On the 3rd day at our training institute, we were asked to make a life map for ourselves: everything in our lives that has led up to this moment right here. It's not an easy task - reaching back into your life and buried memories and extracting both the happy and the painful; sharing intimate details with strangers. The connections and understanding between us that developed from it are hardly tangible at the moment. But the internal reflection helped me at least get a better sense of my decision to join Teach for India, and to get a better sense of myself.
Scared
Picture yourself standing in an airplane, the door wide open, the wind rushing past you in full speed, urging you with every gust to take the step. You have your parachute ready, so you know you’ll probably be safe – although it’s never a guarantee. You just need to take that one step, and the next few seconds could be the worst of your life. Your free fall could leave you injured; you might hate it from the moment you let go; you might regret the entire ordeal by the time you touch the ground.
Or you might just experience the most exhilarating feeling ever as you soar past the clouds and get to see your world from a completely different perspective.
I’ve stood at that door most of my life. In fact, the only time I’ve ever stepped off is by accident or peer pressure – never willingly. I’m scared of talking in front of many people, so I make sure I never have to become the center of attention. I’m scared of taking responsibility, so I avoid it with all my semi-conscious power. I hate making decisions, so I always ask others for their opinion under the garb of wanting all perspectives.
In short, I run far away from that door, or else hold on to it with all my might. Either way, I never step out.
It wasn’t an easy decision taking TFI, because I knew joining this organization would mean doing all the things I run away from: standing in front of a group of people and talking; taking responsibility for their results and making decisions that might affect their lives. People say you should always listen to your heart, but in my case, I think my heart is the weaker link. It’s what nudges me away from doors by altering the blood flow of my body, thus causing massive shivering and queasy stomach aches, telling me that quitting is so much easier. And the mind, for all its determination and courage, is no match for this blood-pumping organ.
Enough biology.
I’ve lived my entire life within my comfort zone, and I’ve been – comfortable – in it. But that comfort came at a tiny cost – self-confidence. I believe in TFI’s cause: “one day all children will achieve an excellent education” – how can anyone not believe in it? It’s myself that I never believed in. And so running away became a way of life – the easier path, the one without the prickly stones or the biting mosquitoes.
I don’t know if the next two years of my life will be the best or the worst; parachutes won’t be able to stop the rush of queasiness or exhilaration. I have absolutely no idea which one it will be.
Yet here I am, with no bars to hold on to, no ground underneath me.
I’ve stepped off.
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