About The Time When I Started

I started my working life a long time ago. Coming from very limited means and raised on clothes my mother bought for me, it was late coming to adolescence, when I discovered Fashion Street. With all the freedom a young boy’s pay check affords I bought myself a cheap grey T-Shirt with this iconic print of “Men At Lunch”.

It was to remain my favourite shirt until it went to tatters. The greatest events of my little life until then were woven around it. About the time I got myself a proper job, I bought a Yamaha RX-135 and several other important events that opened my eyes to a world of possibility around me. It was around this time I developed the idea that I probably had infinite potential.

What can men determined to build great things not achieve?

The spirit of the picture had affected me deeply. I dared larger ambitions compared to my peers and never held much doubts in my capabilities. Sipping coffee with new joiners at the first job, I often found them timid and old men already. Somehow, the act of the first job had withered away in them the spirit of a beginning. While they lumbered at their day job, aspiring only to a better next job, I always saw work as a way to build abilities.

I could seemingly do anything I attempted.

It took a lot of mishaps for me to surrender that will unknowingly, somewhere during the intervening years. Not for long, not enough surrender. A pause to belief. A look around of cautious distrust. This is not how I’d thought it’d go. A momentary self doubt.

I had recovered since. But it was recovery of an old fighter, knowing there’s more ahead and resigning to that.

Until recently — when the old spirit of “Men At Lunch” returned. Its a new beginning from the time I originally started. I remain undiminished and so does what I could do ahead. What lies ahead is no longer a struggle.

It is a playful game of potential.