Failure
I have missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I have almost lost 300 games. 26 times I have been trusted to take the game winning shot and I missed. I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that's why I succeed.
- Michael Jordon
For long, I was wondering about putting my random thoughts in some order. And this is an attempt to put thoughts into words. For me, Failures are something which sculpts a rock stone into an object, a beautiful sculpture. The sculpture does not however show, to the onlooker, the amount of pain that the rock stone has undergone to get this beautiful look.
I, as like Michael Jordon, have failed over and over and over again in my life. And am not yet Michael Jordon. If I have to arrange my failures in some order, the first set of failures that would flash up in my mind, are the failures that I faced during the academic year 2001-2002. Yes. Those were my days in the final year of Engineering. I had no interest in mugging up thousands of English words for the sake of a MBA seat in a foreign country. Nor was my interest in doing a technical post graduation through crack opening the GATE. Since, I had closed both the doors of opportunities myself, I had only one more door which I had to kick open to keep running in Life. Yes. That was the door of getting employed in some organisation leave alone to be choosy. Those were times of recession in Software field and even industry majors were doing recruitments in lower scale fearing a 2000 like recession. And, there came my failures over and over and over again. I had the main criteria to my advantage to any campus selection. Yes. I did not have any arrear at any point of time. Thank God. But, that's just the first step. A shortlisting process would start off with filtering candidates who had arrears at any point of time. If I have to draw lines to a marathon race… this was the first few seconds of the whole race which went into more than a couple of hours…
I would have attended atleast a dozen interviews between May 2001 and April 2002 and the worst part of the story is that for all the interviews that I attended, I fell out at the last hurdle. Yes. I did not fall out in any off the mid stages like the written tests, group discussions & initial level interviews. I cleared all of those in every interview that allows any Mechanical Engineer, of course without an arrear, to be eligle for the process. And the end result was indeed predictable. Yes. I did not make it. In actual terms, it means that, the shortlisting process would start at around 8 am and run into the evenings and the end result was given by around 9 pm or even later… Sad part is that, I would have to wait until the last moment and then turn back home just to wait for my next interview.
How many days spent waiting for the results and how many nights pondering over ‘What went wrong?’ There were even instances when my pillow, my only companion those terrible nights, would get wet. Instances when some nights were washed away in tears. Instances when most days were spent worrying, imagining the pathetic state I would be, in just a couple of months time if I did not jump every hurdle of a given interview schedule. Unanswerable Questions kept haunting every other moment. Would I be able to face my parents? Would my parents be able to face close relatives and friends? Won’t there be questions asked and comments spoken in front off and behind the face? Unreactable situations when people offer their condolences, “Heard that your son has not got a job, YET?” These thoughts would give nightmares and I mean it when I say that suicide would be a far better option than to smile at such condolence statements.
Thank God for not having passed such instances in real life. The mere thought of such things might happen, brings down your abilities by half. Fear of Failure. Yes. When you keep failing and when failing unfortunately becomes your habbit, any amount of inspirational quotes or motivational speeches cant make the slightest impacts on your performance. You start seeing Interviewers as police officers asking you questions which does not have an answer. You start believing that you have been destined for a failure. You start experiencing the tragedy even before the tragedy has ever started. You start liking tragic movies. You don't laugh at comedy anymore. The only subject on earth that you laugh at would be your own self. A laughter which will end up in tears, when you end up being alone. You start complaining that life is too full of miseries. You don't enjoy beauty in women anymore. You reply to warm greetings with a sigh. You begin to grow heavier in heart when actually who start losing weight.
