The Dream

As I grew older, that curiosity stayed with me.

School eventually became college.

Like many students, I had to decide what kind of future I wanted.

Surprisingly, it wasn't technology that first captured my heart.

It was something entirely different.

For as long as I could remember, I wanted to become an Army Officer.

Not because of the uniform.

Not because of the authority.

Because I admired discipline.

Responsibility.

Service.

To me, becoming an officer meant becoming someone people could trust.

That dream stayed with me for years.

It became part of my identity long before I ever discovered programming.

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I prepared seriously.

I trained.

I studied.

I gave everything I had.

And then came my first attempt.

I passed the physical examinations.

I passed the written examinations.

I even cleared Nepal's highly competitive Lok Sewa examination.

But I didn't make it through the interview.

I told myself,

"Next time."

So I tried again.

The result was the same.

Then I tried one final time.

Again, I reached the interview.

Again, I didn't hear the answer I had hoped for.

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People often think disappointment arrives all at once.

For me, it arrived quietly.

When I returned home after my third attempt, I didn't know what to do next.

For three days, I barely spoke.

I wasn't grieving an examination.

I was grieving the future I had imagined for years.

When a dream stays with you throughout childhood, letting go of it feels less like changing plans...

and more like saying goodbye to a version of yourself.

At that moment, I genuinely believed I had reached the end of the road.

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Looking back now, I realize something beautiful.

At the time, I couldn't see that.

None of us can.

When we're standing in the middle of disappointment, clarity usually arrives much later.

Those three difficult days eventually became one of the greatest turning points of my life.

Because after the silence came a question.

"If not this...

then what?"

I didn't know it yet.

But somewhere beyond that question was a completely different world.

One that would introduce me to code.

To design.

To people who believed in me.

To opportunities I could never have imagined.

Everything that became my life today...

began only after the dream I thought I wanted came to an end.