Being a 90s kids I have seen umpteen changes in life such as B/w Texla tv to Ultra/4K color LEDs, kanche, lattoo, kites to playstation, Nokia 3310 to Iphone X and many other things. In my late teenage, I was struggling to get my own bicycle and ended up with taking dad's bicycle. Then completed my entire college journey with pocket money of Rs.50 per month. It was a hard time but it taught me 2 things that value your money and spend it wisely. And second is, even if money is completely spent then stress isn't the only option, it will surely comeback with some efforts or may be with some luck. In short, money comes and goes and comes and . so on.
Change is the law of nature. Luck favored me little so I made efforts(and still continuing) to get a good job and now I owned a car, travelling in flights whenever needed and going on vacation with my family in different destinations.
Above situation looks pleasant. A transformation which every middle class kid wants in life. But situation is bit different. Life has its own rules and whether you hate or love but you have to aide them.
So, I am living in a metro city. In a normal daily routine, I wake up early 6 am in morning. I leave at 7.45 am to reach office before 9.30 am. Distance between my home and office is around 35 kms with full of traffic nuisance and gaalis like areee, kasie chuyon ki tarah chla rha hai(and this goes for me also). Metro ride is cost saving but getting a seat is either a miracle or luck. Office tensions are so much in routine that if a day passes by without a pain then it looks more pain. We have spent so much of life in office complications that it is a drug now. Either you search it or create one yourself but you need one to relax your muscles of mind. It is in our mind that this kind of hard work surely gets noticed in appraisals. For bosses, this is not even in their sub-conscious mind. For them, we are getting paid or over-paid by doing little or nothing. Then the biggest challenge of them all, ask a leave and then you will be realized then how important is your presence. All urgent works will start emerging or the already lying work of last 2 -3 years is now the most important work. If you are in leave, then boss calls will never make you feel that you are on leave but you can't do your personal work in office timing.
I was always thinking for going on a long vacations(like 3-4 days) to get some change from daily routine or atleast take some leaves(which are not even adding and getting wasted every year) to spend some time in home with family.
Then during all this haphazards, Prime Minister of India addresses the nation saying Mitron, aaj se pure 21 dino tak pure bharat me lockdown rahega. Jo jahan hai wahin rahe. Now, this feeling, it was completely new. You got(almost) what you ever had thought once in your lifetime. A vacation or long summer vacation when we were kids. But this time you can't go to your village or parks, we just have to stay inside.
I started my lockdown(2-3 days) with some rests and sleep which I was deprived of from last few years. Then started some serious work from home tasks and delivered pending work. All pending completed, no new work for upcoming 1 week as I predicted. So, now what. What should I do in this lockdown. No latest movies or web series to watch. I dont read books so that option was also didn't worked out. Finally I moved to youtube to watch some interesting videos of travel to satisfy traveller part of my soul. Then I clicked a video curiosity wise and till now I have watched more than 50 videos of that subject.
ME time. Time when I could so which I wanted or planned or ever think of or something new which I never thought of.
First is Photography. Saving memories and gets cherished everytime you those. It was something which I thought but never took it seriously. I always loved to click photographs with creative angles, portraits, landscapes, candid etc. I was also got praised by near and dear ones for my clicks. I was also being suggested to enhance this skill. But I never took it seriously because I had no time for this and for obvious reasons, it requires good bucks to spend for gears which I wasn't aware of then. Lockdown gave me so much of "ME" time that I studied about photography through various videos and reading contents available in internet. Presently, I don't posses a camera but one thing I know that photography is my hobby as well as passion which was hidden in somewhere of me. Now the plan is outlined to execute. I know which dslr camera to buy under my budget, location from where I can buy at cheapest prices, which lenses to buy in beginning to learn, lens kits, how to operate a dslr and how to be creative and so much of it. I don't want to become Farhan of 3 Idiots because I have a family to look after but I hope one day I will take out the best of myself in this field.
Professional Certification. I always thought of but never got time to execute. When I was watching photography videos, I also saw some certification ads which popped out in between. Initially, I took a minute a see one of those ads. Then I got interested, gave some more time from my newly sparked hobby . First, I realized that this is also an important aspect of my professional life and second that now I have to prioritize things. Reason? Costs attached to it. I will do my professional certification which will add value to my resume then will move to hobby after cost deliberation. I also studied from various youtube videos and other videos which are available in internet for this certification cost. I have completed about 80% of syllabus. I gave mock tests and scored passing marks. Inner satisfaction.
Post Graduation. My New Year resolution from last 10 years. I always thought to get admission in MBA. After completion of certification course I moved to this. Inner satisfaction gave me strength this time to pursue. So I searched various colleges and zeroed on one from where I can complete my MBA as distance learning course. And guess what, I enrolled myself. Yes, resolution finally completed. I am doing MBA now. Its 2 years program. I am expecting that it will be completed in given duration with some hard work because you know, luck always favored me little.
Now, what else. I saw sunrise, after 2008 when I was in last semester of my engineering. I woke early during the exam days of my engineering days. I also wake early in office time but to reach office and to get mingle in daily bhasads.
I saw sunset after so many years. I saw Saptarishi in sky(seven stars in spoon form), sparrows. I taught my 3 year old son how to ride a bicycle. The evening breeze which I almost had forgot. Joy of giving water to plants.
Anything where I failed. Yes. Exercise. At the start of Lockdown 2.0, I had a goal to make my body fit and flexible. I was enlightened with my previous successes as mentioned above. I woke up at 6 a.m. in first day of Lockdown 2.0, searched and played a youtube video titled as morning exercise for beginners. It included of squats, push-ups, burpees, plank and many more. It didn't took me more than 5 minutes to understand that I played a wrong video to start. But no, I was motivated. I completed full video(not exercise). For next few days, I was feeling something in every part of my body which was not good. It took 4 days to recover completely.
Now I am almost on track. Tackling with some new issue of Work from home. Boss now thinks we are always available. But anyways, I have a track to follow and lets see what will I get in future.
Stay safe. Cheers.
