What If

As I crossed 40,one question started hovering my mind quite frequently. What if .Life decisons taken in last 20 years got analysed knowingly unknowingly. It was corona pandemic time and working from home was a challenge considering the Indian company I was working was not in favour of same.I had to struggle to convince them to allow work from home.When I looked around I saw people working in MNCs who anyways had a 5 days work schedule getting wfh without even asking for.Then the questions began what if I had considered working for MNC from the very start and it went till what if I had not done CA and had done engineering since most of the CAs had to go to office during pandemic.After sometime I realised what a futile thought it was. Engineering was not my cup of tea at all ,I had loved doing CA,I always had made conscious work decisions as per need of hour and then that negative thought process stopped.

Whenever we have some event or program or we plan for simple outing we have to consider 3- 4 hours add on for travelling to and fro in Mumbai.Then when I visited my hometown I saw people planning for lunch meets or picnic instantly .No stress of commuting, parking,toll.What if we had not opted for Mumbai as dwelling place.What if we too had good picnic spots nearby..But then I felt I love Mumbai more than the inconveniences it causes..What if becomes irrelevant since I have so many positives to talk about living here.

What if is a kind of game which can be played solo and hours can be spent fruitlessly.

What if I had done exercise regularly from a younger age,what if I had travelled overseas for higher education,what if I had purchased real-estate little early,what if I had not broken heart of someone, what if I had confessed my feelings to someone, what if I had made better career choices, what if I had started my venture in 30s so on and so forth...

On close observation what if starts when we are not happy with a situation or when the outcome is not as per our expectation..there is a gap between our understanding and reality.When we compare knowinglyor unknowingly situations..As humans we have certain limitations. We have no control over outcomes..We take decisons as per knowledge and circumstances.

Outcome sometimes is in our favour sometimes as per higher command.We never know the scheme of things planned for us and then this what if becomes a easy way to express or vent out the helplessness or frustration.We just repent without understanding that life choices are bound to go wrong at some point or other. Its a learning process and thats the very reason we are here alive today.

I have come to realise this is one of the most negative trait and harmful thought process which is vicious. It drains our energy and we lose focus. It is self doubt creating exercise.We get entangled and just keep on moving around the things we can'tchange.

When a thought comes what if,and we change it to what now it really helps us in focussing on improving the current situation. This needs a practice and once it becomes a habit we can easily shift gears.

I have myself gone through the process and have learnt accepting things in a optimistic way and believing what has happened has happened for the best and what will happen will be best too only if now I am sincere and true to my intention and efforts.

Let focus on making things better now ,using our energies productively and positively. Trust the process and let the future unfold.