Are you living to live? - Part 4 (Now, Today)

Since I was 14, Music has been the only thing I *know* I’m good at. But it’s funny how I’ve tried to make a career in everything that I’ve been mediocre!

Anyway, my husband didn’t take no for an answer ‘cause he saw how much all this was killing me. And a few months in, I’m closer to getting broke, but so much happier. I wake up with a purpose, workout regularly, am back to my verbose extrovert self, more aware of the world around us and much more patient and cordial. 

I’ll be honest. One of the things that prevented me from taking this step was in the interest of feminism. Having grown up around women who’ve been working all their lives, I have been conditioned to be independent and never think of relying on the husband for financial security. I’ve been one of those women in the past who have judged others’ decision to become homemakers, and thus, I was (and am) still sceptical about how people might perceive my step. There is no doubt about the fact that I will be dependent for quite a while, but I know that my husband will not let me turn into a homemaker, and will keep pushing me till I’m back on my feet again! 

Being on your own is hard work. Because the biggest part of the freelance job is to land work, not the actual doing part of it. Of course there are days when I do not believe in my skill and think that this might’ve been the stupidest thing I’ve ever done. More often than not, I tend to get lazy, till I remind myself that I’m my own Sales, Marketing and Creative teams and there's no minute's rest. Some days I feel like I’m begging to people, some days I wake up motivated with complete faith in myself.

I still get miserable every now and then. This is not an ideal job. Ideal would be me having a manager and I swoop in, do my work and get out. That would be awesome. Maybe in a few years.

I also have a band now - Ashmore. Himanshu, Sandeep and I are working on tons of new music and jam once a week. My singing voice has started to come back, songwriting getting polished and I’m so thankful to these two boys for being active, eager to make original music and just being my Doolally buddies. You bring me joy. :)

Check back with me in a few months, perhaps a year. I might be stuck at the same place, I might’ve done fantastic for a newbie. Perhaps you can help me get there. I would love love love some help :)

Are you living to live? - Part 3 (The Lows)

Sometimes all you need is to get to that breaking point, that lowest of the lows, for you to start making some real changes to your life. Those have happened to me after getting my heart broken and multiple times now because of jobs.

Great things have come out of them in the past. Singing, for one, because my parents were fighting too much. Getting through to a B-school of my choice, because my IT job felt like an everyday nervous breakdown. 2009, the most creative year of my life, because I had to do everything in my power to keep my mind from obsessing over this one person. And even meeting my now husband, just at the time I lost all faith in men. 

What I’m most thankful for is that I’ve always been able to channelize my anger or sadness to create something beautiful. I don’t hate my bosses that they were terrible leaders at a time when I needed their professional help the most (and vocally so). Eventually, they got me to a point where I stopped questioning their competence but started questioning why I was so miserable. Why was only *I* miserable? Everybody else seemed to be dealing with it just fine, including the guy who was humiliated in every single team meeting. Is it ME? I was working against my wishes for someone else’s financial gain, while my own dreams were untouched. If I *have* to feel discomfort every single day, shouldn’t I rather be doing it for my own self? Should I be thanking them for this self-realisation?

Now, it’s not like I *never* enjoyed working. Marketing allowed me to be creative and analytical at the same time. It took me close to ad films, music festivals, content, fun colleagues and things that kept my interest up for most parts. 

Thus, I gave my last job more than a few chances. I even waited till appraisal time to see if the bonus, increment and promotion could compensate for my unhappiness. 

And when that beautiful text came, crediting my account with unfathomable amount of money, my only happiness came from the fact that I could finally pay off my education loan. And be free. Free to risk, for the first time in my life.

The only question was - what was I going to do now? Heh, I was 17 again. 

I had to start from scratch. Music probably only pays Vishal Dadlani’s bills, and that too because he makes Bollywood music. (My aunty is right in a way) And I’m not special. You’re not special, Archita. The universe owes you nothing.

So when my husband suggested Voice Overs, it was almost like “Hey, why didn’t *I* think of that?”. (I have to admit, it seemed a lot easier than it turned out to be.) Took me half a dozen phone calls with people in the field to decide that that might be what I could do. 

The first thing everyone told me that being on your own is tough. One has to be mentally prepared to make very little money, constantly network and have a partner who will always support you no matter what. At least 2 years to get anywhere, everyone said.

I thought I had made up my mind, but this was very difficult to digest. For the first time since I was 21, I started to make money that I considered more than enough and I was gonna quit *now*? I did nothing else for 2-3 weeks but cry and kill myself with anxiety. Start from the bottom, all over again?!

And always raised to be risk-averse, I changed my mind yet again and started looking at job openings. There were at least two opportunities I could’ve grabbed and I probably would’ve even been happy there, but for how long? 6 months tops? Then what, back to square one. I've already had 30 years of putting things off. 

