Dear reader, I want to introduce a short story of how I found my passion and to share findings that you might (or might not) find helpful in your life journey.

A story where one day decided everything. And who would have known that it would be the day when the IT company I was working for purchased…a “ping-pong” table (ping-pong and table tennis are not the same! But this is a matter of a separate discussion).

Past.

When I was 14 there was nothing particular I really dedicated myself to. In most cases I was just exploring my capabilities: playing computer games, learning English (it’s not my native language), mastering the guitar or surviving boring classes like everyone did.

I went to quite a prestigious school so it needed to have a good team in every sports category to compete with other schools in the city. A bunch of my friends and I were invited for a test to see if we were able to learn and play table tennis. We took the test. We succeeded.

In three years, we had three medals: two golds and one silver.

Table tennis was never a passion of mine, but I was OK about having it in my life.

I finished school, then went to university for 4 years and never had a single thought that I would want or need to play again. Still not really interested in anything, I was drifting through my life in the same old manner. Except that I got more social interactions which I did not value much anyway.

In 2013, I started to work at a local IT company and managed to grow pretty rapidly since I was a kind of proficient in computers and English. In two years, I became a QA engineer at a successful international startup.

One day, my company moved to a new office building and purchased a ping-pong table. And this is where everything started.

I brought my personal racket (yeah, a 10 year-old custom racket saved since school days) and challenged the colleagues.

It went smooth and I was able to find some good players in the company, but…I needed challenge. I started regular trainings with the company’s second (next to me heheh) best player and, after all those years of sitting at the computer, I found myself alive.

Fast forward a couple of months, I was playing local tournaments and it was when I figured out — this is exactly what I missed.

Nobody would choke the fire in my eyes, and starting from the middle of 2017 I was exercising four times a week with one of the best players in our region, travelling to the nearby cities for tournaments and, later on, bringing my passion to even farther distances: other countries and foreign leagues.

Went as far as having my school blade (middle) signed by a legend — Timo Boll!

Present.

I still work in IT, but currently it’s only a matter of time (2 to 3 months) till I build enough money to stop wasting my energy and finally dedicate myself to table tennis. Money is secondary.

Conclusions.