I still remember the night in which I saw my first major defeat in the race towards finding a job. Even before I stepped into the Final year, our Campus Interview with CTS had been scheduled. And you know what, based on my mark sheets, I was shortlisted to attend the written Aptitude test. A couple of day’s gap between the shortlistment and the actual interview gave lots of hopes and dreams. I started dreaming as if I am one of the employees of CTS already. Huh… I had built castles already but in thin air. Little did I know that this castle would vanish in air, a couple of days from then on? Back to reality now… On successfully passing the tests and the GDs, I entered the interview round for the first time in my life. I was happy the way I performed and was waiting eagerly for the results. A total of 50 people were interviewed and 25 people were to be offered. In percentage terms, I thought it was a cake walk for me, as I was confident with myself. Is that what was called Over Confidence? It was almost 7 pm in the night and the stage was beautifully set for the students who were about to be offered. All the 50 of us who attended the interview were standing in the ground floor and the results were announced by our Training & Placement HOD standing from the first floor portico. Every name read out, would invite huge cheers and wide smiles and one young guy or girl would run up the stairs and join the staff in the first floor. Names came out of our HODs mouth every few seconds and after that, there was one proud student transforming himself / herself into an employee with an attractive salary package. Those were moments of pride. Unfortunately, destiny thought otherwise for me. It was a long wait. No, An understatement. The longest wait to hear your name being spelt out. I kept counting the names, kept seeing bright and happy faces, kept believing that my turn would also come. With every name spelt out, the probability of my name being called was reducing. At the same time, the rate at which my heart was beating was increasing exponentially. I did not lose hope even after my finger counted 24. As expected, there was a long pause for the 25th name. And then I realized that it was all over. Atleast I knew that it was allover and I need not wait anymore. Initially, I felt very happy for the 25 who stood one floor above us physically as well as in status. Before we broke up, our HOD motivated us that there was something better waiting for the guys standing below. But those were spoken out of lips and not of heart. 25 of us had to leave the building while 25 still screamed in happiness. Infact, the 25 who lost the battle did not believe that they had lost it already and the 25, who had won, did not still believe that they had actually won. Somehow, I kept a cool head and walked towards the bus stand. Nothing was going in my mind about the failure as I waited for my friends who did succeed in this race. I did not have an opportunity to shake hands congratulating them as I was busy awaiting the next name being spelt out. Now that I was not preoccupied, I decided to wait until they came out, so that I can shake hands and share their happiness. After a cup of tea, I saw my classmate coming out in a jubiliant mood. Even now, I did not feel jealous and I shook his hands with full heart. He appreciated me saying ‘If I would have lost and you would have won, I would not have had the courage to congratulate you. I like this quality in you’. I felt proud but that did not matter. Truth was that he was happier guy than I was. He had a memorable day in his life and I was about to have the most pathetic night of my life. I went home well aware that I would have to spend the night alone as none of my room mates was in town. This added fuel to fire and I first started introspection. How difficult is it to answer your own questions? How difficult is it to find out the reason for failure? How difficult is it to start digesting the fact that you have lost? With hours passing, the failure started haunting me more.
I never knew that I need to spend much more nights like this. Nights with more questions than answers, nights with more fears than dreams, more sleepless nights than snoring ones. It was afterall the beginning. Destiny had more in stock for me but I was unaware. In due course of time, this became a habbit as I became a habitual loser. Perhaps, winning was not my way of living. Failing was. Interview after interview, this trend continued. Somehow, I started losing courage in calling up parents at home in the night just to inform that I flunked another one. So, I decided that I would never disclose another interview schedule. Only when you disclose a schedule, will there be an expectation or eagerness from their side to know the result. I started attending interviews without my parents’ knowledge. If I failed, as it was my habbit nowadays, I atleast need not call them up and update my inability to find myselves a job. I solved the wrong problem. Huh.
I was so desparate to win but I did not. By now, I had seen enough failures to forget the results the moment those were out. I started laughing at my own failures amidst my friends when I knew that my poor heart was seeping blood instead of tears. My slam book has got statements of friends who prayed for a job to me even when they did not have one. Such was my reputation in losing at the interview stage. Huh. Our T&P madam used to say, “You should get this job atleast” when she saw me waiting to be interviewed for the nth time. Now was that a statement of sarcasm? Who knows and yet it mattered. I wish I had not heard that statement.
Now, if can say with pride to everyone that I came out of the college with 2 jobs on hand – it was easier said than done. This single success conceals lots of failures within. The single smile conceals litres and litres of tears. The single moment of pride conceals days of shame. And when I called up my parents to pass on the success information, unknowingly my mouth said, ‘At last, I got a job’and I knew I cried more that day than I cried any other day when I failed.
I have missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I have almost lost 300 games. 26 times I have been trusted to take the game winning shot and I missed. I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that's why I succeed.
- Michael Jordon
For long, I was wondering about putting my random thoughts in some order. And this is an attempt to put thoughts into words. For me, Failures are something which sculpts a rock stone into an object, a beautiful sculpture. The sculpture does not however show, to the onlooker, the amount of pain that the rock stone has undergone to get this beautiful look.
