Confused little Rucha decided to embark upon a new journey in the early winter of 2015, when she decided to take up the 100 Happy Days Challenge.

As a beginner I was curious about this long 100 day journey that I was about to begin, there were so many questions in mind and the curiosity was at epitome as to how I was going to try and never be sad or always see life in positive light. One of my friends  suggested that I should start my 1st day by reading the best book on optimism and the one about following your dream, The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho and it began. The day was 3rd Jan 2015 , I was taking deep breaths and getting blues on that day, but I decided to go on.

As the days went by, I saw radical changes taking place in my life at lightening speed, for some days I could not believe that things were happening at such a rapid pace and that too all that I had wished for. These days were one of the most thankful and happiest ones. I can never ever thank one person for letting me experience this wonderful feeling filled with joy up to the brim.Soon after, I got my offer letter for the job that I was looking forward to at Bosch, as a foreign language expert. It was truly that feeling, which you get when you believe in the beauty of your dreams and let them find you. Again the thought of settling down in a new metropolis is always overwhelming and enthralling.The next incident was the completion of the one big Capstone project that had been hyped for over two months, and finally was getting done. Post graduation examination got done and made me feel satisfied that one more milestone in life was being achieved. I cannot express in words how excited and satisfied I was when I received my degree on 2nd March. The love in my mother’s eyes was incomparable and invaluable. This iron lady stayed by my side even when she never needed to, and made me one of the strongest individuals that I have ever been during the harsh stages of my life. She believed in me all through this while and made sure the smile on my face remained.

There were people and optimists whom I interacted with on a regular basis, to improve on my shortcomings and spread happiness. Three words played a pivotal role in influencing my thoughts and bringing the change that I wanted to be, Believe, Aspire and Dream. After you have done all this, try to imbibe the same in your life and the rest will follow. It worked in the best possible way for me. Challenging, but not impossible. There are people who do not believe in miracles, but I have expressed this in my earlier blogs as well, you pull your dreams towards you like a magnet and let them find you. The same goes with love. As a twenties- something confused damsel I kept on waiting for Mr. Right, like many girls do. At the corner of my heart I knew I will find him someday, may be after I cross that long desert that each of us has to go through to seek what you want. Lo and behold!, I found him in these 100 days, one more life changer. It all seemed like a fairytale at a point of time, but as the 100th day ended, it sunk in that everything was a reality, a sweet reality.

This guy changed everything around me, the way I thought, the way I perceived things. It felt like we complemented each other. I could feel that I am becoming a better person, not really giving a damn to people around me who do not care and caring more about those who really meant the world to me. It was not only love that brought the impact but also the liberal thinking that rarely comes from people of Indian origin seeing the way that we are brought up and the events that take place in this country that build up our perspectives. Soon we also decided to be life partners and that is what I call the epitome of these 100 days.Finding my life partner!!

At the same time I groomed myself personally too, I joined this huge MNC Bosch, one of my dream companies and took up training and learning German further for the betterment of the future. I invested my time in the company to meeting new people, getting to know the nuances of my process, bettering my relations with the German customers, getting to know the harsh truths of corporate life, cribbing about saving my salary and the lavish spending of the first one, the happiness of the first appraisal, the buddy and angel that I found at Bosch, my approachable boss, other close friends whom I can blindly trust and my Marathi gang in Bangalore. It is difficult to express how much ecstasy I have felt at certain times and felt scared too, when so much happiness knocked on the doors. God is truly to thank for this.

My pilot friend from Indigo gave me an insight about his world and how being alone could be a lavish party. I learnt to save, control my anger, get along with people I hate and then there were these amazing travel destinations that I visited which changed the way that I saw the world to be. I travelled like crazy, one month every other weekend I was off on a trip. Four beautiful Indian destinations,Baroda, Ahmedabad , Pondicherry and the quiet town of Gokarna. The Wanderlust was at its colossal heights. I was hungry for more , all the time, even now but sadly there is a thing called financial constraint too and therefore had to stop the temporary hippie nature that I was indulging into, to gear up and save enough to gather experiences on the next adventures that were destined to become a part of life soon enough. Bangalore was a part of the parcel, but still this city has lots to explore and I am on it.

Apart from Bosch, the experiences of MBA and the learnings at Germany last year helped to perceive certain things at length and see to it that I read books to enhance my knowledge and keep myself updated not only of the world but also to build my inner strength. It worked well and I ended up reading some enriching classics, at the same time the learning of a new language paved the way, Malayalam. Many events that I have not mentioned can give a broader idea about how actually it helped me develop, but due to time constraint I cannot express all, hence I have captured all my happy and enriching moments to have a cherished memory for my whole life.

Thanks to all the people and expressing my heartfelt gratitude to all who made it a success. IGTC, Bosch, IOCL, Pune, Bangalore, PG are the keywords here. All the people related to these keywords in my life have made a difference.

Cheers!

Rucha Khot