Reflecting back on my 2 0 2 1
2021 has indeed been an amazing year for me — both personally and professionally. This year, I am glad that I inculcated some great habits and unlearned some bad ones. When I reflect back now, despite of all the lows and demotivation that I faced last year, I feel things have eventually connected and are better than what I had desired for myself.
I am very much grateful to everything that has happened — both the good things and the bad ones. Because, every incident has taught me something and have made me more grateful towards things in my life:
- I am grateful that I got clarity as to what kind of career I want for myself
I remember during the time of my college placements, I sat for a few interviews (during the first placement season — till Dec 2020) and didn’t get through any of them. All this made me demotivated. After some failed attempts at placements, sometime back in December 2020, I decided to introspect as to what are things that I really want and what is the kind of career I want to build for myself.
Development space has always intrigued me and I decided to explore my interest further into this sector. From December 2020 to May 2021, I did a bunch of internships and spoke to a lot of people working in the development and impact space — all this helped me gain clarity and understanding about the sector and my interest towards it. Eventually, I got placed at Central Square Foundation, and its been 6 months I have been working at the organisation. In these 6 months, I have learned a lot of things and interacted with some great minds.
Had I been placed in anyone of the companies that I interviewed for, I don’t think it would have been possible for me to explore my area of interest and know what is something that I truly enjoy.
- I am grateful that I started reading regularly and eventually built up a routine for myself
Till my high school, I have been a morning person — I used to wake up at 4:30–5 AM in the morning and do my studies. But after coming to college, this routine got changed completely — I started sleeping very late at night.
On my 20th birthday, one of my friends gifted me a book ‘The 5 AM Club’ by Robin Sharma. I knew about this book, but never dared to read it. Since I had this book with me, I started reading it and ultimately developed a habit of reading. From being a person who didn’t use to read any books before, I read 11 books last year.
Also, after reading 5 AM Club, I started my routine again — sleeping by 9:30–10 PM at night and waking up at 5 AM in the morning. This practise has been very beneficial — in the morning I get time for myself and I started doing and exploring things that I love.
- I am grateful that I stopped worrying for the outcomes and started enjoying the process
In my high-school and college, I have always had an outcome oriented mindset — I used to focus a lot on outcomes, the habit where I didn’t care to enjoy the process leading towards it. And, due to this, most of the time I ended up failing.
In the second half of 2021, I decided to change this mindset — started focusing more on the process and worry less about the outcomes. And, this practise has been very fruitful for me — I have been successful most of the times, but at times when I failed, this mindset has helped me understand and learn what kind of mistakes I made and how can I course correct them.
- I am grateful that I started investing money
Reading books produced a lots of good results for me and one such result was that I became aware about personal finance. I started investing some part of my salary in mutual funds and stocks. I also took an insurance for myself.
Since September 2021, I am living in Delhi independently. And, I would say these few months here have been really great for me — I learned how to handle my income and expenses.
- I am grateful that I became more conscious about my health
Okay, so until February 2021, I was the person who didn’t pay any attention to the kind of food I am having and whether I am doing some physical activities. In Feb 2021, almost a year being at home because of pandemic, my father insisted on going for cycling every morning and that was when I started doing some physical activities regularly, but my diet was still a problem till October 2021. After coming to Delhi in September and getting sick here twice, I realised that it is very important to take care of the kind of food you are having. And since then, I am exercising and eating healthy food regularly.
