24th August,2014 approx 9:00 pm , I was crestfallen , dejected and what not , I was trying hard since last 2 years for civil services exam and discovered that I am scoring around border line of cut off marks predicted by some (bogus) pundits.
My teacher and parents had high hopes from me, some very serious decisions of my life were dependent on this result,was quite confident that I would easily crack prelim ,Cried a lot on 24th night and thought that if even after this much of dedication I could not get through prelims then there must be some fault in me and I should not waste more time and try to find a job , updated my resume next day on various websites ,asked my friends and seniors to forward it, and even started studying technical stuffs required for job interviews but by the end of the day I felt something missing , I missed my daily dose of Hindu, missed those critical discussions of the editorial with my father,missed telling my mother some interesting facts or two, missed telling my “London going” friend economic and IR issues and then I realized that it has become a part of my system and just a single day without these things made me miss them so much.
It is like I can’t imagine myself without daily critical analysis of economy,polity ,diplomacy ,I realized that these things are now embedded in my genes not by some genetic transmutation but by natural selection, I realized that my mind which needed daily dose of intellectual fodder was feeling starved and pleading me to pick up that Hindu which was lying isolated at dining table, my RBCs asked me to give them a daily dose of extra oxygen in form of chapters from that sacred book “Plassey to Partition”, it seemed as if my leukocytes will deny giving me protection from pathogens if I don’t feed them with some mountains and valley stuff,my kidney ,my lungs all my organs(yes all of them ) seem crying for enlightenment which they were receiving incessantly, and then the lightning struck that how foolish it was on my part to even think of quitting this field, I asked myself… was I doing all this just to clear an exam (well actually I started it for the same reason) did not I learn academic as well as some very important lessons of life in last two years ,isn’t knowledge a thing which nobody can take back from you and certainly not a stupid (well not so stupid though) exam.
I realized knowledge is an ocean and it is also an addiction you cant run away from it once you are into it “truly,madly and deeply”.
And then my father said to me “beta antim saans tak insaan ko ladte rehna hai, ye to bas ek exam hai life me isse bhi bade issues aayenge ,you should never give up”, my mum used to pray hard for me she use to spend some more than an hour from 5 in the morning praying for my success, when I told her that it would be hard to make it she said “koi baat nai beta main to aise hi prarthna karti rahungi tum himmat mat haaro”.
Guys first of all its not just an exam it's a process which makes you hard, which expand your knowledge and make you a better citizen. Just don’t loose hope if you have not scored well enough “rise,shine and glorify” (and may be those stupid cut off predictions go all wrong and you even qualify this time around) , I am not saying that don’t plan for alternatives because as Mrunal says don’t put all your eggs in one basket but don’t fret away from this process of gaining knowledge .
Best of luck to every one I hope everyone will be back on track at least from tomorrow, after all you all are “Serious players” and your vital organs are pleading you
