January 19, 2021
In this past year, I’ve been presented with surprising opportunities to reconnect with old friends. Whether it’s because we’ve had to take a step back and look back on life’s journey, or it’s because we collectively have more time to reach out to long lost friends and connections, I do not know.
Regardless, it’s been lovely to connect with friends that I had lost touch with. And that includes Pranil, who I think I must have last seen when we were both in high school! Folks, it gives me much pain and a moment of crisis to be reminded that high school was a decade ago.
Anyhow, come along on my catch-up chat with Pranil.
Trying things out
“After high school, I didn’t really know what to do for school and work,” says Pranil, when asked what he’s been up to since I last saw him a full decade ago.
“But my parents and grandparents were like, oh, just go to school. So I picked a random thing to go into. First, it was General Studies, and I thought maybe I could be an English teacher. I liked English in high school. Or maybe I thought I’d be a psychologist, or go to law school. Then a police officer was something I wanted to be for a while, so I was taking Criminology as a major, while trying to get physically fit. So I was doing school and gym for a while.”
But right around his third year in university, Pranil realized that neither the field of criminology nor the prospect of becoming a police officer appealed to him anymore. For some time, Pranil continued taking classes upon his parents’ wishes, but when he talked to a close friend who was in Massage Therapy school, Pranil became interested. He had always been interested in human anatomy.
Journey into Massage Therapy
“So I dropped Criminology and went to school for Massage Therapy. I graduated recently. There’s a registration exam that I have to write in March.” Currently, Pranil works at a massage spa.
“It’s super cool because it involves movement. It’s all kinesiology. You have to know what muscles are involved when you move, or how to remedy an injury. It’s a painful amount of memorization, but I find it really interesting. A basic relaxation massage is perfectly fine when you go to a spa, but massages can also help when somebody is injured or if you’re helping somebody regain function. If, let’s say, somebody’s leg hurts all the time or has terrible posture, we can help correct those. I also find that it’s a nice job, because you’re active and you move around a lot.”
Working as a massage therapist has also made Pranil more sociable and empathetic over time.
“At first, I was really awkward and I wasn’t very good at small talk. But you talk to different people who don’t have the same interests as you, and you have to be able to make them feel comfortable. Some people don’t like to talk at all and just want to be quiet the entire time, and you have to pick up on subtle cues like that.
There’s also something that I call tactile empathy. Some people like some level of pain and deep pressure, while others just like to relax. I might ask, how is it feeling? And they will just say, oh, it’s fine, cause they probably don’t want to say you’re actually doing a terrible job. So you have to sort of feel what the good amount of pressure is for this person. You start to pick up on it.
I enjoy when people ask about human anatomy, and being able to share what I know. One time, a parent brought their child in, and this six-year-old had a bunch of questions, and it was super cute. It’s cool with adults too, when they ask about things they can do to ease their pain. People do trust you with their well-being to a degree, and if it works out, they’re very grateful. So there’s a human aspect there.”
Dance is a passion
Outside of work and school, dance is something that Pranil has gotten to really enjoy in the past few years.
“I do like to try random things. One thing was taking dance lessons. That was kind of a big step for me. I’ll be real, I was into the whole Kpop thing. I was watching a bunch of videos and their choreography. And I wanted to do that too. And I realized that I needed to be a good dancer first. So I watched more dance videos, I love mostly hip-hop kind of stuff. My major would be hip-hop and my minor would be contemporary jazz. I’ve taken ballet once, too. It wasn’t my thing, but it was a fun experience.
If I ever become a famous dancer and someone asks who my inspiration was, I’m gonna have to begrudgingly say that I was a BTS fanboy! It’s not the coolest dance story, haha.”
You know, I bet a whole generation of dancers will have that same answer!
Post-pandemic life & looking ahead
Unsurprisingly, going back to the dance studio is high up on Pranil’s post-pandemic wish list. Also among the top of his list is traveling.
“Once it’s permissible, my friends want to go to Japan and then travel in Asia a little bit. Japan has always been our group destination. We want to go to an onsen, go to Tokyo and see a couple of tourist traps, but also just see what it’s like there in general.
Personally, I also want to visit Switzerland, and see the culture there. And there’s this thing called the CERN Supercollider, which I want to check out. It’s where you take two large particles and accelerate them really, really fast. I don’t actually know a whole lot about it, but it’s super huge and a technology that cost a lot of money to build. It would be cool to see.”
Beyond that, Pranil is taking things one step at a time.
“As a kid, the goal was having a nice job, with a wife and kids. But as it currently stands, I don’t have a whole lot of big, concrete plans. I might have my own dance studio. Or maybe I eventually do settle down with wife and kids. Or I do dance and travel around. I’m cool with either option. I’m sort of going with whatever I end up with. Right now just thinking about what’s my next step.”
But sometimes, Pranil says, the pressure to settle down does loom over him.
“It’s kind of weird. I used to have this youthful kind of energy, but there is this pressure to settle down. The stuff I’m doing now is fine, but that’s not what I want to do forever. I don’t have a whole lot of plans for 60, which I feel like I should probably have some semblance of. So that’s I guess my one concern. What’s a sixty-year-old Pranil going to do? Do you ever feel like that way at all?”
Oh, do I ever. To all twenty-something-year-olds out there feeling life’s uncertainties, here’s to you. You’re so not alone in this.
Boundaries are key
In closing, I ask Pranil if there is one thing that he’s learned in life in the past decade while we haven’t seen each other.
“One thing I’ve learned is setting boundaries for yourself. You still want to be a nice person, but you don’t want to be a pushover, a doormat,” says Pranil.
“You’re not a villain just to say no. Being able to be self critical and assess the overall situation around and think, what should I do next, and how can I conduct things in a specific way. It’s really easy to be a people pleaser and say what people want to hear. But sometimes it’s important to be direct and blunt and honest.”
Boundaries are key. Striking that balance of being kind while being assertive is so key.
Pranil, I’m so glad we were able to get back in touch! It’s such a joy to reconnect with an old friend as slightly wiser people than we once were, or so I’d like to think.
