I AM ABSOLUTELY CLUELESS ABOUT MY FUTURE….

I AM ABSOLUTELY CLUELESS ABOUT MY FUTURE

Right upfront, I have no idea what I will be doing even 2 years later.

I am more certain about what I do NOT want to be doing. I do not feel like practising medicine for the rest of my life. Studying MBBS at one of India’s top colleges, and having spent my life surrounded by doctors (practically my entire family), I have come to realise that I do not enjoy medicine as much as most doctors and med students do.

Even before joining MBBS, unlike most aspirants, I wasn’t excited about starting the course. Somewhere I felt like I was only settling, perhaps because I was not ready to take the bolder step. I had an opportunity to pursue research at IISc Bangalore, but somehow, I couldn’t commit to not becoming a doctor, something that felt like was my parent’s dream for me. Now that I understand myself better, I know that I’ve been operating out of a deep-seated fear of failure and disappointing people, and that has paralysed me into inaction, into hearing others’ voices over my own.

This insight has been somewhat liberating for me, in that it has empowered me to not give into the same fears again. I am determined to at least give myself a solid chance this time. And I am extremely fortunate to have parents that support me with this decision of mine.

I read something to the tune of “It isn’t failure if you learn from it”. As someone who has always feared failure, I am slowly embracing failing and taking my lessons gracefully.

I have tried carrying a façade of perfection for quite some time, when deep down I’ve been a very confused, chaotic mess. Wish I had known earlier the absolute fierce beauty that was contained in that chaos, but I do now.

That was a lot of very poetic words to say that I am basically ‘going with the flow’ with my life, at least for now.

I am not really preparing for any competitive exams or applications for any masters courses, because I really have no idea if I want to pursue any. Might seem weird considering I am someone who LOVESSSS learning.

I just feel called to creating some form of content on the internet, this blog is something that genuinely excites me and so here I am, pouring all of myself out.

One thing I do know is that I cannot put myself into a box of one stream, one career, one culture, one lifestyle. I have never been happy about NOT learning Economics or Comp Science after class 10, and I have definitely not been happy about the MBBS curriculum, which I feel trains doctors at the cost of teaching them the core life-skills necessary for any human, at a very crucial age in life (i.e., the transitioning phase into adulthood and independence).

I like to describe myself as a person who is made for multidisciplinary work, and I strongly believe, at the very core of my being, that that is what the world needs right now.

I can see no other escape from this dilemma (lest our true aim be lost for ever) than that some of us should venture to embark on a synthesis of facts and theories, albeit with second-hand and incomplete knowledge of some of them -and at the risk of making fools of ourselves.

-Erwin Schrodinger (‘What is life’)

So, I am out in the world, trying to figure out how to make this vision of mine a reality for my life.

As I do so, I want to be documenting the process, and thus this website (among other reasons).

I have no idea where I am headed, but I am oddly excited about the journey. If you share my excitement, I’ll love to have you accompany me. ;D