How Saurabh Said Hello to ‘Self Love’ and Adios to ‘Self Criticism’

This is the story of twenty-five-year-old Saurabh, who used to work as a Quality Assurance Engineer and is now taking a break from corporate life to focus and prepare for Civil services examination. Saurabh has been brought up in a nuclear family, and he credits his hometown, Jamshedpur for making him more of a ‘community oriented’ guy! He is a true extrovert at heart and loves to hang out with friends and family.

In his free time, Saurabh engages himself in reading Bhagavad Gita and loves to play the flute! “Give me any work to do, and I will ace it” – These are the words from Saurabh when any new challenge knocks on his door.

Life took a toll when Saurabh went through a heartbreak which eventually made him a self-critic. After the breakup with his then-girlfriend, Saurabh started comparing himself with other people. Owing to this, Saurabh started complaining about feeling exhausted and burnt out every three to four days. 

“My friends didn’t know the root of my behaviour. They used to make fun of my breakup. My girlfriend moved on rapidly, but I could not.”

Saurabh found himself on the never-ending thought train of self criticism and lack of self-confidence. Putting himself in isolation and not interacting with other people for about one year also didn’t help him. 

Saurabh was confused, as he had never felt such emotions prior to this. He was getting irritated, unable to cope up with his changing mindset and lifestyle. On one fine day, Saurabh received an email from YourDOST, his company’s emotional wellness partner and thought of trying counseling.

As soon as Saurabh initiated his interest in counseling, he was set up with YourDOST expert Ms Madhura Saha. Despite being shy and not wanting to share his emotions, Saurabh opened up to Madhura and told her everything that’s been going on in his life.

“My counselor was the nicest person I met in a long time. She began with validating my emotions and told me it’s okay to feel in a certain way but not okay to indulge in self criticism.”

After initial sessions with Madhura, Saurabh felt good and thought he had calmed down. But as he decided to take a break from counseling, the same feelings came crawling back. This time, Saurabh decided to open up in a much better way and thought video sessions might help him connect with the counselor more. Madhura suggested many techniques to Saurabh to cope up with overthinking and self-criticism.

“She suggested a box breathing technique and affirmations technique. Both helped me miraculously.”

Saurabh was asked to practise affirmations to make him realise his potential and to make him aware that be it anything, he should not blindly criticise himself. As everyone has their own journey, it’s not really advisable for anyone to compare themselves. Another technique that helped Saurabh very much was to prepare a goal-list and break them down on a monthly and daily basis. This way, he slowly learned to do things in the best way possible again.

“I started journal writing by myself. It calmed me down from a  lot of havoc and so my overthinking was reduced drastically.”

Saurabh now can meditate for one hour straight, irrespective of how he could never sit straight for thirty seconds! As hesitant and shy Saurabh was earlier to take up counseling, is now a proud supporter of the same and urges everyone to speak up! He calls Madhura an actual dost and can’t thank her enough for helping him sail through the tough waters of his life. He gives himself 4 stars out of 5 in terms of getting better, but the way he has improved and regained his lost confidence, he is a pristine 5 on 5!

Saurabh’s Warrior Tips:
1. People should reach out to a counselor, whenever they get a chance. Even I was hesitant at first, but after seeing my improvements I’m happy that I made this decision.

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