Journey of an accidental writer who feared facing the crowd.

This is not the first time I call myself an accidental writer, because I never aspired to write. As a student, making notes petrified me, questions with explanatory answered killed me and taking additional sheets in exams never happened with me. Adding to it, was my miserable school life.
To start with, I joined a missionary school and my nursery days were like me getting into one classroom and after lunch break waking up in some other classroom. But that was not too long when my teacher scolded me and caned me for being too naughty. And that marked my journey as a student who feared his teacher. Little did I know, that fear encouraged my bullies to ride over me for the next 13 years of my school. While I did well until the third grade, it was after that, my grades saw a downward trajectory. My bullies used to beat me up, snatch my lunch, take away my pocket money, tear my notes and throw me under the bus for things that I never did, and all I could do was cry in a corner. Over the years, some of my teachers too joined the party and found me being bullied to be their mode of entertainment. This not just made me hate school, but left me devastated and just tarnished my self-confidence. I feared getting on to the stage and face the crowd, because I was scared of being mocked by people, because I was already the butt of all jokes. Whatever I said, was never taken serious. I was too eager to step out of the school not because of the expectations around adulating, but because I was fed up of my school’s toxic environment.
After completing school, I joined college, and I somehow got away from the horrid memories of my school life, and made friends with whom I had some of the best memories of my life. While I was an absolutely different person in the college, I used to get into things that made me look cool and acceptable to the people around me, and over the time I started to seek validation from the people who were around me but little did I realize, I was making a joke out of myself. Towards the end of college, I met a girl with whom I got into a relationship, which did not have a happy ending, and it left me scarred. I chose alcohol and drugs as my escape route but it made things worse.
One fine day, when I was on my bed, I asked myself, do I need to do this to my life? I turned towards my left and a fancy notebook caught my attention. Two years ago, I bought that notebook when my friends told me that I write well, and I should think of giving a shot at writing professionally. Those words gave me an instant adrenaline rush, and I bought that notebook and an expensive pen to write a book, but never managed to go beyond the second page, and that notebook lied in my wardrobe for two years biting dust. That night, I took that notebook and started to write. I didn’t know where to start, but I knew that I wanted to write, not because I wanted to become an author, but I badly wanted to get out of the miserable state I was in. As a part of my job as an HR Professional, I used to meet may people, there were some who spoke a lot about themselves and their lives and some just kept a low profile. Those interactions set a base for designing the central character and other characters of my story, and that’s how my journey as a writer began. The journey that started from writing film reviews, post -match analysis and opinions on the newly introduced Facebook has now been translated in a form of a hardcover book. I never aimed at making a bestseller, selling hundreds or thousand copies, but seeing me as an author was somebody’s dream, and I was happy that it was coming true.
But what came with that book, was my confidence that I had buried somewhere deep inside. The timid school boy has grown up to become a man who turned his life on his own, the man who gave it back on the face of the ones who once bullied him, who proved his teachers wrong who once said that he is worthless and would be a failure for life. That guy who once sought for validation from his friends in college has now understood the meaning of life, he has now understood that people would stay if they want to, they will be your friend if they really mean to be and you don’t need to beg them to be your friend or stand by your side all the time.
Today, I am an Author, not really sure if successful or not, but I am happy that I fulfilled a dream. While I am still working as an HR Professional for the 11th consecutive year, I am still investing my time to write. So far I have authored 3 books (The Loser, I Quit and Milk & Lemon) and currently working on my fourth book named SHero.