NO! YOU’RE NOT DOING THIS! GIVE YOURSELF A CHANCE! How long will you run? 

Are you living to live? - Part 2 (Rewind)

I was 12 when I first went to a recording studio, that belonged to a relative of mine. I asked him what they did there. He said his employees did regional language dubbing of films and Hindi character voices for kids channels. I was fascinated. Having thoroughly enjoyed singing along to TV and radio jingles all through childhood, I remember thinking “This sounds like so much fun!”. 

At 15, I had made the decision to become a singer. I started dreaming of auditioning for musicals, because the acting bug had bit me bad post a couple of theatre stints in school. One afternoon, a relative with a longstanding career in Bollywood asked me what I wanted to do when I grew up.

“She wants to be a singer!”, Dad declared.

“Oh, that’s great beta. Where’s your interest - Indi-Pop or playback?”, she asked.

I was confused; I didn’t realise those were my only two options.

“No aunty, I sing in English. No Hindi music for me!”

“Beta, then you can only maintain it as a hobby because English music will never work in India. Playback is a must. You must try for playback. Try singing in Hindi!”

How do I just TRY singing in Hindi? I hardly ever think in Hindi. You sing what you feel, and you feel what you think, right? (Till date, I might've written close to 200 songs in English, but perhaps only 1 in Hindi)

I guess that was the day I mentally stopped dreaming to be a singer. It wasn’t a viable career option, and people aren’t really wrong when they say that. I come from a highly educated, middle class family. Who'd here support a struggling-something to make things happen in an area they don’t understand, all the while cementing my role as a hopeless case.

Suddenly, I was left ambition-less, at a very wrong age. I didn’t know anything else besides music. Some idea of engineering had “struck” me like every other person around me. But later, convinced I wasn’t made for it, I contemplated studying the German Language and Law, but who was going to help this confused teenager get clarity. Forced into engineering, and embarrassingly so, I performed stellar in an otherwise awful college. Ah those 4 years of my life worth erasing, barring a few beautiful friends and my band. To make matters worse, I unwittingly came across the “fact” that a fairly pretty, talented, no-nonsense and intelligent Delhi girl in Faridabad *had* to be a slut. One 2-month rebound-fling with a loser didn’t help things either. 

I was surrounded by people who were neither rich in their existence nor brought up with ideals, ideas and thoughts that matched mine. The dream of MBA from a great college seemed to be the only way to kept afloat. If it wasn’t my engineering text books, I was buried in novels or CAT prep. Unsurprisingly, MBA entrances tanked just the way engineering entrances had. 

The thing about under-confidence is - it never allows you to get anywhere.

Are you living to live? - Part 1 (The seed)

Nine months ago, I encountered quite possibly the biggest existential crisis of my life. The problem was, I got too much time to think and reflect, being on my wedding leave for a month, and basking during my honeymoon in sunny South Africa. I watched people enjoy their lives, make merry every day, focus more on family and friends than money and I asked myself “Is it possible to live this way? Am I just running because everybody else is?” 

It took me a few days to figure out that I needed to dig deep to find what really makes me happy. I decided that I would love to teach kids music - singing, songwriting, maybe even the piano.

The more I thought and talked about it with my husband, the more it made me happy and sure. But I knew I was living in a bubble; I was, like everyone else, going to get back to my job and get absorbed, only to have these thoughts again at the next international vacation money can buy.

Except when I did get back, I found myself more helpless and frustrated than ever before. I woke up depressed, cried every evening and slept cribbing. “Sure this can’t be the way you’re gonna live for the rest of your life, yes?”, I asked myself. I was (am) newly married and I couldn’t start a relationship on a bad note. I couldn’t imagine being a 40 year old mother to talented kids, bitter and unfulfilled. What example am I going to set for them - kids, please don’t live your dreams because mommy didn’t and it’ll hurt her too much to see you happy doing yours? That’s classic Low-Self Esteem. 

At work, I felt invisible and challenged in an area that was neither in my zone of interest, nor in sync with my skill sets. You can even say I was trying to *become invisible* - maybe I could continue to make money while nobody cared whether I was working or not. (There are tons of people like that, I fooled myself into thinking I could happily be one of them.)

Teaching wasn’t going to work out. I had no idea how to design classes. I had been out of music for too long myself. What were my creds? Some washed up, has-been, singing-to-my-bedroom-wall musician? I couldn’t even hit notes I could 3 years ago. I quit piano lessons because my highly-accomplished teacher was pushing me too hard! Like hell I was going to convince parents to send their kids to an under-confident musician with only a Berklee College free course as a “degree”! I almost grudgingly accepted to be part of a band, hoping that my love for music might be tickled, hoping it hadn’t left me completely.   

If this was not the time to make some major changes, I might as well just have considered euthanasia at 30. I would’ve been the first case of “Kill-me-because-I’m-already-dead”.