A Reject's Story

No one ever pegged me for one who'll get sentimental on leaving college after four years. They were right. I had this realization quite early on about myself - places don't matter to me, people do. So I'd not give a second thought to leaving paradise even, metaphorical or real(?), if there's promise of keeping in touch with my loved ones. So why this swan song you ask? Firstly, because it's good practice to take stock of what you've lost and gained. Secondly, because I'm tired of repeating "sage words" time and again to overly enthusiastic, highly inquisitive juniors. This isn't some guide to success (or recipe to failure I hope!). This is simply a tale of VIT's best gift to me - rejections. But not of the romantic kinds! Let's keep that for some other time.

When you enter college from school, it's a change no amount of sibling's wisdom, parents' coaching or friends' support can prepare you for. It will overwhelm you. Especially when you've been a big shot at school for as long as a decade. You're thrust in an ocean of peers where everyone is trying to carve a niche for themselves. The rat race begins here, albeit on a much smaller scale, but significant all the same. There's no cap on opportunities. They just keep coming your way and initially it happens so fast that everything is a blur. It's hard to keep track of them, let alone hunt down and decide which one's best for your interests. And when you're in the masses, what interests you, interests others too (and sadly, vice versa). That's where your seniors come in, and sometimes maybe reluctantly, they help you out all the same. I may have been good on stage from the beginning, but I am terrible with people. I just don't know how to talk to new people, so taking help from seniors was not much of an option. I relied on my friends to tide me alongside them and it worked just fine then. I got to know a lot about how the social life works here, all the clubs, chapters, etc. And then came along my first tryout, and my first rejection - core committee member selections for IEEE student chapter.

For a CS student, I feel a little embarrassed to say that I don't so much as passionately love it, but rather have a strong liking to it. It was true then too. Seeing my limited passion and even shorter supply of technical know-how, I applied for the management side of things. I thought I had enough experience at school, how bad can it get? Turns out, very. It's a whole new ball game. I made it through a few rounds, but in the penultimate round got the boot. I was far from innovative, couldn't handle the pressure properly, and wasn't my usual assertive self. At least these are the reasons I believe I got rejected, nevermind the politics and "settings" of others. First rejections always hurt. But you shake it off, put on a smile and celebrate with your roommate who made it. I knew it was just the beginning, so I learned what I could from my mistakes and moved along. For starters, I enrolled in a certification course that gave me an edge over others and labored along to improve my technical skill set.

I gave some opportunities like CSI, ISTE, IETE, etc. a pass, since I didn't feel prepared/interested enough. I did start volunteering here and there, attending events to gain some groundwork experience. E-Cell seemed promising in the beginning when I volunteered for them, but later on they seemed to have lost interest in me and so, dejected as I was for having given a freebie (one which cost me my health), I distanced myself from them. But no such thing as bad experience. I had kept up my habit of writing part time (though then only for deeply personal interests), so I thought I might as well try that out. Consequently, I showed up for the Yearbook committee's tryouts. Boy, I didn't even make through the first round. That was a big shock, as for the past three four years I had only heard praise for my literary skills and though I smelled something fishy in that, I didn't know it was this bad. The seed of self doubt had been sown in, and it would be a long time before I'd make a fool of myself for trying something in the literary arts publicly again.

Shaken as I was, I had almost given up until one day calls for IET came up. My friends egged me on and so I paid them a visit. The low turnout gave me mixed feelings but then I thought, something would be better than nothing. I applied for technical this time and with the certification course in my kitty, I got through the rounds fairly easily. Selected at last! The initial days were all excitement and energy, about proving myself, doing good work. But hardly a month in, I saw some nasty politics in play and started doubting my decision to join. But then came along an idea, an event so unique that it was just too good to pass on. We were then at the cusp of building something new, a legacy - TUC. And so I gave everything into it, working with the team and took the event to success. A big success. We had loads of fun, made some crazy memories, but life is never this hunky dory. I rubbed a lot of people the wrong way, just by the way of my work and thus the politics of it got to me so much that I chose to quit. Looking back, I know I passed on a President opportunity, but I also know that it was the right thing to do. The one time I get selected, politics rejects me.

