Feeling Nervous

The MBA is finally getting on to my nerves. I did not get shortlisted for a role which has always been my dream job. While I was aware that it is very difficult to convert that particular role I never imaged that I would not even get through the initial short list. Feeling dejected I started to question the whole reason of doing an MBA. Entertaining counter-factual thinking, wondering what would I be doing if I were still in my old job makes me more sad. The whole things is difficult to deal with at this moment. I might laugh it off once I get through this but I can clearly see that getting through is definitely not going to be easy.

With all these thoughts going on I am at a critical point which makes me wish that the entire universe ceases to exist - right now at this very moment as I type. Thinking about job, career, EMIs, and not to mention marriage and settling in life - all things make getting though this moment more difficult. It's not like I am bad at studies. I am doing decent and would be in top 10% of the class at a decent MBA school. So if I am so stressed about life I can only imagine how others would be feeling. May be they do not stress so much and just go easy. What's the point of all my education if more of it is only making me more nervous? If ignorance is bliss why am I trudging towards knowledge and success?

B School is a tough place to survive. If not for anything else the sheer element of comparison and competition sucks the fun out of learning leaving us gasping for some sort of validation of our capabilities to reassure ourselves that we are not here by accident but rather our achievements. I doubt if I will ever be successful with this state of mind as my fickle definition of success itself keeps changing. That man, whose definition of success is not his own, has already lost even before he begins. I am lost in a way for I don't know what I truly seek as I keep seeking what others desire. 

Feelings of farewell

Do you remember the feeling that you have as you say bye to someone you would be missing so much. I used to have it a lot as a kid. After every summer when I said good bye to my cousins it was always there. It used to come back ten times worse when I had to say good bye to mom. I never understood why one has to go through such feeling. Why can't we all be together forever when we enjoy each other's company so much?

I do not feel that anymore. I am trying hard to remember how it feels like and I might have an idea of how it would feel like but there is no way for me to be sure if I cannot experience it ever again. When I was a kid I always wished that I never had that feeling again and now it is strange that I am wishing for the very same thing. When we are with someone special time flies by and though we enjoy every passing second we barely pause for a moment to reflect on how happy we are at that instant. Only during these partings do we really perceive the depth of our bonding. We need these moments of farewell to pause and be grateful for the relations and bonds we hold.

My life has been mostly running away from things. For some reason I feel more comfortable among total strangers than among familiar faces. I wish I go back to my older self and I wish I get that feeling once more. I wish that I meet someone who makes me feel that way again. A while back I thought I found one. My heart should have broken into pieces when I said farewell to her knowing very well that I might never see her again. Instead I felt relieved that it would now be easy to forget her. It makes me a bit sad but not very much because I tell myself that even though I still try to remember, she would have completely forgotten about me. Well, life is complicated and random and I am trying to keep it as simple as I can by not taking any chances. But what chance do I have of meeting someone then?

She haunts me

I was planning to meet L for a while. She recently had a loss in her family but I couldn't muster the courage to go check on her. I am usually lost for words in such situations and the whole thing makes me very uncomfortable. I typically don't have anything better to say; and I typically choose not to go. But this was not a typical situation.

It has been too long now so I finally managed to drag myself to her place. She looked very pale with a gloomy dead expression that made me cringe as if it were my fault. The interior made me restless, so I asked her out for a walk. I often find walks refreshing especially the ones taken during twilight as I get to put 'life' on hold and drift around pointlessly. Alas this wasn't one of those walks and I could feel the pressure of the situation as we strolled. The silence between us was interspersed with scant words and she barely looked at me all the while. Things were over between us but I realized how I could never get her out of my head and for a moment there I hated myself for thinking about my feelings at such an odd moment. As I bid good night I felt how she sensed the desperation in my eyes but all she could reciprocate was pity. I hated myself once again for making her feel that way. Nevertheless all hope was not lost as I would be extremely delighted to even settle for pity, if not love.

She looked better the next time I saw her. She was holding a flier about a forest trek, studying it intensely.  On the spur of the moment, with her head still down, she blurted out 'N shall we go?' and N gave her the quintessential boyfriend look of dismissal. Sometimes in life you grasp so much in tiny little moments and this was my moment. She realized my presence and gazed at me for a while before she asked if I was interested. But by then I was already all torn up as my heart broke into a billion pieces. It felt as if someone was stabbing my heart over and over again. As always she could see what was going on with me but I was totally oblivious to everything else as I brooded over the reality of my situation.

I felt a deep unbearable pain in the heart that lasted for a very long time. Deep down I had a sliver of doubt that this might happen one day but being an eternal romantic I always hoped that things would work out. You love someone so deep and blind with all your heart but love can be piercing cold when it mocks at your misery. The jolt was long due and I had better move on as it was not romantic anymore; rather pathetic. Utterly hopeless that I am, I gravely wished I could move on.

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"Ok relax!" I said to myself as I heaved myself out my bed. That was a terrifying dream which made me gasp as I made sense of my surroundings. Through it was a dream, the characters and events are real - the me, the L and the N and not the least the rejection. And in some way the situation was a reconstruction of what really happened.. in a very vague sense so to say. But when I got up I was actually feeling the pain in my heart. It was as painful as it was in the dream and it was a very long time before it eased off. Phew! I am mid-way through my end terms, two down and two more to go. I slept for more than six hours which in itself is a crime at a Bschool especially during the exams but the dream was bad enough to keep me alert for the next 16 straight hours of study! I learned more about Supply Chain Management in these hours than I had in the entire part of my former life. Of course I kept thinking about L and I just couldn't get her out of my mind for the next day or so. I barely know her and I do not even remember her face anymore but she still haunts me. The weirdest part was the real physical pain I felt - excruciating to the core! My dreams are a mystery. They are powerful, scary yet motivational too. They fill me up with energy which gets me to trudge through the rough parts. They are as much a part of me as my real life is!

- 04 Oct 14 12:16 PM