The HBS Journey: The Show Must Go On

Adhitya Raghavan (MBA ‘25) reflects on his last days of EC year.

I remember the first time I stepped onto campus, freshly admitted, half in disbelief, and entirely unsure if I belonged. The red-brick buildings, the polished wooden walls of Aldrich, the well-worn paths crisscrossing between Spangler, Baker, and the dorms all seemed to whisper, “you’re here now. Make it count.”

And boy, did we try.

We approached HBS with a maximizer mindset. “It’s only two years,” we told ourselves. “Do everything. Say yes to everything. When else will I get to do this?” It became a constant loop: treks, conferences, startup ideation workshops, happy hours, one more coffee chat. We were always squeezing out every drop of value like it was our job. And as our final weeks creep up, that impulse to maximize only grows stronger.

But one evening, something shifted.

I was rushing — literally running — back from an event, trying to make it to a small group dinner on time, my brain already spinning about the group project I still hadn’t touched. As I crossed the Weeks Footbridge, I saw someone just sitting there. No AirPods. No laptop. Just them, the Charles River, and a spectacular sunset. I walked past. Two hours later, I came back. They were still there.

They could have done so much else with those two hours: worked on a deck, attended a speaker session, added another bullet to their résumé. But instead, they just existed. And at that moment, they looked like the happiest person at HBS.

It hit me: life is not a checklist to be completed. It is meant to be lived. To be felt. Maybe I won’t get to know every professor. Maybe I won’t have a meaningful 1:1 with every person in my section. And that’s okay. That has to be okay.

Ask any EC right now and you’ll hear it: HBS feels like a peak. And in some ways, it is. The intensity, the privilege of learning from brilliant minds, the safety net to take wild risks and, perhaps most of all, the friendships. The ones born from late-night cold call prep, hiking through Patagonia, and pulling together a FIELD project at the eleventh hour.

It’s in the tiny moments that transformation takes place. The classmate who offered quiet support when things back home got tough. The professor whose closing line at the end of a session made you question your entire worldview. The partner who, despite not being in the classroom, was every bit a part of the journey.

But despite all of this, I’ve come to believe something that might sound a little strange on the eve of graduation: this is just a blip.

In the grand timeline of our lives, HBS is short, fleeting, even. If we’re lucky, we’ll live decades more. We’ll build companies, families, nonprofits, portfolios, and maybe even treehouses. We’ll move to new cities, switch careers more times than we expected, and learn to navigate things like taxes, retirement plans, and possibly robot coworkers.

The world ahead is full of unknowns. AI is moving faster than regulators can blink. Markets are shifting like tectonic plates. Trade policies flip with elections. Sometimes I find myself staring into that uncertainty and feeling a weight settle on my shoulders. This idea that I must have it all figured out now. That if I just tried hard enough, squeezed out every last drop of learning, networked just right, optimized every minute, I could future-proof my life.

But that’s a lie we tell ourselves.

Let me say this clearly: you don’t need to have it all figured out. In fact, you can’t. Life isn’t a five-year strategic plan. It’s improv theater with no script. Curveballs will come. Some will knock the wind out of us: loss, failure, illness. Others will sweep us off our feet: unexpected love, serendipitous partnerships, moments of joy we didn’t see coming.

Some of my most cherished moments at HBS didn’t come from executing a perfect plan, but from unexpected pivots. A startup idea that forced me to return to the drawing board. A class I thought would be boring that left me questioning my assumptions. A squash match that turned into a soul-baring conversation with someone I now call family.

So what do we do with all this? With the friendships, the lessons, the pressure, and the promise?

We do the next best thing.

Don’t try to architect your life in a single masterstroke. Instead, take the next step that feels true. Build that product. Take that job. Move to that city. Call that friend. Mentor that student who reminds you of who you were at 23. Be kind to yourself when you fail. Celebrate yourself when you win.

HBS gave us tools — yes, frameworks; yes, a Rolodex of contacts — but more than that, it gave us perspective. We saw what leadership looks like in times of crisis. We learned that vulnerability can exist in boardrooms. We discovered that who you are matters just as much as what you do.

And we gained people. Friends who will be groomsmen, bridesmaids, co-founders, late-night lifelines. Friends who will meet you at your lowest point and remind you why you keep going. Friends who will challenge you to be a better human.

The truth is, a glass already full can’t be filled with anything new. As hard as it is, we must leave this place behind — at least physically — to make space for what comes next. And while this blip will fade into the broader timeline of our lives, its imprint will remain.

So yes, cry at Bridges. Hug your friends. Say thank you to that Spangler barista who knew your complicated oat milk order by heart. But also remember: this is not the peak. It’s a mighty ridge, sure. But the view ahead is even grander.

And if you ever forget that, look around. Look at the people beside you, the strength within you, and the chapters yet to be written.

HBS was never the destination. It was just the bridge.

And now, it’s time to cross it.

Adhitya Raghavan (MBA ’25) is originally from Chennai, India. He learned about rockets during his undergrad at Princeton, studying Mechanical and Aerospace engineering. Adhitya loves playing sports and hopes to make a difference in the world by building scalable social enterprises through leveraging technology.