When I am asked to join Youth Alliance..

Today when I am asked to join Youth Alliance, full time, I am humbled! Thank you Prakhar Bhaiya, Kishan Bhaiya, Shefali Di, Sanjeev Bhaiya, Vibhuti and all others.

When I look back last 9 months or so, when I first encountered the Youth Alliance's Lead the Change link on Facebook in late February and today when this offer is made to me, iIsee a whole world getting upside down for me.

Then I struggled to survive, was doing some things in college, but was largely insecure and unhappy. Then, I doubted all the ideals that I came with to Delhi, to college, frustrated with the way things worked, YA came like a breath of fresh air, I could recover those ideals that iIhad during school. And when I reflect back today, I realize things flowed quite smoothly with LTC happening very well for me, followed by Gramya Manthan which too helped improve my perspectives a lot, consciously-unconsciously i started feeling for the cause, all rational judgements aside, i was enjoying doing little things with Youth Alliance. For the first time, I felt I was following my heart, for long i have been a person who follow rules very well, competes and wins every rat race I become part of, but all this while I realized what's the point, i have been compromising with my happiness.

I remember asking Anshu Sir, feeling all the pressure in the world, "Sir, I want to do something, i do not know what, there's pressure from parents and my own self to perform, how to do that I feel for, and how to know what I feel for in the first place?'. To which he replied, 'Karna to tumhe hi padega, aur karke hi pata chalega ki tumhe kya pasand hai! kud pado, be free, take some risk, experiment'. Then I felt these words too heavy, thinking it may be too difficult for me to do something like that.

Today when I recall these words, I feel things happened so without all the logical interpretation and worldly analysis that we put to life, as if the entire universe reverberating my inner wish. And last 2 months when i seriously started thinking of the possibility of joining YA full time, sharing with Vibhuti since we were on same ground and had similar dilemmas, talking to Prakhar Bhaiya, and observing around what my peers, siblings were doing and what else i could do (close to a year prior to this phase, I superficially thought to prepare for IAS exam and be part of civil services), I increasingly felt disinterested in doing anything else. But still was confused.

So i went once to Ravi Sir, he with all the humility and calmness said, 'you may now think that a year is a long time but when you will be at my place, it would just be a small part of your journey.' He told me, just follow my heart, and sighted his example who never thought of working in education and working in Delhi after studying in a B-school. He said you will discover ways.

In between one evening, when I sat with Prakhar Bhaiya and Kishan Bhaiya outside a metro station just before the closing day of LTC and we discussed the feedbacks and what went wrong with LTC 2, after that I decided to stop thinking too much and just listen to my inner voice. And some sense of responsibilty dawned on me, towards Youth Alliance :P

And like Ravi Sir said, the universe responded. The challenge for me was to talk to my family, and tell them what I want to do, 8 days the entire family was together for Diwali, I could not gather courage to talk to Papa for the first 5, but nature has its own plans. On November 14, while I slept (as I usually spend most of my time when at home :P) in the afternoon, Papa came across my Diary, it had all good things and all bull shit that my mind feels. I don't know what all he read, but when he came to wake me up, he was someway happy, I had written the lyrics of Satyameva Jayate song, which he loved, and another thing that I had written was about 'the fact that i don't share enough with my family and that I needed to resolve it'. So this being the foundation to that epic talk that I had with my mum-dad, though didn't end with a conclusion yet i could bring out before my family whatever I felt.

Later, somehow things collided, when my parents met Prakhar Bhaiya at Purani Dilli railway station, with both sides exchanging thoughts and Prakhar Bhaiya being interviewed :P Again, they didn't show any excitement yet the resistance eased. They were more open to accept what we think and wanted to do. Blessed to have parents like them.

Then Jagriti Yatra, happened for me which is a whole beautiful story in itself.

Last few days, Lead the Change, Gramya Manthan have acquired new meanings for me, I am understanding them in new ways than i did before.

Now, I feel that things do change and can change dramatically. And when I am asked to join Youth Alliance, to dream together with the most amazing people I have met and spend sleepless nights to work for those dreams, I stand up and say "Yes, I will".

With loads of Hope, i dream today of Youth Alliance touching more and more lives in more ways than one.

I thank the universe for all that I have got from Youth Alliance and all those connected to it, any attempt to define it will be void. Blessed!

*Lead the Change and Gramya Manthan are two programs of Youth Alliance