Learning to Manage Myself: A Life in Progress

Managing others is easy compared to managing ourselves. That’s a truth I’ve come to accept over time. The hardest battles don’t involve shouting matches or boardroom debates. They happen quietly, inside, where no one else can see them. Where we wrestle with fear, anger, insecurity, shame.

For a long time, I found it easy to give in to those darker emotions. Hatred, blame, resentment. They offer a kind of comfort. They make you feel strong, like you’re protecting yourself. But they lie. They build walls where bridges should be. They bury joy. They convince you to stay small when life is calling you to grow.

At some point, I understood that I had a choice. I could keep dragging around all that weight, or I could put it down. I started paying attention to what lifted me up: learning something new, creating something with care, helping someone without expecting anything back. I tried replacing bitterness with curiosity. Complaints with action. That shift didn’t change my life overnight, but it changed the direction I was heading.

Staying positive isn’t a slogan. It’s work. Some days, it feels like dragging yourself uphill with no idea what’s waiting at the top. But I keep climbing. Not because I think I’ll reach some perfect version of myself, but because the climb itself is teaching me how to live.

‘Chal pade hain to kuch door tak chalenge,
Manzil mile na mile, baat raaste ki hai.’

Growing older forces you to face certain truths. People will disappoint you. Some will walk away without explanation. Others will stay, but fail you when you need them most. And sometimes, the hardest truth of all: you’ll disappoint yourself. You’ll make choices you regret. You’ll hurt people who didn’t deserve it. You’ll look back and wonder why you did what you did.

But that’s part of the deal. You don’t get to skip the hard parts. You feel heartbreak. You cause heartbreak. You lose people you love. You make mistakes that don’t come with second chances.

Still, through it all, there’s so much beauty. So much worth holding on to. The way a friend makes you laugh in the middle of a hard week. The comfort of an old photo. The moment someone lets down their guard and trusts you with something real. These moments matter. They’re not loud. They don’t need to be.

‘Zindagi ki kitaab mein kuch panne khali rehne do,
Har baat har waqt likhna zaroori nahi.’

Take pictures. Laugh more than you think is reasonable. Say what you need to say to the people who matter. Even if your voice shakes. Especially if it does. Life doesn’t wait for the perfect time. It just moves, and we either show up for it or we don’t.

We don’t need to be perfect to live fully. We just need to be present. To listen more. To let go of what we can’t control. To learn, even when it hurts. To keep choosing growth over comfort. And when we fall short, and we will, we get up, take a breath, and keep going.

That’s what managing myself has come to mean: not controlling every part of my life, but responding to it with honesty, strength, and as much kindness as I can find. It’s not a destination. It’s a way of showing up. Again and again, day after day.

And if I can do that with even a little more grace than I did yesterday, then I’m on the right path.