“Look guys, if you're just going to stare at me, I'm going to bed!”

But it made me think about death. I don't feel I'll live a long life. That's why I have to get what I can from every day.
- Elvis Presley

I can still do something very easy like joining Infosys when I finish my engineering next year. I can start earning immediately and have a good chance of staying with my parents for longer. I can enjoy the rest of my days in the college and even get to keep around Rs. 20,000 I have taken from my mother for admission processes for MBA. My parents would be happy with this and nobody would complain. I will become independent and do what I want and when I want. I will be in control of my life.

The difficult thing is to become a slave of my dreams. I will have to work a lot more - do my best in CAT, try to do better in XAT and IBSAT and work even more to get the admission. That won't be the end of it - I will have to spend two years doing hard work like I have never done before. And stay away from my parents. This will even delay money reaching me. And I won't be able to relax in the months to come. I will miss everything I have enjoyed these 21 years.

The rewards might constitute a heavier pay check when I finally get a job, more respect and most importantly the fulfillment of all the dreams I have seen. I will become a slave of my dreams. I will have to make sacrifices. Stay alone and away from my parents and not meet them for months together. The biggest sacrifice would be the ease I would be running away from on a chase for something that could bring a lot of criticism for me if I succeed. I will have to face negativity and loneliness.

Everything has a price attached to it. I don't know why my parents keep talking about me getting married. They enjoy it and confuse me. It confuses me because it looks attractive and easy and simple. I will get respect even this way. I am just 21 - a bit less than that in fact - and my parents look excited already. They just make me think. And I enjoy thinking about it. That's the problem with me right now. It's a feeling I must contain and look for delayed gratification. But why?

I had this thought when I wrote the last post here. That even made me put up that quote from the movie 'Troy'. I don't compare myself to any character from it and neither am I interested in making my name immortal. I just want to be happy, lave and be loved. And right now I feel like pouring all my heart here the way a drunk would do in front of his closest friend. It would be such a big relief only if I could do it and nobody questioned. I wouldn't mind being laughed at - I laugh at myself more than anybody. I know every boy or a girl of my age has these things, or rather plans, in mind and many fantasies attached to them. I don't have any fantasies though - I have stopped enjoying them long back - but the things that could easily be turned into reality seem far from real if I choose to continue with my studies. And I am going to go ahead for my dreams. I don't dream wild; I dream hard. I never work hard.

I remember my father telling a few times "you need to have children and lots of money when you are young", and I agree with him. I guess I would still be young at 24! And this is not immature thinking. Staying away from my parents is my biggest worry now; it's not much with CAT. There isn't much I can do about it - I can only write it and pray for the best - for its only Allah who decides. I don't want to be a celebrity or a famous personality - I just want to be called as the best person by the people who know me. This, I don't know, is realistic or not. As a bottom line, I have to live for what I have dreamt and see it come true not as a miracle but as a blessing from Allah which gives satisfaction to me and a feeling of deserved achievement. Some things still attract me.

I have not written this post to come to any conclusions or make resolutions. I wanted to be analytical and critical of this dilemma and confusion I am facing and for which I know, it is just a transient feeling. I have never found anything in my life as boring. I have enjoyed every bit of it and have seen how it feels to be so blessed. Its not even that I am living in a fast lane - I know what's happening and where I am leading myself to. Some earlier defeats come as a reminiscence but retrospecting and learning from them makes me feel stronger. I couldn't have experienced them at a better time and I couldn't have salvaged any better. I want to be loved, not envied.