Unfinished-A writing challenge
Almost
The Unfinished Story Of Everything I Nearly Became
As much as I love to write, my life is very much a work in progress,much of it remains unfinished.
Uncompleted. Half-built structures and abandoned side quests scattered across the landscape of my life.
Take, for example, the judoka dress I bought when I enrolled in a judo class in the 8th standard.
My mother had enrolled me for two reasons:
- To encourage some vertical growth instead of continued horizontal expansion.
- To channel my rapidly escalating preteen anger into sport rather than household warfare.
Why judo?
Simple. It had the fewest students.
In my mother’s strategic calculations, this meant I could quickly rise to district, state, or even national level in my weight category and add a shiny achievement to my academic record.
Life, however, had other plans.
I aced my medical entrance exam and moved to another state for college. Unfortunately, the college had no judo training. And thus ended my glorious martial arts career before it had properly begun.
Then there were the yoga classes I joined after marriage.
I was doing well, enjoying the practice, and was almost ready to enter teacher training.
That was precisely when I secured my MD seat.
In another city.
Away from home.
And just like that, my yoga journey was folded up and stored away along with the mat.🧘♀️🧘♀️
Then came the near misses.
I nearly became a dermatologist until I concluded that spending my life prescribing steroid creams and anti-itch lotions wasn’t for me. No offense to dermatologists.
As it turns out, dermatology would later become one of the most sought-after and highest-paid specialties.🤯🤯
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Excellent timing on my part.
I also nearly became a psychiatrist.
Years of watching dramatic Hindi films and observing enough eccentric behavior at home had convinced me that I had already met my lifetime quota of “mentally affected characters”.
☑️☑️I didn’t want more of them at work.
❌Another giant miscalculation.
Trained psychiatrists are now in tremendous demand.😒😒
And then there was my brief flirtation with becoming a yogini.
I once met a guru whose teachings seemed profound, transformative, and utterly life-changing.
I was so enchanted that I was seriously considering leaving everything behind and joining his ashram in Rishikesh.
Fortunately, before I could embark on my grand spiritual escape, a collective intervention by the wiser elders of my family descended upon me like divine grace.
Only later did I discover that the guru was running something much closer to a cult than an ashram.
Another unfinished chapter.
So you see, my life is filled with unfinished stories.
A judoka who never competed.
A yoga teacher who never taught.
A dermatologist who never prescribed.
A psychiatrist who never analyzed.
A yogini who never renounced.
And perhaps that is why I have so much to write.
Not because of what I became.
But because of all the fascinating things I almost became.
Tagging Manmeet Singh Bhatia jifor this challenge
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