The Validation
Saga

H E L L O, people. My name is Kush, and I am trying to become a writer—or to find a job as one. I am currently based in the UK and have been here for more than 1.5 years. If this were an interview, I would have said that I finished my master’s recently, and this “recently” was around seven months ago, so hopefully no recruiter will notice the lie or the gap in my CV.

Every day, I doubt whether I have what it takes to become a writer. Since I am trying to cash in on this skill of mine to land a job, I am only getting rejections, so obviously, with every “Unfortunately, your application has not been…” email, the doubt in my skills gets heavier and heavier.

There are two types of rejections: a) when they reject you based on your CV, and b) when they meet you, talk to you for several long minutes, say that they really love your ideas and profile, make you do a writing assignment, and then say that they loved the assignment—it was really so out of the box that they did not need it inside their box—so they are rejecting you.

Rejection A is still fine; it does not sting. But B makes me cry like a bitch. I cannot even change my underwear because I do not have a job and cannot afford new ones, so how can I change the world?

All these things make it really difficult for me to keep going and find a job in the empire where the sun never sets. Well, for me, it has not risen even once. But mama did not raise a quitter. I mean, my mother was mostly busy with work during my childhood, but grandmama did, in fact, raise a quitter.

So, what do I do to keep going? I use some of my past memories—incidents when I received applause or good feedback for my writing and creativity—and use those memories as a stage on which I try to keep myself standing and moving. All this BS is about those memories.

You are going to encounter three short stories about why I want to become a writer. I wanted to start a blog or website for my articles, but I procrastinated on that idea a million times because of laziness and a lack of confidence. I realised that this was the best time to finally start my own page. I do not want to be chained to any job for validation; I want to write for myself, and if I do not do it now, I may lose every ounce of passion I have for writing and creativity.

By the end of this story series, either all these instances will help me stop caring about validation and continue writing for myself, or I will become completely convinced that every appreciation was just fooling me. I do not know how invested you are in it, but as an audience member, I am very interested—as if my life depends on it.