Preparation

For the starters, please do not read this as a bible and consider it as a red line of approach. This is not meant to be that. This is just an accumulation of thoughts and a reflection of what has been my learning from, I proudly say, one of the experiences of life. There is no better way to in life to know one-self than attempting to push yourself into something, which forces you to answer the question ‘Who are you?’ ‘What are your priorities?’ ‘Why you are doing what you are doing?’ ‘What is your stance on your own career?’ ‘What do you think about your professional qualification vis-à-vis your work?’. This is the single biggest experiment you can do to yourself. This is the learning in life, which frankly, no one can give you but you need to find these answers yourself to be able to come to terms with it. Sooner you find it, better it will be for any aspirant at any field. When I joined my company, I never knew I will be at a certain place like this, I am still not at where I want to be though, but it is reflection time to sit and pass on the learnings to the people who may need. I am 28, and have a career in front of me, but one thing that has been my success factor is a continuous push towards achieving what I want and believing that it is mine. So few things to keep in mind while gunning for something really big in life and for the ones you think is a very important step:

· Never allow yourself to think about Plan B, because it does not exist.

· Never think about anyone else in competition except yourself, agree it is relative, but your own performance matters.

· Take this as a big learning curve and always approach to the steps as one more step. (Higher you go, rope will get thinner and pie will get smaller)

· Introspect as hard as you can, try and dig out about yourself more than you possibly think.

· Do not take it as a challenge to overcome it, but as an opportunity to learn from it and take it as learning.

· Have an ability to listen and comprehend.

· Be your own harshest critic, and never allow any sense of complacency go into your head. (Roger Federer would not have been that great, if he had settled with what he has got in life in 20 years.

· Learn as much as possible.

These are just pointers and can be many of such, but one thing that keeps everyone occupied is the 1st point above. I myself, during the course of preparation, asked myself. ‘What if?’. This is an inherent human folly to think about. We always like to be in the comfort zone of thoughts wondering what if it does not turn out the way you want. Let me pull the trigger, it will never turn out how you want. But you can determine the result by just giving your 100% and not thinking about it. That’s the best way to overcome it. Result are a momentary realisation of what you have achieved, a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy. It can never take you far ahead in life. It can only keep you in that moment. Result-win or lose-works differently or matters differently to different people. It never is/will be a barometer of your success. It is what you do with the result matters. Always. Just like what you do with the success in hand or how you deal with the failure in hand. I have had my own share of failures-some of them are big ones, some of them made my career at stake, thankfully I am a little bit stable now- but still miles to go. So when you are running for something big in life, and this is nothing to do with competition, remember results are relevant only to the point how you take it. Failure presents an opportunity, but success presents a different variety of complacency. Not to say success is not good, of-course it is good, but as one of my favourite speaks ‘Failure is always the first step towards success’. Public life is filled with stories of people who have bounced back. Make this a mantra about results not affecting you.

Only then will you go in front of the panel, more blank, more open, and without doubt more honest. Being aware that your life rests on this, makes it a little harder. Prepare your best, do all you can to win it, work as hard as needed, think this is the only one that exists (Now or Never) but never allow fear of failure to cross your head. I gave an explanation above about failure, just to make one understand that it does not matter. As Vikram always says ‘What got you here, won’t get you there’. So you need to keep exploring what you are good at, what you need from work and life, what your priorities are. Make sure your approach to this is positive and honest. If those two works, Confidence will flow and doubts will get washed out.

And lastly, the home of Tennis, the Wimbledon locker room has two of the best line which captures the above theme very eloquently ‘If you can meet Triumph and Disaster, And treat those two imposters just the same’.