Rick Ruben who is a music industry legend has said, “It’s hard to get really depressed until your dreams come true. Once your dreams come true and you realize you feel the same way you did before, then you get a feeling of hopelessness”. If you think Mr. Ruben is making this up to sound cool, you’re probably wrong. Mr. Ruben is not the only who has experienced in this.
If you don’t believe me, read about Abhinav Bindra. As a child growing up in India, he has dreamt of winning Olympic Gold. He won the Olympic Gold Medal in shooting at 2008 in 10-meter Air Rifle event. Result – he realized his life’s only goal was achieved at age of 25. He didn’t know what do next. He went into depression…
Look I am not a mental health expert but what this tells a simple story. It’s about constantly looking for and preparing for what comes next. One of the prime reason why Sachin Tendulkar (the greatest batter the world cricket has ever seen) didn’t have similar challenge like Abhinav Bindra after winning 2011 World Cup was – he probably had something else lined up as his next goal. He continued to play international cricket for another couple of years. While there is no confirmation of it (yet), but my guess is, after winning the World Cup in 2011, Sachin had set his eyes on becoming first batter to score 100 centuries.
Few months after I started my career as an engineer, just shy of turning 22, I had virtual interaction on a conference call with my mentors who were having title of Vice President. Over the years I worked very closely with them. But since that first interaction, I had dreamt of becoming a Vice President! Few weeks ago, I was awarded a corporate title promotion of “Vice President”. This is something I have wanted from the beginning of my career. And now, I have been contemplating about this question of what’s next. Obviously, I am not ready for retirement (although idea of quitting busy city life and opening a café in the mountains or near to a beach has crossed my mind couple of times)! Like Sachin did after winning the World Cup, I’ve started to find new goals and targets for next decade. Wish me luck…