On learning to navigate change and keep on movin'

WARNING: this is a long article. If you have a short attention span and need information to be presented in bite sizes, this is not for you! For my fellow readers, read on.

I just recently returned from a quick trip to Nairobi (please don’t be mad if I didn’t reach out, I was literally there for three packed days)! While there, I was honored to join a fireside chat to share my professional journey with a room full of brilliant people. I will be honest, at first I wasn’t sure what I could possibly share with this amazing crowd as I am still navigating my own path to 'success', whatever that means.

What I realized as I was speaking was that while I don’t believe I have ‘made it’, (and thank goodness for that because it means I have so much more adventure left in me), my definition of success has changed over the years. Focusing on shifting my perspective on how I reach the ultimate goal has helped me see opportunities and seize them, ultimately leading me to create a path that is true to me.

I have never been motivated by titles and raking up accomplishments but rather have always strived to understand the impact I was meant to have in this world and to live a life of purpose and intentionality. ?I have had to accept that mine was not a linear trajectory and while deep down, I never actually wanted to follow a prescribed path, I craved the security and stability that those paths seemed to offer. Unbeknowst to me, my entrepreneurial mom had been planting seeds of non-conformity in me since I was a kid, reading me Dr Seuss' Oh the Places You'll Go and hammering the point that my life was meant to be an adventure. I remember loving that book as a child and even reading it again when my sister gave me the book for my MBA graduation. Little did I know I would be soon embarking on a path similar to what was described in the book: the highs, the lows, the waiting.....

Sharing my learnings from living my own Oh the places you'll go journey:

After short circuiting a few times while trying hard to fit the mould and follow a prescribed path, I learned that my biggest times of growth have come from periods where nothing was going according to plan. Life would throw me a big curve ball right when I thought I had finally arrived somewhere where I could settle in. This would be followed by periods of self-doubt, feeling lost, and then I would succumb to the waiting zone playing out the victim narrative. Luckily staying in the abyss is not something I can stomach for too long, and somehow I would find my way out and be onto the next thing.

The biggest thing I had to learn was to shift my perspective and not be attached to the road I take to get to my intended destination. If one looks at a map, there are many roads one can take to go from A to B. You can go hundreds of kilometers down one road, turn to another, make a quick turn, travel down another for a kilometer, shift again and jump back on the highway for a longer stay. The problem I had taking these various roads is that I confused the roads I took with the final destination and so when I outgrew a certain stop on the path or something didn't work out, and ?I needed to get on a new road I saw it as a sign of defeat.

Looking back, every eclectic experience I have had has prepared me for where I am now and I am grateful. Keeping focused on the ultimate destination and letting go of my attachment to the stops along the way has greatly helped me stay focused on what is unfolding for me.

The first time I short circuited from the traditional path was in college. I was doing everything I was meant to do, studying hard, doing everything I needed to prepare to go to Law School and eventually apply to the UN to change the world. My spirit must have known that wasn’t my path because when I came home to Delhi for Christmas of my junior year, I just crashed and literally could not get back on the plane to go back to school.

Externally it looked like things were falling apart but internally I was feeling alive in a way I hadn’t for years. Luckily I came into university with a semesters’ worth of credit so I was fine to graduate in time, but I was a bit ashamed to be honest that I just couldn’t cut it like everyone else. While on one hand I was in the full flow of life, I was battling these emotions while putting on a brave front. I knew deep down though that I was exactly where I was meant to be. Instead of reading and submitting a bunch of political science papers that semester, I had one of the most enriching experiences!

A burst of creativity that I expressed through painting and decorating my room, (I hope I can find pictures because it was freaking epic with each wall having a different theme and just bursting of energy). I took up singing again and worked with a musical genius (RIP Andrus) who taught me how to use operatic techniques to open up my vocal range. I connected with my first spiritual teacher (RIP Akash) who taught me techniques on how to let go of the baggage and stories I was carrying so I could open up my heart and live a fuller life of service instead of focusing on my own wounds. I started making jewelry and spending time in Janpath and Dilli Haat looking through beads and making exquisite necklaces which a couple years later I would sell through Sarafina.

Instead of writing about making change, I got to actually participate in change by joining the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's commission on affirmative action to revisit the Indian Government’s equity agenda for religious minorities. And yes, I was 19 so the semester would not have been complete without a two week Spring Break in London with my best friends from high school! I wrapped up that semester by going to Amsterdam to study human rights practices through the Humanity in Action program. Story for another day, but the connections I made and the familiarity I had with Amsterdam thanks to that summer turned into a lifesaver 9 years later when I went back to the city for work and was unceremoniously laid off one month into the job after getting caught in a political cross-fire.

It’s easy to write this all now but in the moment, my perspective was so focused on the fact that I should be at school like everyone else, that in my mind, I was a failure. I couldn’t take in these amazing opportunities that were happening to me and instead felt like a spoiled brat who was back home living with her family. The mind can be such a nuisance when not kept in check….

What I have learned from going through other experiences like this is that I needed to understand that when things are ‘not working’ out for me, it’s probably because it’s time to take another road to get to my destination. You see my destination has never changed. I have never dreamt of being in a certain profession or have some type of external success, my wish has always been to be at peace and be of service to this world. That I have never wavered on. How I am supposed to be of purpose has been slowly revealing itself to me and while I don’t think I have succeeded, as I have not even scratched the surface of the impact I would like to have, that talk in Nairobi made me realize that I have finally succeeded in learning to shift my perspective and learn to lean into the next step I need to take on my path. I truly believe that life doesn’t happen to us, it happens for us. It is then up to us to decide if we want to lean into the flow or swim upstream.

?I don’t know why I am sharing this but I feel compelled to. If you are going through a hard time or things are just not working out, I hope you will be comforted in the knowing that you are not alone. Changing our perspective and being authentic to what we truly want can help shorten the painful periods, and allow us to be energized by the opportunities that unveil themselves if we train ourselves to see them and learn to navigate the waiting periods with grace.

I share this not because I think my story is particularly interesting. I have met people doing far more amazing things, thank goodness! I share this in the hopes that it can help someone else come out of that waiting period stronger and ready to take on the next challenge when the new road unveils itself. Many of us trying to carve our own path get hit with bouts of self doubt as we don't fit the 'acceptable' mould. For all the non-conformers out there, I am shining my weirdo torch out there to say you are not alone, you will make changes in this world, and everything really does come together.