(Soumil writes this story in the year 2024.)

Hi, I am Soumil Grover. While traveling alone today by train, I am thinking of the last ten years in my life.

The career choices that I had after finishing my school were about me only—I never realized how it impacts the family and sometimes the society itself.

It was an ordinary world by all standards—not easy, and full of trials. We had family disagreements at the dinner table, teachers’ advice added to the complications, and I had many sleepless nights. We often questioned whether the struggle was worth it. Why not astronomy?

And along the way, I met allies. Meera, my batch-mate in the college who taught me to rebuild from the ashes. Meera—“Approval ke liye mat jeeyo. Compass ke liye jeeyo. Tumhaara compass (Steering) tumhaare haath mein hai.” (Do not live for the approval, live for the compass, you have your own compass, the Steering.)

I did not even know that one day, we shall be working together—changing many lives on the way.

And our Professor Vikrant Rai, my greatest skeptic that time—who, years later became my business coach. Last year in Berlin, it was Professor Rai himself who introduced me as the keynote speaker at a conference.

And me? I had my moments of doubt, of what-ifs. However, my Steering was my strength.

Sometimes recalling those voices that said “perhaps, possibly, probably”. The failures that cut deep—not the endings but the twists. The ROI was not in the salary or growth, it was in the family trajectory as well. We collectively saw it in the Steering analysis and later in our discussions as well.

I’m sitting here in 2034, writing this story in this train moving around the beautiful Alps.

So if you are reading it in 2025 and if you feel scared or uncertain or confused because the weight of choices feels too heavy—you should get on the Steering. This could be the script written for you.

Because one day, you will feel proud of your choices and smiling at how you will be living your story.

(PS: Do not think that this is Soumil’s story, this is the story of many more students who applied and then got their Steering.)