Watching the Easy Choices

When it comes to choices, I was trying to understand how a conscious mind helps you make choices and evaluate them.

So I went back to the book I wrote two years ago, a summary of the blogs I've been writing for almost 15 years.

I found that sometimes, in hindsight, you feel you opted for the easy choices. Then comes a series of thoughts and feelings. It isn't the chatter that takes you there. It is the mindful experience of the past, trying to interpret every step.

During this process, I felt a level of consciousness where I was observing, watching, remembering, recollecting, but not completely attached to it.

I'm sharing a chapter from my book, What the Mind Won't Say.

The Illusion of Easy Choices

While watching Half CA, a web series on Prime Video, I found myself reflecting on the choices I didn't make—the harder paths I quietly avoided.

At school, I was the quiet, obedient child. Teachers often said, "He can do better; he's careless."

Maybe I feared mistakes. Or maybe I just liked the approval that came with being the disciplined one.

I didn't have a plan. I wasn't rebellious or ambitious. I followed routines. My classmates solved past-year papers; I stuck to the textbook. They asked questions; I responded only when called upon.

In hindsight, I wasn't lazy. I was unprepared to lead my own path.

Moving to Chandigarh brought new hopes. But instead of focusing on academics, I poured myself into cycling. I lived with medal-chasers whose ambitions revolved around government jobs and state rankings. Slowly, I drifted from classes.

When I failed to win a gold medal and lost my chance at a sports quota for engineering, reality hit. I had run far from the classroom, and it had quietly left me behind.

In Indore, I followed what my parents suggested: a BBA program. It didn't challenge me. I floated through it. My heart was still in Chandigarh. But love gave me structure. I prayed, I read, I taught tuition, and I worked hard to create something stable.

It was my second big life choice—again made more from emotion than clarity.

Later came the PhD. A noble pursuit, but not one I fully understood. I lacked the foundation in math, research, even confidence. I exited halfway.

No drama. No collapse. Just another quiet ending.

Since then, my career has been a patchwork. Eight companies. Some returns. Always the search for something that fit better.

Sometimes, I justify my path. Other days, I wish I had chosen differently.

But the truth is, a lot of us don't make bad choices. We just stop too soon to see what they could've become.

Most of us aren't scared of challenge. We're scared of not being enough inside it.

And that fear?

It's what makes the easy path so tempting.