Born in Bihar (avg. per capita yearly income 2023: 650$), in a middle class family in India, my family's resources were limited to providing the basic necessities of life. The resources were so less that even my dreams were very basic such as one day having a 9 to 5 job, owning a car, or sitting in a plane.

The only way to achieve those dreams was to study. So, every time when I didn't perform good enough in academics, the dreams were reiterated and I had to work harder. Almost everything in my life revolved around studying. My parents didn't own a flat or a car, but they made sure that our education never suffered because of financial problems.

Vacations meant just sitting at home or visiting cousins a bit more frequently than usual (everyone was in same city). Weekend and evenings meant waiting for electricity (we had min. 6 to 8 hour power cuts almost daily) to get my homework done or doing it during daytime or under oil lamps.

With no computer at home, no internet or exposure to the world, my knowledge was limited to what I was taught in school, read in newspaper or heard from my friends and family.

After performing pretty good (90%+) in my class 10th exams, the typical middle class family decision was to be made, i.e. Engineer or Doctor? 

Anything else was considered either too ambitious (i.e. risky), or too easy (i.e. useless). 

As a middle-class family in India, a lot of decisions are oriented towards making sure you can cover the basic needs (food, shelter, clothes, health) on your own in future. There is no govt. taking care of you (paying for your food, shelter, clothes). If you can't earn, you can die on street and no one will care. Period!

So, from the two given options, I went for engineering.

I couldn't make it to the top 5000 applicants who got selected for the 7 IITs (my IITJEE rank was approx. 9000).

Still, with an all india rank of 963 in CEE exam, I did get accepted in Delhi College of Engineering the same year.

Although considered worse than the top 5 IITs, DCE (now called DTU) was still considered almost equal to the lower ranked 2 IITs because of its prime location (Delhi is capital of India) and University of Delhi affiliation (which is the top university in India). Also, I was just tired of studying 14 hours a day for the last 2 years or so. I decided to go for DCE.

In DCE, following were the main directions students wanted to prepare towards:

1. Best private companies

2. Best government companies

3. Best management institutes in India, 

4. Best management institutes in US or Europe

5. Best masters courses in US or Europe

6. Civil or engineering services through UPSC exam (work for Indian state or central government as a high ranked govt. officer)

As the preparation is very different across these 6 directions, I selected 1, 2, and 3 as my target direction. Eventually I applied, gave exams and got offers from three companies and ended up joining NTPC Ltd (aligns with direction 2) which is the biggest electricity generation company in India. At the time, NTPC was considered as one of the best government company in India for mechanical engineers in terms of benefits, lifestyle and work. 

After I joined as assistant manager in NTPC working as mechanical engineer, there was a lot to learn. Power Plants are amazing feats of human intelligence and engineering capabilities. 

But, I also started craving learnings apart from power plant machines, pipelines and engineering problems.

As I had prepared for direction 3 (management institutes in India) during my DCE days too, I decided to restart the preparation. Subsequently, I appeared for CAT, cleared it with 99%ile score (in top 2,000 out of 200,000+ applicants) and joined IIM Calcutta for its 2 years MBA (PGDM) program. 

I was extremely happy and proud of me. From my humble beginnings in local below average schools, I had now made it to the most elite and top ranked MBA program in India. I felt I had finally won the extremely competitive Indian rat race which I was born in, but sadly the race continued ... 

I met the most brilliant people in my two years at IIM C. 11 years later, I still agree to this statement.

The students, even the ones who were always the best in their classes / schools up until then, were failing exams or going into depression due to the sheer competitive and high performing environment at IIM C. It was true survival of the fittest as everything was relative from course grades, to job opportunities, to performance in debates and projects.

I struggled to keep up as well (Institute Rank 130 out of 400), but still kept following my hobbies (table tennis, dance) to keep my sanity.

As a participant and spectator of many of the successes and failures from these two years, It was the first time I realized that it is not only intelligence or hard work which matters, but also luck. Although we all love to give credits to our intelligence or hard work in whatever we achieve, actually luck matters the most. It is everywhere - from which country we are born in, to what parents we get, to what skills, gender, wealth, environment or looks we are born with.

After MBA, I joined Kirloskar group in their leadership trainee program.

Soon enough, I realized while working there that the business world exists way beyond a country or a domain. 

To grow further, it made sense to work towards becoming a global citizen and have good enough understanding of as many domains as possible. Life is a journey of continuous learning and improvement and settling in a job in my 20s felt like a mistake.

I decided to go for my second masters with a focus on business and IT, applied for University of Mannheim in Germany and joined its Master in Management program.

During my 2nd masters in Germany, aim was not only to learn inside the university but also outside. 

Moving to a new country in a different continent is in a lot of ways like being reborn. Many things need to be re-learnt. That meant multiple things had to be managed simultaneously and in the short time-frame of 2 years.

I had to: 

• fully self-finance my study and stay, 

• learn German language, 

• learn and score good grades in University, 

• make new friends, 

• integrate in the German society,

• perform good in my working student job,

• find a good full-time job, 

• (and last but not the least) enjoy the journey and student life

With the right combination of luck, intelligence, and hard-work, I was indeed able to achieve all of the above in 2 years. 

Towards the end of my degree, I already had the job offer from SAP to join as project consultant (financial accounting), B2/C1 level German (CEFR), and successfully graduated my second masters with a grade of 1.9 (good).

Looking back, I feel very lucky to currently have a life which is way more satisfying than I had ever expected. 

I still learn every day in my job, enjoy my life outside of the job and am working towards finding my true life purpose. I can speak German at C1 level and am still learning further on the go.

Life is not perfect and of course there are also problems I still need to resolve, but I am on the right track at least.

I have also realized that life is not about what we finally achieve in life in terms of money, fame or power, but the journey and the day to day happiness itself.