I, as like Michael Jordon, have failed over and over and over again in my life. And am not yet Michael Jordon. If I have to arrange my failures in some order, the first set of failures that would flash up in my mind, are the failures that I faced during the academic year 2001-2002. Yes. Those were my days in the final year of Engineering. I had no interest in mugging up thousands of English words for the sake of a MBA seat in a foreign country. Nor was my interest in doing a technical post graduation through crack opening the GATE. Since, I had closed both the doors of opportunities myself, I had only one more door which I had to kick open to keep running in Life. Yes. That was the door of getting employed in some organisation leave alone to be choosy. Those were times of recession in Software field and even industry majors were doing recruitments in lower scale fearing a 2000 like recession. And, there came my failures over and over and over again. I had the main criteria to my advantage to any campus selection. Yes. I did not have any arrear at any point of time. Thank God. But, that's just the first step. A shortlisting process would start off with filtering candidates who had arrears at any point of time. If I have to draw lines to a marathon race… this was the first few seconds of the whole race which went into more than a couple of hours…
I would have attended atleast a dozen interviews between May 2001 and April 2002 and the worst part of the story is that for all the interviews that I attended, I fell out at the last hurdle. Yes. I did not fall out in any off the mid stages like the written tests, group discussions & initial level interviews. I cleared all of those in every interview that allows any Mechanical Engineer, of course without an arrear, to be eligle for the process. And the end result was indeed predictable. Yes. I did not make it. In actual terms, it means that, the shortlisting process would start at around 8 am and run into the evenings and the end result was given by around 9 pm or even later… Sad part is that, I would have to wait until the last moment and then turn back home just to wait for my next interview.
How many days spent waiting for the results and how many nights pondering over ‘What went wrong?’ There were even instances when my pillow, my only companion those terrible nights, would get wet. Instances when some nights were washed away in tears. Instances when most days were spent worrying, imagining the pathetic state I would be, in just a couple of months time if I did not jump every hurdle of a given interview schedule. Unanswerable Questions kept haunting every other moment. Would I be able to face my parents? Would my parents be able to face close relatives and friends? Won’t there be questions asked and comments spoken in front off and behind the face? Unreactable situations when people offer their condolences, “Heard that your son has not got a job, YET?” These thoughts would give nightmares and I mean it when I say that suicide would be a far better option than to smile at such condolence statements.
Thank God for not having passed such instances in real life. The mere thought of such things might happen, brings down your abilities by half. Fear of Failure. Yes. When you keep failing and when failing unfortunately becomes your habbit, any amount of inspirational quotes or motivational speeches cant make the slightest impacts on your performance. You start seeing Interviewers as police officers asking you questions which does not have an answer. You start believing that you have been destined for a failure. You start experiencing the tragedy even before the tragedy has ever started. You start liking tragic movies. You don't laugh at comedy anymore. The only subject on earth that you laugh at would be your own self. A laughter which will end up in tears, when you end up being alone. You start complaining that life is too full of miseries. You don't enjoy beauty in women anymore. You reply to warm greetings with a sigh. You begin to grow heavier in heart when actually who start losing weight.
