Can I Have It All Read online

  I moved to Delhi, commenced my degree and fell in love with the subject. I realised great teachers and mentors make a big difference. Unlike school, where teachers treated us like children (as we were!), college opened my mind and more mature relationships with professors transformed my worldview. I embraced every aspect of the subject from social, child and criminal psychology, various approaches, experiments, and best of all abnormal psychology, which came with a warning. With the introduction of each new chapter we studied in abnormal psychology, we had the feeling that these specific conditions existed within us! Scared and anxious, we thanked our stars to further find that they existed in each individual and it’s the extremes that create the problem. However, our professors held us together as they had seen many such mad hatters pass through their lecture rooms. Anyway, I loved the subject as it taught me how each of us stores multi-faceted aspects of our personality, in a disguised way. It was great fun to unravel the amazing mysteries of the human mind.

  In retrospect, I’d say psychology was the right decision, the subject, and my mind and heart were aligned, which led to a wonderful outcome, and I was a gold medalist for three straight years. Given what I had let go in medical school and the unspoken expectations of my parents, I felt an over-arching need to prove myself. During those three years I focused only on college studies, with limited interactions and social life. I had some great friends but I used my time much more wisely as I saw it as an investment to earn a great future!

  I immersed myself passionately into the subject. I began to believe that this was what I wanted to the specialise in. I contemplated the future and started to plan to go to the United States for further studies. But destiny had something else in store for me.

  In retrospect, the college experience made me realise that when you give yourself fully to what you really like, you can get more than hundred per cent returns. The passion for what you love to do so much, transforms that work/study into a fulfilling feeling that leads to rewards beyond what you may have asked for. I learnt the value of relentless focus, ability to zoom in and out of a situation and acquired in-depth knowledge of my favourite theories of Gestalt or systems that I leverage till date. This purpose of making an impact in life got more refined though the milestones were fuzzy and the future a bit hazy…but it was taking form behind those clouds.

  WONDERS OF AN OPEN MIND

  During my third year of college, as stated earlier, I was planning to go to the US to pursue further studies. I worked through months to do my diligence, applications, ran around every information centre in Delhi for guidance, when one of my professors, Mrs Kapoor, whom I respected the most, called me in for a chat. What was to follow was going to change the course of my life forever.

  Oblivious to this, I was looking forward to meeting Mrs. Kapoor that winter evening in Delhi. Surprisingly, in spite of the biting cold, the day felt fresh and the sun shone magically with a glint of warmth on the green grass carpets of our college. I had put together a file of all my applications, college documents, recommendations and details that explained how much I wanted to discuss with Mrs. Kapoor that evening. I was also looking forward to the lovely ginger tea that she always offered when we visited her home. I simply loved the way she prepared that special cup of tea, served with some cookies.

  I picked up my file at five in the evening and hurriedly walked towards Mrs Kapoor’s house which was at the other end of the college. Clearly, I was keen to maximise every minute of my time with her. She was the Head of the Department and someone who had supported and mentored me as I worked on my grades.

  Mrs Kapoor greeted me with a calm smile and then we both sank into comfortable chairs in her living room. The delicious ginger tea arrived with smoke curling over the cup, enticing me to pick it up without any hesitation. I started to update Mrs Kapoor on where I was with my application process. Till then, it had not dawned on me as to why she had really called me there, until she interrupted me after ten minutes and requested me to hold these thoughts. It left me a bit perplexed. She really couldn’t be talking about final exams which were almost four months away. Mrs Kapoor lowered her cup of tea on the table and looked at me with a radiant smile.

  ‘Anu, I am so ecstatic to see the passion that you have for this subject. Which part of psychology really excites you?’

  ‘Mrs. Kapoor, I like all of the strands, but clearly the industrial, criminal and abnormal, stand out for me!’ I said. This was also evident in my grades and she was well aware of it.

  ‘Hmmm.there is a similarity in all these three strands. you are rectifying something that is broken whilst building on new concepts. All require mind power and tend to have an impact on behaviour and functioning of the human mind by being reactive and proactive at the same time.’ She continued, ‘The other strands of psychology are more developmental and far more long-term in nature.’

  Now I was really confused about where this was all going. Yes, I liked these subjects and would have probably specialised in industrial if I went overseas.

  Mrs Kapoor continued, ‘Anu, you have a commercial mind that thinks and executes at the same time. I have looked at your MBTI scores and a few more diagnostics. In my view, you are ready to get into the commercial world wherein you can leverage your education in psychology. One of the upcoming, emerging streams in India is Business Education. I am not sure you have thought it through.’

