Peace with Chaos!

When my dreams shattered, I was afraid to dream. I dreamt of attending the Silicon Valley Meet-Up after listening to the stories sung by my seniors. The shattered dream helped me to adopt a mantra -"Everything happens for good". 

I stepped into Stanford thinking how once a dream came to reality. It took me some time to bring back the energy I hid after graduation. It's been a while since I experienced such a josh. I became a student once again.

 The Thinkers

My expectations of the meet-up changed over time. My goals as a sophomore were to talk to as many people as possible, learn how they were change-makers in their school, explore the places around and visit Google headquarters. 

My thoughts now before the meet-up were:

1. To listen more.

2. Foreigners are people like us and I should not feel like an imposter.

3. Meeting new people is not the objective but imbibing their best behaviour is.

4. Accepting the change and embracing the past.

5. To be grounded.

With this attitude, I was fortunate to have 15 minutes of discussion with "David Johnson" a professor from Stanford Law School regarding "The power of negotiation between interviewer and interviewee". I was with people who shouted "Ta-Daaaa!" when I made a mistake, suggested embracing the ambiguity, asked me to look at the world with algorithms, proved how creative hustlers made the change and asked me for suggestions to improve a prototype. I met people with a similar motto of how to leverage the most out of the community. We created the uif-bff and turned many flying butterflies into bees to indulge in a deep conversation. 

Who hates yogurt?

Little did I imagine that "my juniors" become "the friends who know my shitty side". There were situations when Vikranth was too embarrassed with Bhavya's and my behaviour. I felt like looking at myself when Pavithra addresses an issue. I was in tune with absolute strangers. I met "Manu" from Uruguay. I introduced her to my friends, they made her "our best friend".  She wrote us a letter which will be my greatest possessions of Stanford meet-up. As much as each of us understood ourselves, we understood each other. 

All the pic credits to the man - Vikranth

We explored libraries, museums and the art of Stanford together. Manu helped us understand art and culture. We used to look at an art piece and leave but Manu used to explain the details of it and how it is beautiful. She helped us explore the mysteries of Stanford University. 

We couldn't decode this art, kindly help!!

A big shoutout to Ananya who made my day by sharing one of her mantras - " I cheer for people. I was raised to believe there's sun for everybody". I am grateful for everything that happened and everything that will happen. This journey was emotional, fun and inspiring. I made some of the toughest decisions during that time which I will be proud of. After returning to India, due to the change in diet, my health got affected. It is nothing deadly..lol.... It will take a long time to recover completely. 

Peace with Chaos.....!

Even if you are conscious, some things go wrong. Learn the lesson and move forward!