Owing to the months of hardwork I had just put in, the days after leaving IET got extremely dull with no work at all. I was seeking ways to keep myself busy and somehow it still hadn't got through my thick skull that clubs and chapters aren't the only way. I applied to YRC, and they didn't even consider my application. I applied to ELA, and got rejected again. Two straight off rejections boosted my self doubt so much that I had started to believe I'm good for nothing, and I was already halfway through my second year. Then one day as I was relating this to a senior I had befriended during my stint at TUC, he smiled sympathetically and told me that I had associated myself with some people who had enemies almost everywhere. Just my luck. My one experience at a chapter was such that it got me thrown out everywhere. Because I got involved with the not so popular people. I was damn frustrated, and coincidentally the same night, I saw the ELA selects list. Some of them, well let's just say they would have been a sadistic grammer nazi's gourmet meal. That got me plain livid. But I used that anger to do something which has given me joy ever since - this blog. 

Rejection from ELA was the best thing which happened in my life. With all the free time, I started to read more, and write more. Sometimes about mundane stuff, at others about serious issues everybody has to deal with it. I must say my blog and my writing also helped me to get through one of the biggest losses I have suffered in my life. Practice makes a man perfect and so with practice, with carefully curated words, I kept on honing my skills and though I commit the sin of pride by even thinking about this, but my biggest achievement came when my friends from Yearbook and ELA both said that I didn't deserve to be rejected. But that wasn't it. The free time I had, a lot of it was spent tinkering around game dev and over time I had amassed enough experience in all its aspects that when on a whim, I and two of my friends decided to hold a workshop in our college's annual techfest - graVITas, our proposal got selected. Of course it helped to know the right people by then. It was decided that we three would be working only on the tutoring end of things; the management side would be handled by a chapter. And guess what, the chapter was IEEE. Small world. The workshop went on to be the most profitable event of the fest and it's still a joke between the three of us that we should have taken some cut for our pains at least.

But the good times didn't end there. The rejections and the time and again treatment of being a nobody had humbled me so much that I started living the quote "hope for the best, prepare for the worst". Actually just the latter half of the quote. So my selection into Microsoft GD was as much a surprise to me as to anyone else. And yet it didn't stop there. My writing paid off big time when I along with three of my friends won a spot at the top 10 entries at Wipro's Earthian 2013. We brought home 1.5 lacs to our college. But did it stop there? No. When you achieve milestones like above, you come in notice of a lot of good people. It helped to have friends everywhere but now I had a friend in a Prof who has always helped me in achieving better things in life since. He got me a spot in a special course by MIT, even when I had missed a set of compulsory precursory classes and tests. It was a unique, funny and highly eventful ride in its own right. And if that wasn't enough, I also got in the delegation of students who got to have a lunch and Q&A session with a Nobel laureate in Physics, Claude Cohen-Tanoudji. That was other worldly. It's not everyday that you break bread with a Nobel laureate, let alone one whose friends and students too are Nobel laureates!

And yet it didn't stop there. I continued to enjoy new experiences and responsibilities all along. Now that the first purpose of the tale is achieved, let's move on to the second. What should a freshman or a junior take away from all this? Essentially - it's OK to be rejected. My four years in VIT have been a testament to the fact that good things, if not better, always come your way. You just have to be patient. But it won't be a free pass. You have to work hard at making yourself worthy. You have to keep besting your previous benchmark. And politics is for idiots. I've seen countless people who've spent their years tongues wagging and that didn't get them anywhere. At least that alone didn't get them anywhere. Actions speak louder than words, so let your deeds and achievements speak for you. Having the right company obviously helps to keep you connected so that you don't miss out on anything. But learn who to trust, and more importantly who not to. And learn this fast. It may be sunshine and smiles on the surface but it doesn't take a moment for it to give way to cutthroat competition. Also, it's never too late to explore. Don't fall into despair and depression thinking on some senior's words, that first and second year is all you have. You have your entire life to learn new things.

One thing which people have always said to me throughout these years is that I lacked ambition and passion. That I could have gone on and achieved even more than I already have, if I wanted it bad enough. Well, maybe; who knows! But herein lies the most important lesson of all - make your own definition of success. Here, at the end of all (well almost all) things, I am happy. So I guess I was successful.