  I was now extremely confused as I had not studied Commerce or Economics that would typically be the subjects that lead people from Delhi University into an MBA course. The discussions continued and Mrs. Kapoor turned the thought-reflection mirror towards me, sharing how she had seen me excel in certain topics and enjoy certain experiments. She continued and said that she had noticed my ability to connect psychology to the corporate world at large and not just social work. She encouraged me to think about Management in light of the impact I wanted to create, fuelled by my self-reliance and that feisty drive to get out there and do different things. I walked away after a couple of hours slightly clearer and slightly confused but convinced. I knew I needed to give management a shot, while I concurrently apply to the US universities.

  As destiny would have it, or maybe Mrs Kapoor saw something that I couldn’t…I took the Common Admission Test (CAT) and got calls from various business schools, including a few IIMs, XLRI and FMS. Post-discussion with the faculty (and of course Mrs Kapoor) I decided to go to XLRI and specialise in HR as that would help me leverage my learnings and groom me for the corporate world.

  I realised the value of having an open mind and the willingness to evaluate options objectively. Given how this lesson changed the course of my life, I hold it very dear and practise it to the hilt, even to this day.

  ONE BOLD STEP LEADS TO ANOTHER

  It was a beautiful monsoon morning when I woke up in the Beldi club in Jamshedpur. The light breeze gently kissed my face welcoming and preparing me for what was in store. My parents had come to drop me to Xaviers Labour Relations Institutes (XLRI) and I looked again hopelessly at the three bulky suitcases I was carrying. I had given up on explaining to my mother why I did not need so many things anymore. I just wanted to let her rejoice that finally her rebellious, deviant daughter was probably taking her life a little more seriously than she had thought.

  My parents did not know much about Management leave alone Human Resources. Management Education was becoming as fashionable in those days, as probably e-commerce is today. A few friends of my parents had affirmed my decision, which had been a big relief for them. They were further assured by the fact that most students from this college got decent jobs irrespective of what they did there!

  We entered the XLRI main gate. The campus seemed quaint yet cosy. There was a calming scent of fresh, wet soil from the rain showers overnight. The trees looked washed and the flowers smiled at us, welcoming us to the XLRI campus. There was something about the place that I took an instant liking to and it has stayed with me for a lifetime.

  I settled
in the girls’ hostel with one of my batchmates; classes began, seniors arrived and we gradually settled into the routine, studies, and the ways of the professors, etc.

  Business school campuses usually operate in a world of their own. A happy bubble that we lived in for two years and I enjoyed every moment of it from the day I entered campus to the day we had our final farewell party.

  The big difference for me was the motley group of people I met and I learnt from. It was not always about what we learnt in the class but a lot more about what we learnt off classes in the dining hall, music room and walking in the garden or while sitting with friends under the Bodi tree. Doing project work late at night over the most tasty Maggi, fried in tomato and onion, egg bhurji and ginger tea! Those precious moments are stored in my treasured memoirs forever.

  There were of course many romantic plays in the works and our batch was much more diverse with more women students. Hence, it was furiously poached by the senior batch for possible matches.

  Here is where I found my partner, Sandeep, who was a senior and, at the onset, very different from me, both socially and intellectually. An engineer from Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) was not really my idea of a life partner! We spent some time among friends and our relationship blossomed from thereon. I realised we were different but complemented each other well.

  My business school education taught me social skills and the agility to flex my style with very different people. Many of our peers were engineers and probably far more analytical and quick on their feet than I was! A few peers from Mumbai University and Delhi University always lagged behind these geeks in grades and of course, attendance! Students in the class had enrolled from almost more than a dozen states; you could see cliques forming depending on cultural or social background. During this period I learnt to deal with people from varied backgrounds, managed them, made friends with some and stayed away from some. Maybe my psychology background helped me read the undertones and unsaid messages.

  Another important feature during this phase was peer learning. As much as there were relevant topics discussed in the class with professors, a lot of the learning really took place from peers and classmates. Various debates, teamwork (sometimes lack of it) during assignments, understanding each other’s perspectives, sometimes agreeing with diverse thoughts and sometimes disagreeing with them – made my mind grow and helped me develop a different perspective that broadened my mind.

  I could feel that after the stress of college we were beginning to come into our own. It gave us empowerment and autonomy of execution on our careers. Not that decision-making for me was an issue since school or college, XLRI however, taught me considerate decision-making for the right impact, weighing and analysing issues and outcomes, rather than jumping to conclusions at the spur of the moment. It taught me to respect and manage constructively the challenges thrown at you by peers, without getting negative about it.

  I felt better and stronger every day!

  XLRI also taught us how to enjoy our work. It taught us how you can have fun (and romance) with friends on campus, working on building our future brick-by-brick, while completing our course. We worked hard and we played hard. Our campus was an oasis in Jamshedpur and there was very little to do offcampus, so we all seemed very contained in our little world as if nothing else existed.

