What do you start your day with?
A cup of tea? A morning walk? Checking your phone?
Unconfidence, Self Doubt, Anxiety.
Well, these are the things I start my day with.
I’m not a person who wakes up and scrolls through social media. When I wake up, I look at my calendar and the tasks that I have to do. And I don’t know why, but it starts making me feel unconfident when I look at it.
I start doubting myself.
Will I be able to do it?
How will I do it?
What if I couldn’t?
Am I a coward?
But on the contrary, my family, my friends and colleagues have always believed in me. They always say positive things.
“You have such good willpower. “
“You do things easily.”
“You are a confident person.”
“You have good control over your feelings and emotions.”
“You are so strong.”
“You inspire us.”
Listening to all these compliments would give me temporary happiness. But after a few hours, I would doubt myself again.
I was so unconfident that I couldn’t even talk properly to a random person – either it’s a delivery guy at the doorstep or Airtel wali ladki on a phone call.
One of the reasons I was anxious and worried was –
What am I going to do after college?
Two months before my college got over, I couldn’t beat my anxiety and had no idea what I was gonna do.
It was not that I had no option, I was anxious because I had multiple options. I was confused about what to choose.
Family Business? I didn’t want to join it at the age of 21.
MBA? I got 35 percentile in CAT and failed to join IIM.
Job? Why should I do a job when I have my own family Business, log kya kahenge?
Phew!
Eventually, I ended up choosing which was not an option – Enterprise India Fellowship, Pune.
I became a partner at Enterprise in April 2020.
I was curious how this journey would turn out. Because I chose a path that was going to take me to my destination.
I knew somewhere in my heart that it was going to be a roller coaster ride. I didn’t wear a seatbelt and the ride began.
Other partners joined from different cities and I didn’t know any of them.
I was with random people of different age groups. I got a mentor who could guide me and opportunities to work on real-life projects.
And yes, it started the way I wanted – Adventurous.
I always enjoyed and loved roller coaster rides, but I started noticing that I’m actually enjoying it with a bit of fear.
I used to work for more than 15 hours a day. To be honest, even at the time, I was not confident, was worried and doubting myself.
And then, I started working with 4 partners.
I was totally out of my comfort zone. But the hunger for ‘doing’ kept me going.
I was stuttering, repeating the same words in a sentence, mixing two words and forming a new ill-logical word while I was talking to them. I was scared, literally scared. I was wondering, what would the partners think?
Will they support me or laugh at me?
Do you know how I dealt with it? I simply told them how unconfident I was feeling and doubting myself that I couldn’t work.
Me: “Guys, I’m not feeling confident. I don’t know what and how to do it?”
Partners: “Yes, don’t worry. We are a team and we are here to support each other.”
Seems like a filmy reply, right? But that was real. And then I saw the magic. Yes, they supported me. I was spending around 7-8 hours with them in a day.
I liked working throughout the day. Imagine waking up every day at 5 am during the lockdown and starting your day with Zoom meetings! I loved it.
Attending Scrums, working with Agile Methodology and learning Soft and Hard Skills.
I was in a growth environment, the way I wanted.
However, as months passed, the complexity of the work also increased.
But I kept on grabbing the opportunities. I never said ‘No’ to any opportunity.
Yes, I was feeling unconfident, anxious and self-doubt, that was obvious.
However, I never took a step back. I kept on doing and doing and doing – #Karo.
Now when I see myself, I feel 10 times bolder. I can see how far I have come. However, there’s still a long way to go.
So far my journey feels like an ordinary roller coaster, but now I’m ready to experience the Formula Rossa.
[As published originally for Enterprise India Fellowship on 19th April, 2021]
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