My Serendipitous Journey Into Animation

<div>Not long ago, in a small town, there lived three men who had no names. The first one was a dreamer. He followed his heart and chased his dreams. No matter how hard the struggle, he never gave up and always emerged stronger than before, and passed away in content that he had lived his dreams to the fullest. He was known for what he did and the people of the town were full of respect for him and engraved this on his gravestone: Somebody. The second one too had his own dreams, but he didn't muster the courage to follow his heart. Soon he gave up his dreams to live a compromised dream. He had his ups and downs but it only made him tired and weak as he could not be enthusiastic about a dream that had not been entirely his. There were so many people like him in that town, so the people of the town wrote this on his gravestone: Anybody. The third one had no dreams for he was not told that he could in fact dream. He had to borrow others' dreams and call it his. Eventually, he was crumpled in the twists and turns of these dreams he couldn't fully understand. He died too, along with the countless other dreams he had taken upon himself. People could not come to an agreement on his contribution and they simply scratched Nobody on his gravestone.<br /><br />I stumbled upon animation as a career option in the early 2000s. I decided to become an animator, not knowing anything about animation. It was exactly like what had happened to my parents and their parents when their marriages were arranged-a blind date in both cases, with pleasant surprises all along the way! Let me tell you the whole story.<br /><br />I went to a residential school where the system made all the choices. As cliché is it may sound all of us had unanimously aspired to become engineers, if not doctors. None of us ever wanted to become an evolutionary biologist or an adventurous underwater camera person. Most of my extra ordinary friends became ordinary engineers and camouflaged in the crowd-to be just another brick in the wall. There must have been a somebody among us, a potential genius; only if we were encouraged to find our own calling. I was terribly lost when I said no to engineering. It was more frightening to take that dream of being an engineer, a Nobody.<br /><br />A few years later I was accepted to the National Institute of Design, an education system that focuses on bringing out individual expression. Students were exposed to mandatory module called 'Science and Liberal Arts' along with a chosen trade (mine being Animation). Subjects discussed in that module struck a chord in me. I was glad for the first time of having shown a direction. I felt my life had much more to offer, without which even animation would have been just a mundane exercise. The choice of consciously selecting what to communicate became more important. This liberal system of education helped me understand that one can go beyond being a Anybody. <br /><br />In 2011 I came across the Young India Fellowship, a complete science and liberal-arts-based experience that encourages reading, writing and participating in debates with diverse set of people with fire in their bellies. It brought clarity in me by presenting conflicting ideas, encouraged independent thinking and enabled better self-evaluation. This bridged the gap created during my school education and plays a vital role in my career. The persuasive power of films can make dramatic changes in the way the world functions hence it shouts out the importance of a holistic and liberal education among filmmakers. It provided me the necessary conditions to intellectually and creatively stimulate to be a better filmmaker. <br /><br />Great knowledge can possibly create a successful corporate leader, but true geniuses are born out of liberated thinking fueled with creativity and imagination. There will always be room to be Anybody or Somebody or Nobody in any society. Moreover, it is a designation that others give one in the end. However, it surely reflects the choices we have made through till that end. I am glad about those tough days at high school, for they made me independent and I took my own decisions- which triggered a journey into animation at the first place. I was at NID in pursuit of a meaningful career, and grew to redefine myself, learning from peers and the past, and cultivating promises of the future. And from those days in YIF, I have come to be comfortable with the fact that sometimes things go wrong, no matter what I do. I just need the conviction to be somebody.</div>