What am I doing here?

It’s 10 pm on Friday, 10th of July. I am supposed to post on Saturday. I have been procrastinating since Monday to write something.

I’m the one wearing the black hoodie and t-shirt. This is one of the few pictures of me laughing with a close bud of mine, Prashaanth.

Living in Chennai and Coimbatore had made my Tamil much better than my native tongue Telugu, much to the annoyance and disappointment of my grandmom and relatives. They couldn’t understand what I spoke because I would inadvertently speak Telugu with a lot of Tamil words in them, assuming I had a large Telugu vocabulary.

I have dabbled in too many things since childhood. Starting from karate in third grade, when I lived in Coimbatore. I managed to get through three levels, and received my orange belt. I didn’t continue it after I moved to Chennai shortly after. Table tennis was another disastrous activity my dad put me in. I quit it in a few weeks. I should have realised sports wasn’t my thing. Moving back to Chennai, my art teacher noticed my perspective drawing skills and recommended me to take up arts and craft classes. I had drawn a train running on a bridge as another train underneath the bridge. I had seen this kind of a train bridge when I used to travel to my grandparents’ in Tenali. She found it pretty cool that I drew in perspective without having any idea about it.

Another disaster venture came in the form of cricket – I absolutely hated dressing up in that blue tracks and white polo and go for those classes. Soon, my dad signed me up for guitar classes as he handed me his dusty, unused guitar which he had bought while working in Mumbai. Then came two years of guitar classes where I was taught to play the guitar in the same style of playing a keyboard. Not good. It was only after I made friends with another guitarist at school that I realised it.

The next big wave of hobbies came. I signed up for a computer hardware course during a boring summer vacation. I was hooked. I had a lot of fun learning about computer hardware, troubleshooting and assembling PCs. But this would sort of bite me back in the ass later. The next summer, I learnt to code in C, and it played a major role in helping me improve my logical thinking. I started have similar geeks in my friend circles, where we’d discuss about hardware and technology.

Getting into Omega for my 11th and 12th grade was a dream for me. I was done studying in APS and wanted a fresh start. But I didn’t clear the first round of admission exams for the interview. I decided to go for the interview anyway. The teachers there couldn’t find my name on their list. But they decided to take me in. I am sure it was sheer luck. A good friend of mine, Sanjay, showed me how to play the bass guitar. I was hooked. I loved playing in the school band. After school, my dad compelled me to get into DJAD and study design. Fast forward four years later, I sit in front of the TV, watching Bangalore Days as I type this blog.

Why am I saying all this? What’s the point?

This life story I had been writing all this while isn’t to milk sympathy or evoke any sort of feeling from the reader. The positives from all these things I had done all through these years outweigh all the negatives that have possibly happened.

At the end of my fourth year, a collective introspection of every single thing that I have done so far resulted in a very profound insight.

I wasn’t in touch with myself. There was a severe lack of communication. This fundamentally affected my ability to have a conversation and I ended up being diagonsed with depression and social anxiety. I realized these things needed more actions than just medication or meditation. I had to learn to bring more clarity with my inner voice – to be precise in my thought and expression.

What am I going to do about it?

Well, I already am doing something about it. I had seen a video by Jordan Peterson, a psychologist from Toronto, who had posted a video about being able to communicate clearly with oneself and others. His solution was to write – by putting down thoughts into concrete forms of words. This is my first written blog post. So, here I am.

Wait, why did I type so much in the first place then?

I am going to set a goal from now on, for every post I write. For the next post, I shall plan and organize my content properly. Baby steps…..

Skandha