers, heard some inspiring song (on any other day I would have been face-hiding-embarrassed by this) and pledged to myself that this is the last time that I am going upstairs for the process as a candidate instead of a Placecommer helping others with getting their jobs – My actual Job!!

So 3 hours from this, I got my first job of my life!! Thank you so much to everyone who were a part of this. Well, it’s 2-3 days of stardom and then it’s all the same guys. So make friends, love others and enjoy life. And a new phase of my life starts which scares me sometimes, but you know what… Bring It On!! :)