I still remember the night in which I saw my first major defeat in the race towards finding a job. Even before I stepped into the Final year, our Campus Interview with CTS had been scheduled. And you know what, based on my mark sheets, I was shortlisted to attend the written Aptitude test. A couple of day’s gap between the shortlistment and the actual interview gave lots of hopes and dreams. I started dreaming as if I am one of the employees of CTS already. Huh… I had built castles already but in thin air. Little did I know that this castle would vanish in air, a couple of days from then on? Back to reality now… On successfully passing the tests and the GDs, I entered the interview round for the first time in my life. I was happy the way I performed and was waiting eagerly for the results. A total of 50 people were interviewed and 25 people were to be offered. In percentage terms, I thought it was a cake walk for me, as I was confident with myself. Is that what was called Over Confidence? It was almost 7 pm in the night and the stage was beautifully set for the students who were about to be offered. All the 50 of us who attended the interview were standing in the ground floor and the results were announced by our Training & Placement HOD standing from the first floor portico. Every name read out, would invite huge cheers and wide smiles and one young guy or girl would run up the stairs and join the staff in the first floor. Names came out of our HODs mouth every few seconds and after that, there was one proud student transforming himself / herself into an employee with an attractive salary package. Those were moments of pride. Unfortunately, destiny thought otherwise for me. It was a long wait. No, An understatement. The longest wait to hear your name being spelt out. I kept counting the names, kept seeing bright and happy faces, kept believing that my turn would also come. With every name spelt out, the probability of my name being called was reducing. At the same time, the rate at which my heart was beating was increasing exponentially. I did not lose hope even after my finger counted 24. As expected, there was a long pause for the 25th name. And then I realized that it was all over. Atleast I knew that it was allover and I need not wait anymore. Initially, I felt very happy for the 25 who stood one floor above us physically as well as in status. Before we broke up, our HOD motivated us that there was something better waiting for the guys standing below. But those were spoken out of lips and not of heart. 25 of us had to leave the building while 25 still screamed in happiness. Infact, the 25 who lost the battle did not believe that they had lost it already and the 25, who had won, did not still believe that they had actually won. Somehow, I kept a cool head and walked towards the bus stand. Nothing was going in my mind about the failure as I waited for my friends who did succeed in this race. I did not have an opportunity to shake hands congratulating them as I was busy awaiting the next name being spelt out. Now that I was not preoccupied, I decided to wait until they came out, so that I can shake hands and share their happiness. After a cup of tea, I saw my classmate coming out in a jubiliant mood. Even now, I did not feel jealous and I shook his hands with full heart. He appreciated me saying ‘If I would have lost and you would have won, I would not have had the courage to congratulate you. I like this quality in you’. I felt proud but that did not matter. Truth was that he was happier guy than I was. He had a memorable day in his life and I was about to have the most pathetic night of my life. I went home well aware that I would have to spend the night alone as none of my room mates was in town. This added fuel to fire and I first started introspection. How difficult is it to answer your own questions? How difficult is it to find out the reason for failure? How difficult is it to start digesting the fact that you have lost? With hours passing, the failure started haunting me more.
I never knew that I need to spend much more nights like this. Nights with more questions than answers, nights with more fears than dreams, more sleepless nights than snoring ones. It was afterall the beginning. Destiny had more in stock for me but I was unaware. In due course of time, this became a habbit as I became a habitual loser. Perhaps, winning was not my way of living. Failing was. Interview after interview, this trend continued. Somehow, I started losing courage in calling up parents at home in the night just to inform that I flunked another one. So, I decided that I would never disclose another interview schedule. Only when you disclose a schedule, will there be an expectation or eagerness from their side to know the result. I started attending interviews without my parents’ knowledge. If I failed, as it was my habbit nowadays, I atleast need not call them up and update my inability to find myselves a job. I solved the wrong problem. Huh.
I was so desparate to win but I did not. By now, I had seen enough failures to forget the results the moment those were out. I started laughing at my own failures amidst my friends when I knew that my poor heart was seeping blood instead of tears. My slam book has got statements of friends who prayed for a job to me even when they did not have one. Such was my reputation in losing at the interview stage. Huh. Our T&P madam used to say, “You should get this job atleast” when she saw me waiting to be interviewed for the nth time. Now was that a statement of sarcasm? Who knows and yet it mattered. I wish I had not heard that statement.
Now, if can say with pride to everyone that I came out of the college with 2 jobs on hand – it was easier said than done. This single success conceals lots of failures within. The single smile conceals litres and litres of tears. The single moment of pride conceals days of shame. And when I called up my parents to pass on the success information, unknowingly my mouth said, ‘At last, I got a job’and I knew I cried more that day than I cried any other day when I failed.
3 comments:
Huuhhhhh... Very Goood post man.. U deserved to WIN. Hope u r doin good in ur organization.
BTW u didnt mention abt ur job offers? where do u work now?
Naveen
Hi Naveen,
Thanks for the comments. I have now changed a couple of jobs in the 6 years span and i now work for a company called "Nokia Siemens Networks" in Chennai. By the way, how did u find to read this blog. I quit blogging sometime back & its nice to see people still visit my blog when i myself dont do :-(
Karthikeyan S
Read Failure blog... couldn't put myself into writer’s shoes to understand what he has gone through, as i have never failed in a campus interview...but well written one... had some tears in eyes...not sure about it as because of growing old to have these kinds of sentiment or to have this problem reading in computers...jokes apart, felt little bad about not to have known when a friend with you was going through a struggle and doing nothing, yet not sure, my consolation would have done something…but as you know a say goes “ Worst days are your best days, as you learn something”
KP
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