30 days In
Its 2:36 A.M. and my Kafka is buried somewhere in between Business Statistics and Organisational Behavior. I don’t have the faintest idea of the consistency or taste of the last meal I ate. My eyes are in essence sunken sockets with pools of doe brown in between. I don’t remember the last piece of literature I read. And the only way I clock time is by keeping track of the meetings I have to attend.
In spite of what may seem like a completely horrible day, I have this completely unbearable mixture of content and excitement settled right at the pit of my stomach. The realization of knowing I am exactly where I NEED and WANT to be. In all probability — no scratch that — most definitely, this is the first time in my life I’ve come across this degree of certainty about a decision of mine. For some of my friends who’ve sold their soul and made their deal with the devil (this is an inside MBA joke. I swear it is), can I take the liberty of assuming that you’re smiling a little smile to yourself in acknowledgment of the emotion I’m referring to? Good. As for the uninitiated — the lucky lot — I’m largely talking about a typical day (or night. We wouldn’t be able to recognize the line separating the two if it came and bit us on our nose) in the life of someone pursuing an MBA.
They’ll tell you about the ungodly hours, the many and minute compromises, the food you barely taste because you’re always in a hurry, the four walled class that you will come to hate and eventually love, the bed you never actually sleep in because lets face it — who’s going to seal that assignment your professor is expecting by midnight? Only to see it and make you frame it all over again. What they won’t tell you about is the friend who saves you a burger because they know you’d be squeamish enough to forego a meal and who also gets you the medicine you need before you know whats wrong with yourself, the two degree change in perspective that starts branching inside you because of all the theory you’re forced to think about that you’d otherwise blatantly ignore and the keeper of the tuck shop who’s always ready with your mango shake the second you think your day couldn’t be worse.
My decision to quit work and ‘get some more studying done’ (as it’s usually said) strangely wasn’t shaped by any of the usual factors. For instance, as parochial and cliched as it sounds, money doesn’t drive me. Which is mostly why 90% of the student lot is here. And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. What sets off that fire inside ME personally and individualistically is the simple want to be better than I was yesterday. It’s THE only mantra that’ll work. I don’t ever want to spend a day where I have to shut my eyes at the end of it NOT knowing that I am a slightly more polished stone compared to the previous day. Granted that there are days where that just simply wont be possible or maybe even enough. But you have to keep shooting. Even if you’re shooting in the dark. I’d rather fall a million times than not jump at all. Because that one time that you fall and actually land on your feet — feels ruddy brilliant.
30 days into campus and it feels like the puzzle I was trying to solve is slowly coming into place. It’s going to be a lot of impossible deadlines, fire fighting, running like the wind, biscuits for dinner through the year and honestly I cannot wait to feel every bit of the many high’s and low’s. Now I must shoo away to finish off the assignment due in a few hours that includes a SWOT analysis that I need to believe will end up changing the world (please don’t miss out on the sarcasm). Adios!
