“We got our grounding by playing live. You had to fall flat on your face, pay your dues and grow.” – Dave Clark.
Born and brought up in Uttar Pradesh, Ashwini has been a person with a lively soul. Having been away from home for more than 10 years now, Ashwini has experienced great struggles and never stopped dreaming higher.
Ashwini completed his engineering in Computer Science from NIT Durgapur, after which he completed his masters as well. He then joined a start-up venture with one of his friends. Ashwini has also been one of the oldest employees of WhiteHat at one point in time. Ashwini never let himself stop dreaming bigger as a result of which he has experienced a lot of shifts in his career.
“Previously, I used to take a sabbatical after a few months of working to travel. I found my peace in exploring places and at the same time, wanted to do something big of my own.”
Ashwini, who is 32-years-old, currently works as an Associate Director. But as Ashwini finally settled for a stable job in my life, he started noticing issues that needed attention. During his masters, Ashwini had felt these issues for the first time in his life.
After getting into some trouble, it was the first time Ashwini took the chance of getting therapy for himself in college itself. Back then he was overwhelmed by certain anxiety levels.
“My journey has been like a roller-coaster. Since I joined the mainstream career with a stable salary, it became slightly complicated. I discovered that I had some serious grounding issues.”
When Ashwini was not working in a constant job lifestyle, he would often compromise his living standards. From living in a neighbourhood that didn’t look aesthetic to not sticking to a particular regime, Ashwini would instead save a few bucks to devote to the start-up.
Nonetheless, with sweating out every last bit of energy, the nights seemed like an escape from reality as they would celebrate with parties for Ashwini. Ashwini quit his first corporate job after clearing some debt from the past which had piled on due to the start-ups.
“Now that I think of my previous corporate job, I realised that I could have been in a very senior position if I hadn’t quit it. Everything summed up to indicate my grounding issues.”
Aswini was soon triggered with massive anxiety as he felt clueless most of the time. The stable job and lifestyle didn’t align with his personality any longer. But more than that, the grounding issue was the root cause of the same.
Ashwini came to know about therapy through his friends in an organic manner as they were involved in that field. So naturally, Ashwini didn’t have any preconceptions about it. Be it smoking, cheating or using certain dating apps, Ashwini wanted to drift apart from that lifestyle and become a newer version of himself.
“My company was associated with YourDOST. So I took this opportunity to get in touch with Ankita Aggarwal who was my counselor, through audio calls.”
At the starting of the therapy journey, Ashwini was a bit sceptical as he felt like the sessions weren’t going anywhere. But with the fear of falling back into the same habits and his inner urge to improvise on himself, Ashwini continued the sessions.
Eventually, it got easier for Ashwini to resonate with his counselor with her understanding as well. As described by Ashwini, the therapy sessions involved more self-introspection rather than techniques.
“Therapy is a process of self-realisation. It gave me a place to think about my issues and thoughts in an unfiltered manner.”
Ashwini realised what he was in reality and what he tries to be are altogether very different. So, he understood what he had to do to develop his overall personality. Instead of being harsh on himself, Ashwini took the higher road of being considerate of himself.
One of the most difficult tasks for Ashwini was to move on knowing his shortcomings which was the most difficult thing to change. What took Ashwini out of his grounding issues were his efforts to be more flexible and less critical about himself.
“Ankita has been very kind and understanding. The immense comfort and listening from her end made it easier for me to express myself in front of her.”
Ashwini described his improvement through therapy by saying that he moved one step ahead, and indeed, we second that! He said that the best part about therapy was self-introspection and the most difficult was getting a grip over the acceptance of his reality. Ashwini rates his overall improvement through therapy with a 3 out of 5.
We, at YourDOST, feel that he is a true inspiration as clearly portrays the fact that it’s never too late to start. We wish him luck in his future endeavours!
Ashwini’s Warrior Tips:
1. We should be more disciplined. But that doesn’t mean that one should be hard on themselves.
2. People who are struggling haven’t started on their journey to betterment. Many of them aren’t even aware of mental health. It’s an exposure issue, which we, as society, need to deal with.
3. therapy is nothing but a type of effort that will add to your productivity and help you clear your thoughts to move forward in life.
Are you someone who has gone through a difficult phase and emerged stronger and better, with some professional help? Share your story with us to encourage thousands of others who might be struggling. Click here to submit your story.
