Jack of all trades but a master of some
TWhen the time came for my children to choose their careers, I collected information about all coaching centres in the city and state. My daughter opted for the medical profession. I had to keep track of all entrance exams across India and had to juggle between cities where the venue was located. I became an expert in the counselling process. My son opted for engineering, so I had to refurbish my knowledge about admission processes in that field. I learnt about the top 50 colleges of the country and travelled with my son, who took many tests.
My friends now come to me for advice regarding admission of their children in professional colleges. This has made me halfbaked education consultant.
The life expectancy in our country has risen over the past friends on nuances of building construction and how to save money doing that. So I’m a novice contactor and tax consultant.
In the 1990s, I started working with an non-governmental organisation to do charity. There was a lot of paper work involved to get permissions and exemptions from different government departments. Again my chartered accountant didn’t know much about laws concerning NGOs. I had to read about them and act. but got a shock when I realised that he was not able to satisfy them and I had to pay a penalty but it was a good lesson for me.
Jolted, I studied all tax laws, account maintenance, building evaluation systems and came out wiser. I decided that from then onward I would not blindly follow the CA but monitor things with my own eyes. After that I constructed five buildings but have never been on the wrong side of the tax law. In fact, I have advised quite a few hey say life is the best teacher. It is a long drawn learning process where we keep learning till our last breath. In this journey, we become Jack of all trades but master of none. I have been through this journey and think though I am Jack of all trades, I have mastered some of them.
In my early 30s, I started my clinical practice in a small town and built a nursing home. The disadvantage of being in a small town is that you get noticed easily. In the very first year of my practice, income tax officials came to my hospital for a survey-cum-raid. It was my first encounter with tax officials so I was nervous. I thought my chartered accountant was handling the accounts efficiently two decades. Now we have two sets of elderly parents (parents and in-laws) to take care of. While taking care of their physical and psychological problems, I have become confident that this experience will help me in leading a healthy post-retirement life.
As far as my writing is concerned, several of my articles were rejected by newspaper editors before the first one got published. Now that several of them have been published, I think I have become some sort of a writer.
I have completed half a century of my life. During this journey, I have become a Jack of all trades but my hard work has made me master of some.