Exactly a month ago I experienced something similar when I left home to come to the United States, to Phoenix, to pursue my higher education. It didn't seem to matter that I had strived for a year to be in the position I was in, that the thought of this NOT happening was a source of endless worry to me. Because the only thought going through my head when I was at the airport was “I’m not ready for this.”
Despite the turmoil going on inside my head, I think I did a pretty solid job masking how nervous I was to my parents who had come to drop me off. In fact, I did such a good job that I rushed through the airport gates without even clicking a photo with them. Pretty good start to my trip, wasn't it?

Nothing much to say about the flight(s) to Phoenix. The 30-hour journey was as monotonous as it gets. I killed time either sleeping or watching Anthony Joshua pummel some poor fool. No shame in admitting that I’m on his bandwagon now, I don’t see him losing a fight anytime soon.

The fact I was in a different country didn't sink in till I stepped out of Sky Harbor Airport. The only thing that struck me as different from home was the complexion of the people outside. And how well-designed everything around looked.. Okay, maybe there were a lot of things that were unusual, but none of them made me feel out of place or any different from how I felt 30 hours ago. For the past few months, I had imagined something changing inside me the instant I stepped foot in the States, as ridiculous as that sounds. Clearly, that had been wishful thinking.

I spent the first few days in Tempe roaming around alone. I never had much love for photography, but the time spent looking at the few photos I had of my undergrad days had made me realise its power. So I decided to catalogue my time here by clicking a few because I was sure they’d matter to me down the road, even though at that moment I didn’t see the point of it. How was I sure you ask? I had realised by now that I obtained better results when I didn’t listen to my first instinct.

Though most of the expectations I had of the States had been proven wrong, one that surpassed all expectations was the temperature at Tempe. I was certain nothing could be worse than Trichy, but even that hell hole was nothing compared to this. I could feel every inch of unprotected skin on my body being burnt to a crisp every second I spent outside the house. In a way, this helped me establish a routine: leave for college before it got too hot, come back after dark. The heat forced me to spend all my time outside of the classrooms in the one place I had never entered during my undergrad days: the library. Which, ironically, is now where I spend most of my free time at. Life.

Now, it’s finally the section where I express why I sat down in the library to write this! Yes, I know my mind meanders a lot. I blame the heat.

“Everything you've ever wanted is on the other side of fear.” — George Addair

I’m not big on quotes, but this one deeply resonates with me. About a week ago, I got the opportunity to try out for a TA position and managed to land the job. But even with the offer in front of me, I was hesitant on accepting it for a multitude of reasons. For one, I had no experience teaching a class, and this one would be filled with incoming freshman no less. Also, since I was expected to start working on very short notice, I felt I didn't have enough time to mentally prepare myself. In the end, I decided to take it up for the sole reason that I knew I’d regret not experiencing how it would have felt like if I rejected it. I accepted the offer and I loved every second of my first class. As expected, things were much worse in my head than in reality. I realise I have to train myself harder to not assume that the current situation will be any different from the ones I've experienced in the past. Also, it makes me wonder about the number of times I've said ‘No’ to a potential opportunity that presented itself to me over the last few years. Though recently I've made a conscious effort to not shy away from uncomfortable positions, I’m still nowhere as confident as I wish to be. I intend this post to serve as a reminder to myself to not say ‘No’ to any opportunity. The only way you progress is by asking yourself WHY NOT?

I had already planned to spend the two months of my “holidays”, between the end of college and the joining date of the company that had extended an offer to me, working in a startup. I’d been in contact with quite a few, some rejected me, some I felt wouldn’t be places where I could learn as much as I wanted to. It must have been fate when a newly founded startup located in another city, consisting of just the four founders, was ready to give me an opportunity to work with them. I was very excited, especially when they said they’d want me to work in something related to software. I felt it was the place I’d always hoped for. A place where I’d be in a position to learn how things work in the real world and an opportunity to be mentored by people with achievements that would make most envious.

And then everything seemed to go wrong.

• When the offer came, it turned out they wanted me to work in Android App Development, something I had no experience in whatsoever.
• Since it was a startup which was in it’s infancy, it would expect me to put in a lot of work. I had initially talked myself into believing that I was ready to spend my time fully committed to my work, but then I realized that subconsciously I wanted to spend my time doing what I used to do in college; just enjoy myself fooling around and expect good things to happen to me. Did I really want to spend the last two months of my pre-corporate life by working for 10+ hours every day?
• The location of the workplace was pretty far from where I’d be staying. I never liked travelling, and travelling in a city as crowded as Bangalore wasn’t appealing to me in the least. Imagine working for around 10 hours every day, spend an additional 2–3 hours on travel, for six days a week.

How could I honestly transition from living the most chilled out college life, one with next to no responsibilities, to this? Was I even ready to be an adult?

And then my mind was flooded with thoughts: About what I wanted to be. What I had dreamed of becoming when I was younger. How I had wasted all my time until now.

And then I decided that I HAD TO change myself.

I couldn’t afford to be the same person I was in college. I owed it to myself to at least put in my full effort before I decided that I wasn’t ready for that life.

I took up the offer.

“Everything you’ve ever wanted is on the other side of fear.” — George Addair

The past two weeks have been a crazy experience. The first thing I realized is that all my fears were misplaced and that I procrastinate too much. This has been everything I hoped for and MORE.

• I honestly feel I’ve learnt more in the past two weeks than in the past four years of college. From starting learning from scratch, seeing myself get better bit by bit, spending hours thinking about how to solve a particular problem and then the happiness you get when you see your proposed solution getting the desired result. Aah, bliss.
• That feeling of awe while listening to people with more experience discuss things in your midst, things I’d never have gotten the opportunity to hear if I had decided to listen to my fears. I’ve always had plans for something that I wanted to develop in the future, but listening to them talk has made me realize it’s not enough to just have an idea. Seeing their passion and drive in a situation where their future and the future of the product isn’t secure made me realize that I don’t have what it takes to startup right now, but someday, hopefully, I will.
• Admittedly, travel was a big issue. For the first one week, it took a toll on both my energy and my wallet. But then, I worked up the courage to ask them if I could stay with them in their apartment(our office) during the weekdays and take a break during the weekends. And they happily agreed. I don’t know what was I even scared about. Maybe I was subconsciously hesitant to ask them, even though I had the feeling they would agree because that would require me to spend every waking hour during the weekdays working, something that even the “new” me wasn’t looking forward to. In return, I get two full days to myself in this beautiful city, so I don’t think it’s such a bad trade.

And now, the reason for this post.

I spent the last eight hours trying to figure out why my code wasn’t functioning properly and it not even the new episode of Game of Thrones was able to make me feel less depressed about it. I spent my time asking questions on Stack Overflow, reading documentation, watching some YouTube videos while not being able to understand where I had gone wrong. Finally, one of my mentors realized that one of his core inputs hadn’t been defined properly and once he corrected it, everything ran smoothly!

It’s that feeling of happiness on completion of my first module that inspired me to write my first ever blog post.(Hopefully, it’s not the last)

A few weeks ago, I would have never pictured myself in this position. I’d never have worked up the courage to spend an hour or so writing down what I’ve experienced ever since I left my second home and put it out there, but every thing that I’ve experienced in the last few weeks makes me wonder: WHY NOT?

I’m just glad that I didn’t listen to my fears for once.