In this Level 2 Toastmasters project delivered on 1 January at Mumbai Toastmasters, Tanay Mehta opens with a playful question about why anyone would be present on New Year’s Day, then frames the holiday as a symbolic fresh start and ending. He shares his personal background as an obedient, “good” kid whose early rebellion was limited to sneaking a McDonald’s lunch. A turning point arrives when he spends two weeks traveling alone in New York, realizing that a more comfortable life abroad is not his true desire; he wants to contribute to his own country. He recounts how, over a month, many of his friends left for the United States, leaving his car rides increasingly quiet and prompting a deep sense of loss. He copes by journaling, discovering that sadness signals the value of what’s been lost. The experience pushes him toward optimism, leading him to a random Sunday in February 2022 when he “knocked on the door” of Mumbai Toastmasters. He describes the club as an experimental space where failure is safe and encouraged, allowing him to practice speeches, make mistakes, and grow. Concluding, he celebrates the audience’s commitment to growth, wishes them a Happy New Year, and reinforces the message that embracing failure and continuous improvement is the path to greatness.
Chapters
Good morning everyone. Good afternoon. Good afternoon everyone and welcome to Toastmasters. I have a question for all of you. What are you doing here on 1st January at Mumbai Toastmasters? Really? I mean, this is a genuine question. What are you guys doing here? Okay, before we answer that, I want you all to raise a round of applause for yourself. You made it to Mumbai Toastmasters on 1st January. Really, I mean, I'm really happy that you guys lead such extremely boring lives. But what am— but who am I to say this? I myself am giving a speech on such a day. But there is something about New Year, isn't it? It represents something. It represents the start of something new and the end of something old. And you know, for example, this New Year, it represents day one. And day one has a lot of meanings for different kinds of people. For students, day 1 is exactly 8 o'clock. If it is 8:01, it means 2 more episodes of Friends before they open their books. For kids, it is when they pick up their toys and they start playing. And for adults, it's first jam. So I am also an adult, and this is a new day for me. This is the start of something new for me and the end of something old. Now, this end might seem sad, you know, ends always seem sad, but they're really not. Because every time something ends, you learn something new. And I'd like to share some of the things that I've learned this year with you. Now, when I was growing up, I was a good boy. I was an obedient kid, an innocent kid. And obviously I've remained the same. And in doing so, I've always followed the path that society has laid out— school, college, not, not going outside much. I did this, I did everything everything I was expected to do, not more, not less. And to say that I was— my idea of rebellion was to— my idea of rebellion was to have lunch at McDonald's and not at home without telling my mother. That was my idea of rebellion. But still, I somehow followed up. And but all of this changed last year when I got a chance to visit New York. Last day I visited New York and I traveled the entire country and the entire city of New York alone. I sat alone, I traveled alone, I ate alone, I did everything on my own. And after spending 2 good weeks there, I had a stark realization. I realized that despite the fact that America offers a far better everyday life than Mumbai does right now, or perhaps ever will in the next decade or so, I still wouldn't want to live there for one sole reason. Even though the everyday life is better, that is not what I want. I'm not looking for a better comfortable life. I am looking for a place where I can try to build something for and in my country. I don't know if I'm even remotely capable of something like this, but it would be a crime if I wouldn't even try. So I decided to not go abroad, which was the path of the— path society laid for me. All my friends went there. And I didn't, and I'm really glad I'm off the well-worn path. Now, my friends in the month of August decided to go to America for their own reason, and in that entire month, 20 of my friends went to US in the span of 15 days. So I was going to the airport almost once, sometimes even twice a day. All of us would pile up in a car, we would drive to the airport, and then drop— and we drop one of them, and we'd come back home. When in the ride we would just make most of it. We would crack jokes, we would reminisce about the good times during when we were in college and in COVID, and we would count who owes more money to the canteen guy. But either way, we kept doing this. And after some time, the problem that happened was that as the number of people started to go, the car started to shrink. It became more and more quiet. The laughs started feel forced, and the small talk just didn't seem— that just didn't fulfill the void that our friend had left. And so I remember the last time I dropped my friend, my last friend. I dropped him, I sat back in my car, and that 30-minute ride back home felt like an eternity. For the first time in my life, I had seen something so drastic. From the first day when I went with everyone The last day when I'm coming back home alone, all of this was gearing up on me and I didn't know what to do. So I went back home and I did the one thing that I knew best. I picked up my journal and I started writing. And I had another realization: you only value things when you lose them. You realize the true value of something when it does not exist. And that day I was extremely sad. And I didn't know how to deal with them. But somehow I made peace with the fact that this sadness is a proof of the fact that at least they meant something to me. I mean, it would have been worse if I wouldn't have felt anything and I'm paying every day for the parking ticket also. So I made peace with that and I went home to sleep, and that made me really, really happy. But when you go through something like this, two things can happen. One, you become extremely sad and you do all kinds of stupid things. You start drinking, you start reading Chetan Bhagat books, you start listening to Taylor Swift. Anything can happen. Or something— or you become very optimistic and you start doing very good things. You start playing video games, you start listening to Punjabi music, and you watch a lot of Nike ads. And that is what I did in January of this year— I mean, last year. I saw, I saw an ad which said If greatness doesn't come knocking on your door, then you go knocking on its. And that is what I did on a random Sunday in February of 2022. I traveled to Bandra and knocked on that door, and the sa yelled at me. I walked in with intrigue in my eyes and awe in my mind, not knowing where I was but hoping that this place would answer the questions I was looking for. I walked in, sat at the end, and I've spent an amazing 1 year now. And in this 1 year, I've learned a lot. I've learned how to give speeches, how to make mistakes, how to learn from them. And after spending 1 whole year, the best lesson that I've learned is that this place is not a club or a community as much as it is a place to experiment, to fail. Because failure is expensive. But not here. Here you are pushed to fail. And as I have failed again and again, as I have given more and more tries, I have grown each and every time. And today when I see all of you, I don't see a bunch of boring people. I see a bunch of people who have really committed to their growth, that they have decided to attend Mumbai Toastmasters on 1st January. So ladies and gentlemen, all the best and Happy New Year.