  As we built our perspective my purpose to make an impact, make a difference and be somebody distinct to my family, strengthened even further. As a small child in Rishikesh, I used to play with friends in a big garden at my mother’s hospital. Very often, when we spotted a helicopter or an aircraft in the sky, we used to run after it till we reached the edge of the garden hoping one day we could fly in one of those. Fly we did two decades later…so much so that there has been no looking back. XLRI provided me with the wings to fly.

  My purpose got further refined with how to do things and I tightened my seat belt to take my first fight on my final placement day post the two-year course, in January, 1994! XLRI had provided me with the much-needed network, access to learning and confidence, which would be a coveted treasure in the times to come.

  As any business school graduate will share with you, the two-year joyful ride ends with a traumatising placement process. The countdown to this moment is built over months with the placement committee working furiously with various companies, to ensure the best roles to open up on campuses which we had to compete for. However, it is a socialistic process wherein the institute wants all students placed; hence, there are very complicated rules about ranking of companies and days of placement. Things like – how many offers can be placed by companies and how many offers a student can expect and so on, came into play. The whole ranking of companies on Day Zero, Day One and so on, had put tremendous pressure on the students. If one was not placed on Day One, it implied that particular student was probably not as good! In a typical Indian competitive student environment this process won hands down.

  I never liked this process and would have much preferred that a student be allowed to appear for any company and get as many offers. No company would hire a sub-optimal candidate and no student would gather tens of offers and take none! I clearly lost this battle then. Even to this day when I visit campuses for hiring fresh grads, the process that existed two decades back, still prevails! God bless the young students who go through this!

  After much toil, I had a few offers and I chose a top FMCG, because of the brand, track record in people-practice and their new renewed focus in India then. They offered me an opportunity to do something futuristic and I felt I could make a difference and thus create an impact. Little did I realise that I was also creating a rupture in my marital prospects.

  Sandeep, who had graduated a year earlier, was already placed with a leading FMCG. But what we hadn’t realised by then was that there could be a potential conflict that could arise with us working for competitor companies.

  This company was my first brush with corporate experience and a very memorable one at that. I made some deep and wonderful connections with the group of management trainees. We all grew together as professionals. Living on our own, spending our own money – was a significant expression of freedom. Some of those relationships remain with me till date and are very precious. In the corridors of the company head office, I had met my first managers who taught me the nuts and bolts about not just work but also the appropriate behaviours in a professional environment. This company had a very structured approach in “success transferring” best practices across the world, which was immensely useful for young professionals like us, who were ready to assimilate any learning that came our way.

  MOVING FORWARD

  It is not always easy to plan for an unforeseen future; however, having a view on a larger purpose defines your life as it did mine. I have always worked towards adding value to myself and to the environment around me to progress further. I wanted to be remembered as someone who made a difference. With this purpose somewhat defined, I was able to synchronise my life, interests, energy in the direction of value addition. Milestones were set, some achieved and some not, but I never lost my direction.

  Through school and college, I understood that a belief about your purpose that is driven by your values, will create a sense of clarity and conviction that can be unwavering. Clarity of purpose is thus the key not only to achieve, but to stay focused and steady on a path to self-discovery if you take a dive into your mind. It will help you surmount any obstacle and keep you on the right path even though the odds are against it. This is what helped me manage through the tricky decision about my higher education and choice of profession. A clear sense of purpose provides a long term view in such situations and pulls you along. Keep fanning this drive as there will be odds that can pull you down.

  SUMMARY

  Someone once said that happiness is when you are not striving for it. And more often, every time you live a purpose that isn’t your own, this struggle would continue. Be nice to yourself, for you deserve everyth
ing that you want. Sometimes you only need the clarity of thought to say ‘what I want’ first to yourself and then to others. You’d be amazed then to see how just one moment of truth has the potential to simplify your struggles.

  Very candidly, so far, my life had progressed like any other girl with a similar background like mine. Not very different. Maybe not even very defining. But, if we look at it again carefully, the desire to succeed had already started to take roots in my life. Key learnings were:

  – Outline your purpose: This could be in broader terms the impact you want to create or which direction you want your life to take. Without this defined, we may as well live somebody else’s purpose or life. My purpose was to make a difference for the better for people around me in anything I do.

  – Follow your heart: ‘Feel’ your purpose. Choose your own path for your destination. My desire/purpose lent me the courage to decide how. If it did not feel right, then it probably wasn’t! That’s how I decided to forego medicine for psychology.

  – Strong sense of purpose will lead to your convictions, which is the key to taking this journey forward. You simply need to know what you want! It will also help you to think things through and clear any hurdles that may come in your way. This is the real foundation for what you may want to achieve in life; personally or professionally. Hence, it is imperative that the foundation is strong, as your life-long dreams can get transformed into realities based on this.

  While one’s destiny decides where one is born and consequently the education and upbringing, there is definitely more than that which contributes to how one’s life evolves. So what is it? Maybe your purpose is yet to be found. The beauty is that you are always free to choose your purpose, a better future, anytime.