A Little About Me
I am an Indian guy who went abroad for a master’s degree just like lakhs of us do every year, chasing the idea of seeing something beyond what we already know. I did my undergrad in India, completed my master’s in Europe, and worked there for almost two years. I’m back in India now, working at a startup in the SaaS space.
Why Did I Come Back?
The honest answer? I felt lonely in a way that got harder to ignore & my Self-Sabotage attitude.
Every festival, every birthday, every family moment. I was the one missing. And the strange part wasn’t even the missing. It was starting to feel like no one noticed. That they’d celebrate regardless. It started eating at me more than I expected.
My Indian friends in Europe used to vent about the country constantly. I joined in, not because the country had done anything wrong, but because somewhere in the back of my head, I never stopped feeling like an outsider. That feeling never left, no matter how long I stayed.
So I started self-sabotaging. Stopped pushing hard for visa sponsorship. Stopped wanting it badly enough. And when six months were left on my visa and no job had come through, I wasn’t depressed. I was almost relieved. I think if I had really wanted to stay, I would’ve found a way. But I didn’t.
So here I am. Back home.
How Indian Work Culture Is Treating Me
The first two months back were the toughest of my life.
I came in overconfident, master’s from a good university, foreign work experience. I genuinely thought companies would line up. They didn’t. The callbacks weren’t coming, and everyone around me had an opinion. People who’d never left the city had advice about my career path. The pressure was constant and exhausting.
The one thing that kept me sane was MMA. I loved it for two reasons: the people there were focused on themselves, not on judging others. And I was actually getting better at something. That mattered more than I can explain. Also, there was a girl.
Then one day, a friend from the MMA gym said something that cut right through me:
“You’re at Step 0. Just get to Step 1. From there, do whatever you want.” It stung. I spent that whole weekend applying, no filter on salary, no ego about company size. By Monday morning, I had an offer. The founder took the interview himself. I started that week.
Four months in now. I started with energy. I don’t have much of it left.
I work late, come home, and somehow end up working again. I can’t focus the way I used to. I feel like I’m going dull and the unsettling part is, this isn’t new. I’ve felt this at every stage of life. School, college, unemployed, now employed. There’s always this quiet voice that says
you’re not sharp enough.
The real trap I’ve landed in: if I work myself into the ground and still miss my targets, I’ll regret the sacrifice. If I don’t push hard enough and miss them, I’ll feel like I wasn’t capable. Either way, I lose.
What’s Next
I’ve made a decision, not a dramatic one, just a quiet one.
I work my designated hours. When I come home, work is done. No messages, no laptop, no one gets that time from me anymore. That boundary is non-negotiable now.
I want to write again. I want to build something. I have a domain I bought and never used, ideas for apps I haven’t started, a blog I walked away from. I don’t know which one sticks first.
This post isn’t for views. I’m not building an audience tonight. I just needed to write something that was mine — outside the job, outside the pressure, outside everyone’s expectations of where I should be by now.
That’s enough for today.