Explorer. Thinker. Storeteller.
Hi, I'm Dharam!
At a yonder point, now hazy made,
I see the past: a faint charade.
Evanescent dreams deceiving my eyes—
I let you elude, I won’t let you fade.
Professionally, I work as a Senior Data Scientist, hold a Masters degree in Business Analytics from University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and B. Tech. & M. Tech. degrees from IIT Kharagpur. These are the things that my scientist brain wanted.
But the artist heart never liked the stereotypical life. So in the past decade, I’ve moved cities almost each year, taken a dozen solo trips, immersed in different cultures, experimented various styles of living, pursued multiple passions in parallel, fulfilled the most important goals of my life, and established geographic freedom since before most people knew about remote work.
I wasn’t content with what the traditional route offered, so I turned the wheel and built the life I desired.
From delivering flagship projects in Consulting firms to living like a hippie without phone and internet, from flying luxury in Q-suite to hitch-hiking on the roof of a truck, from building sophisticated Machine Learning models to fixing pixels on this blog: I’ve been fortunate to have experienced a plethora of flavours in a short span.
This blog will tell you how and why.
My story.
From a life of chance, to a life of choice.
I’m on a continuous mission of building a slower, intentional life—one where passion wins over survival—and where chasing money is not the sole purpose of living.
I was born in Calcutta, India — the City of Joy.
For most of my early life, I did everything that fits the definition of an ideal kid. I was curious, excelled at academics, and was driven by the idea that achieving success means earning a lot of money by following a career path carefully laid out by people who’ve walked before me.
“No matter what you want to do in life, if you get into an IIT, you’ll be able to do it,” my friend once said.
That one, powerful line brought me to IIT Kharagpur—one of the topmost engineering institutes in India—where I studied Mechanical Engineering but got a Management Consulting job, telling my interviewer how I expected it to be nothing less than Mad Men.
"We're flawed, because we want so much more. We're ruined, because we get these things, and wish for what we had."
Don Draper, Mad Men
For over 2 years, I drove impactful projects, flew on more than 100 flights, worked with some of the smartest people I know, and checked off many of the boxes I once thought defined success. I was a “road warrior” living the proverbial “life out of a suitcase”.
However, somewhere along the way, things didn’t feel quite right. I didn’t choose my career, my career chose me.
I wasn’t particularly unhappy—but I wasn’t fulfilled either. Life felt scripted and strangely unauthentic from who I really was.
“Is this it? Is this what I was working towards all these years?” my heart questioned my brain.
It knew there had to be more.
"The problem is, as achievement-subjects, not only do we burn ourselves out, but the meaning and value of our lives is always deferred. Once we have our dream job, the perfect home, a perfectly optimised life – once we are productive enough, efficient enough, successful enough – only then will we arrive at meaning."
So in September 2018—after six months of deliberation—I made a decision that would alter the trajectory of my life: I quit my job without a plan in hand and decided to explore indefinitely.
Madness—that’s what people around me called it. I was cutting off the roots of a career I’d built with an unbelievable amount of sweat and hardwork, before they’d even formed a grip in the soil. In addition, I was creating an unexplained employment gap in the process and a large hole in my savings account, all for no apparent reason.
They were right — I truly had nothing to show. But what I did have was a burning passion and a question that I couldn’t wait to get an answer for: what kind of life do I really want to live?
That question had more power than anything else.
"The best way to predict the future... is to create it."
Peter Drucker
I set out on a journey of solo travel, exploration, and self-discovery lasting 15 months. I used solitude for self-reflection and gave myself the freedom to experiment with everything — ideas, interests, beliefs, career paths, and even identities I’d never imagined for myself.
From photography to writing to creating music, from freelancing to business to experimenting with startup ideas, I explored several paths. Some worked, most didn’t. But most importantly, for the first time, earning money wasn’t my primary goal. I was doing something just because I was passionate about it.
Sure, there was uncertainty, self-doubt, and fear, but there was also freedom, clarity, and a feeling of being fully alive that cannot be described in words.
At the age of 25—for someone coming from a conservative middle-class background in India with a shit ton of responsibilities—making a bold decision like that was harder than climbing a mountain. Nevertheless, it transformed me as a person and paved the path towards one of the most rewarding periods in the future.
Not only did I realize goals that initially seemed vague and impossible, I also had profound experiences that I would’ve otherwise never dreamed of.
"Your time is limited, don't waste it living someone else's life... have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become."
Steve Jobs
Today, I’m fortunate that my efforts were successful in helping me build the life I wanted. Whether it is at work or outside, I’m grateful to be able to spend time on things I’m passionate about.
Since 2018, I’ve made multiple career pivots, taken more career breaks, went on dozen solo trips, strategically found work I love, sought geographical freedom to live wherever I want, created and published music, and most importantly, spent countless hours on my personal projects (such as this website).
This blog is both a reflection and a product of that journey. It is built on the foundation that life must be intentional, and that it doesn’t come with a universal blueprint for all.
Stepping away from the “tried-and-tested” path of success gave me the space to define success on my own terms and to start building a life around what genuinely mattered to me: curiosity, creativity, health, balance, and meaningful experiences.
Here, I share my stories, lessons, and insights about taking career breaks, navigating pivots, traveling solo, and designing a life driven by intention rather than the norm.
In a world where everyone wants to fast-track the corporate ladder, my hope is to reach those who feel the need to slow down but are afraid of falling behind. I hope my journey shows you that sometimes stepping away is the most intelligent decision you can make to find the right direction before moving forward!