Nightmares to dreams - that would be the journey if I could sum it up. I want to talk about the emotions, the fundamental changes in perspective towards life and my reaction to all. I have been remodeled - filled with hope, passion and discipline. I hope I shall read this again during my time of distress and it would support me to go through it all again.

It is the year 2021. A soon to be 19 year old teen. Pretty motivated academically, attends lectures, asks doubts. A curious mind. He is pretty fascinated by mechanical bots. He builds stuff in his room. Nothing has changed after he is admitted to college, except his discipline in his life. Motivation doesn’t drive him to try hard anymore. Still, he gets a decent score in his first year of college. Changes his department easily. Elated, he hugs his father, sharing this happy news. Little did he know, that was the last time he could hug his father.

Over the next two months, the condition of his father fluctuated. The teen was stressed. He could see the pain in his father’s face. Helpless, he would return to his room. He still felt that he was a child whose voice could only ask for help and not support anyone. He couldn’t sleep anymore. He would hear his father and mother crying. What is he to do? Only way he could find is to turn up for the help of The Almighty. He believed his adherent belief would rescue his father from the pains. His prayers were heard apparently. The condition of his father grew better. There were talks of him commuting back to his work. Things seemed normal again. The days were brighter and the nights were peaceful. He could finally sleep.

“Hey, *** *** wake up.” He is woken up by his cousin. “Uncle is no more.”

I couldn’t wrap my mind around the incident that had occured. Devastated. The rituals of a Hindu household doesn’t help you to recover from it. I feel they are designed to make you completely grasp the pain that you have lost a loved one. Re-live pain at every moment. My mother was not in a state to talk, walk, eat or to live. All she did was cry. In the span of 12 days, she fainted 3-4 times. Everytime, I stood by and watched, neither crying nor showing emotions. I thought it would be for the best. She can’t exist without him. I can survive. I didn’t cry. It would be correct to say I couldn’t cry. I had to be strong for both of us. There were “family” around us but I have never been more alone. I stopped showing my emotions. On one such day I got a visit from a friend. I cried then and I realized the shallowness of “family”.

My end semester examinations were just a week away. I wrote to some professor notifying him of my situation. He writes back stating I will be graded on my mid semester examinations. This broke me further. I was afraid performing badly will lead me to dropping out of college. I had to continue college to support my mother. Thus began the hatred of academics. I started hating music. I started hating everyone.

I feel this much history is enough for my future self to recall the events. I was back home from college. I had graduated. I had no suicidal intents anymore. I had to survive. But I wanted more. I wanted to live. Uncertainty is how I would define my life. No passion. No hobbies. Everyday felt an eternity. I wanted to envision my life 5-10 years ahead, but I couldn’t. Blindly pursuing something because of my peers wasn’t an option for me. I sought guidance. I was desperate. I tried pursuing my old loves - physics, coding, music, new loves - chess, drawing, but I failed miserably. I lacked discipline. I couldn’t stick with anything. All I could do was daydream about how everything will be fine.

Books. I can’t thank them enough. I started reading them. Didn’t like it. Forced myself to read them. The Almanac of Naval Ravikant was a real motivation. But it lacked content about philosophy of life. Life seemed fragile and meaningless. Questions of existence popped in my mind. Hermann Hesse came to the rescue. Siddhartha. “I can think, I can wait, I can fast” became my motto. Quality of your thoughts indeed defines the quality of your life. Patience, in a difficult situation, often brings clarity. Flourishing with less when required is a prerequisite of freedom. It felt okay to be confused. Demian by the same author taught me to look within for guidance and way of life. Man’s search for meaning by Viktor Frankl also cleared some of the indecisions. I was content.

Art in the form of photography and music forged a path for me to enjoy the non-linear flow of time. I liked this eternity. Let me be frank, I am not good at it. Neither photography nor music. I enjoy it because I can pour my soul into it. I wish to be able to create art which brings happiness, sprouts tears and cures people of despair. It made me see the beauty in the sensations. What we hear is beautiful. What we see is beautiful. Be enchanted incessantly. Universe never seemed more welcoming.

Still life is long. I need to pursue something. I decided to continue coding for the time being. Give it a few years. I don’t want coding to be my lifelong pursuit, I still want to fall in love doing what I do. Creating stuff is fun. As I said, life does seem long to me, I have numerous things to fall in love with. I will be jumping ships soon.

People around me molded me as well. I couldn’t be more grateful to them. I try to show them that through my actions and will continue to do so. I hope you are up to date with my exploits and I was expressive enough. This isn’t the first time that I wrote an article but writing this was very difficult. Emotions don’t come easy to me. Expressing them is even harder. I hope you readers have a smile on your face, be content and stay healthy.