The Uncertainty Of Planning

Are you the sort of person who likes to plan down to every snippet of their day only to realize that your day has made plans for you? Welcome to the club!

My safety net is a bullet journal. Keeping track of habits, budget, daily tasks, reading lists, movie lists, etc. everything is penned down in this notebook. I break these down into tiny goals and daily tasks. I then set aside time everyday dedicated to achieving these goals and make sure everything fits in my planner. The time management is quite unrealistic, but the scent of a brand-new journal and the use of colorful, fancy pens is enough to convince me that tomorrow is a brand-new day, and I can actualize my vision.

And thus, I absolutely jinx it.

• I had plans to go to a ‘volunteer abroad’ program for a year but ended up signing for Graduate School.
• I had plans to not marry before the age of 26, but here I am, engaged at 22, to be married soon.
• I had plans to graduate before I settle with my fiancé, but then I dropped my course midway, and ended up spending 3 and a half months at a meditation retreat center (Kanha Shanti Vanam), during a world-wide pandemic.
• I made plans to rise before dawn for a month but only to stay awake the entire night and morning because I was too excited to sleep.
• I planned to be the kind of writer who would always look presentable, with her eyeliner on point and a glass of cold coffee always ready to drink. But my creative side decided to visit me today while I was brushing my teeth and playing with the oily strands of my hair. I grabbed my notebook and with toothbrush in my mouth, scribbled down some notes. Not the kind of Instagram aesthetic I had in my plan.

I reassessed these ‘jinx’ moments. At every stage of my exhaustive planning of the day, I am presented with choices. One of them would serve my interest – my choice to do a certain activity at this time. While another choice would be what nature had in store for me.
Either, it would challenge my will power and discipline to give in to temptations or it would present me with a bold opportunity that add up to moments of courage and learning I hadn’t acknowledge I needed.

Suggested Read: Life gets better and better

In short, my strategy for life never works out and I realize that there is another force at play. What matters then is –
1. Am I courageous enough to let go of my plans and believe in the higher purpose?
I found my answer while reading a book called ‘Wonder’ by R. J. Palacio. A quote read – “Don’t just go with the flow, take some dares through the rapids.”

2. When the choice has been made, will I always cheerfully accept it?
I was worried that once I dropped out of my master’s program midway, will I ever make it successfully in life?I sat down, dejected, took out my bullet journal and suddenly a chuckle escaped my mouth. In every one of the plans that I made for myself, it took a spin for the better. Life brings many gifts in the form of unexplored opportunities – perspective helps.