Priyam Narayan is really just a synonym for competitiveness. She has to stay a notch ahead in every aspect of life. This has yielded her with a lot of positives - tirelessness, passion and focus. But as she would realize in endeavours gone horribly wrong, there are only so many situations in life where one can triumph. These are times when the same passion and tirelessness become burdens one can’t shed. My story, then is about how I understood that being good enough is sometimes better than being perfect.
This is a fable that begins with chaos. Someone slated to head for a Medical College does a complete flip and chooses English honors for her bachelorette degree. Having fared relatively well academically meant I had the privilege of pursuing a course in one of the finest colleges. The liberating atmosphere of Miranda House and the e-rickshaw-and-Maggi-point filled alleys of North Campus shields one from the outside world, and yours truly was no different.
Completely aloof and directionless, I finished my three-year course, planning to head to a business school, but life had different plans.
Since Priyam Narayan doesn’t like staying away from chaos for too long, I made the switch from my academic field once again - this time by opting for a career in Marketing, a field I was completely oblivious to. Without letting my confidence take a back seat, I jumped right in.
What I took for chaos however, was ultimately going to turn out to be a jig-saw fit! I was acing the bullpen with skills I acquired in the workplace, handling tough assignments with ease, all while maintaining the ‘Priyam grin’. However, a fable is hardly so without there being some sort of malaise in it.
I was ready for every professional challenge that life threw at me, for the competitive spirit was fuelling my adrenaline rush. I believed I was a force that corporate had never reckoned with, before. However, I soon faced a grim reality that changed my outlook towards life as a whole - “office politics”. No matter how good I was, I was somehow never good enough.
Those appraisals never seemed to come my way, but went instead to the office sycophants, a brand of people I’d promised myself to never relate to. I’d be burning the midnight oil only for lousy seniors to take full credit. When I finally decided to pursue something on my own, I was politely told by my ex-boss to fall in line or face the consequences. The competitive spirit in me soon became unbearable. What became my saviour ultimately was the realisation that there is a limit to how much I could achieve and how much I could stay in everyone’s good books. This temperance gave my stint in corporate a new lease.
When I’d received too little for having given too much, I finally decided to start my own journey. This is when Buzzin happened, an innocent little venture where I had the full creative freedom to pursue my dreams. Turned out, all I ever needed was a dash of confidence with the right amount of quirk to have my Jerry Maguire moment.
What started as a side hustle became my driving force, it was and is still teaching me things I always thought weren’t “important” enough- from balancing between a corporate job and a business to dealing with finicky clients,
from hiring people (which is a massive task in itself!) to taking a back seat when required and trusting people around you to hold the reins. Buzzin is still in its nascent stage, but it is spreading its tiny wings, ready to take off when the time is right. At 24, I have realised that I am not perfect and that it’s more about accepting my flaws and moving on with it. My thumb-rules in corporate and in life are simple - it’s a tough world out there; one finds no ethical issues with treating people unfairly. You are an asset but if the chips are down, you might be the one who’s liquidated the quickest. In this seemingly brutal world, the one thing to always be mindful of is your own ability to deliver. You need a steady, focused mind that can silence all the doubts people may want to drill into you. You need the mind of a student who refuses to stop learning- at every step, your abilities and skill set need to speak for you. At the end of the day, it won’t be any B-school or college, but your commitment which will make you sail through in life.