Of Unsaid Feelings And Words: Yet Another B-School Tale

Today I’m going to tell you a story: The story of a girl who almost gave up on herself. It’s a story about motivation, about finding yourself. It’s about believing in people and building trust in them. While some say that it is fiction, I believe even fiction work is real in the mind of the author and of course, in the head of the readers. So, I leave that decision to the discretion of the readers.

Every story in my childhood use to start with "Once upon a time there was a…", thus I’m going to begin mine on a similar note. There is a girl, I don’t want you to stress upon the fact that the protagonist of the story is a girl; no! I can very well narrate this story with a male protagonist but the message here is not of it being a girl or a boy. It is about the message it delivers and the learning it is supposed to imbibe in the mind of the reader. Choosing a girl protagonist allows me to draw more attention towards certain points in the story.

So back to the story-

There is a girl, in her early twenties, belonging to the upper middle class of the Indian society. Mentioning the financial status of the person is important because it allows me to put few things straight about the character and now I don’t have to explain much about the character; I can safely leave them for the reader to assume. In general, it is observed that people have the tendency to compare themselves or ‘put themselves in place’ of the characters of the story they are reading. This helps them connect better with the story and derive learnings out of it. So, she belongs to the upper middle class of the Indian society. Like any other person of that age, she has a desire to do something in life, something which can give her eternal pleasure. She graduated from a good college and got a job - a high paying job. But she decided not to join the job and decided to pursue an MBA. She went to an IIM, tried many things, found her soulmate, got a job, felt satisfied with life and that's it; end of story! No, this story is nothing like this. This is different.

Let me resume.

So, she decided to pursue an MBA and got into one of those fancy schools where people do MBA these days. Everything was going fine there, until she realised she is pursuing something which she really doesn’t want to and in doing so she has failed to build a good relationship with people around her. There is this saying which I read on the back of my notebook long time ago, “If you want to go fast go alone, and if you want to go long go, with people”. Few months passed and the reality hit her: she was alone. No one was there with whom she could talk and share her feelings with. People of her age often have emotional outbreaks.This is often the sad part of their lives, and even worse is facing that moment alone. On one such event, she found herself crying alone in the dark alley. Things become even worse when she saw people around her laughing and enjoying the sunny afternoon. This was the moment when it hit her that she’s surrounded by so many people and still alone. Such moments are very painful, particularly when you are facing the most difficult times of your life.

Think for a moment: What would have happened if Krishna was not guiding Arjun during the war? He broke down even before the war started, and then at every step, Krishna was guiding him to win the war. While some may argue that Krishna was madly manipulating Arjun in doing what he believed was true, not even a single time did it happened that Krishna failed to convince Arjun into doing what he wanted. But when you are clueless in your life, you have to trust people around you. It is your smartness as to whom you trust; like Arjun trusted Krishna. A wrong person can ruin your life and a good person can make your life. No matter whom you choose, you’ll end up becoming their Arjun if your frequency matches with your Krishna, and if it doesn’t, you’ll leave them and find another Krishna. She found her Krishna. She wasn’t Meera; she was Arjun here.

He found her sitting despairing alone in a corner; he understood everything. He took her out for a walk and began doing his ‘thing’, and she started opening up. One after the other, words started to weaken her and she broke down! Funny things tears are. For months, you control your disappointment, you control your tears, feeling that if you show them, you’ll look weak! But when you want them to stop badly, they give up on you and begin their journey to break your apprehension. And then the membrane breaks and you tell the person everything! That person becomes your Krishna; not because he is extraordinarily divine, but because out of all the people, he noticed your apprehension! That’s when you devote your life to that person. Finally, he heard a lot of sad things, her thoughts on how unfair the place was to her, and how the place is not what she expected. He was listening to her carefully and continuously. Listening is the key to gain the trust of people. Everyone wants to talk about themselves all the time; feeling sad- listen to make them feel better, feeling happy- listen to them to be a part of their happiness. It allows you to penetrate deeper into the heart of that person.

Finally, he was able to console her and made her comfortable enough to face the Devil world again - some people are so screwed up that they are used to see the world with wet eyes! She was becoming into one of these people. The day ended, it was her second breakdown of the week, but this time she was was confident;  confident that she now has a person whom she can trust and share her feelings with. I am sometimes amazed at how easy it becomes to connect with someone if you are willing to open up to them. Sometimes, it is your sheer defence mechanism which stops you from connecting with people. You just have to master your defence mechanism; the incident with the girl is just another instance which strengthens my point.

To be continued...