#letterstomy40self

Byju’s was fuckall.

Here’s what I understand now, at 38, that I didn’t then. Things I didn’t tell anyone.

I was called into Byju’s after my long tenure as a teacher.

For a long time, I tried to be “balanced” about it. Grateful for the opportunity. Polite about the learning. Neutral in tone. But neutrality is often what people are forced into when they haven’t been allowed to be angry yet.

So here it is, plainly: what I experienced there was not okay.

I came into Byju’s from the learning space. I had been teaching, working closely with children, and developing a relationship with language that was intuitive and alive. That was precisely why I was hired — to write for kids, to create scripts and screenplays for learning videos, to bring warmth and clarity into educational content.

And I did that. I wrote. I created. I adapted. I performed. I moved across written, audio, and video formats at speed. I was even part of the videos themselves, playing characters, embodying the content.

On paper, it sounds exciting. In reality, it was relentless.

The expectation was simple and brutal: be creative every single day, on demand, at scale, without pause. Creativity was treated like an infinite resource — something you could squeeze harder without consequence. There was no understanding that creativity comes from a nervous system, from rest, from space. It was treated like factory output.

It felt like running a marathon that never ended, while being told to smile because you were “lucky to be there.”

Then the pandemic hit — and whatever thin boundaries existed collapsed entirely.

Work-from-home turned into work-all-the-time. Late-night calls became acceptable. Personal time stopped being personal. There was constant pressure, constant urgency, and very little clarity. Blame was assigned freely and often unfairly. Support was rare. Empathy was performative.

What made it worse was the complete lack of people management.

Many in leadership positions had no business managing human beings. There was no emotional maturity, no training in leadership, no awareness of how stress travels downward. Their unprocessed anxiety, frustration, and volatility were simply dumped onto teams.

This wasn’t one bad day or one tough project. It was a pattern.

Decisions were reactive. Communication was chaotic. Feedback often felt like emotional discharge rather than guidance. And instead of accountability at the top, there was constant pressure on those below to absorb the dysfunction quietly and keep producing.

Calling someone at 2 in the morning for work is not “passion.” It is a boundary violation.

Expecting creativity under fear is not “high standards.” It is exploitation.

What disturbed me most was how normalised this all was. As if this was the price of ambition. As if burnout was a badge of honour. As if emotional damage was collateral.

What made the experience even harder to sit with was what I saw around me. The marketing practices were deeply uncomfortable. Sales teams were sent into underprivileged homes and sold a dream — that buying this product would somehow fix their lives, transform their children’s futures, make everything better. Fear and aspiration were quietly weaponised. People who could barely afford it were persuaded to spend money they didn’t have, under the guise of “education” and “opportunity.” Watching this happen stripped away any illusion of moral high ground. At the same time, the way managers treated employees internally was no better — dismissive, demeaning, and often cruel. People were spoken to like they were disposable, not human. It was hard not to see the parallel: a system that had no problem extracting from customers also had no problem extracting from its people.

I watched people doubt themselves unnecessarily. I watched confidence erode. I watched talented, thoughtful individuals slowly numb out just to survive the pace. And I realised something uncomfortable: this system didn’t fail accidentally. It was built this way.

So when the chapter ended around the beginning of the pandemic, it wasn’t just a job ending. It was a nervous system trying to recover.

And here’s the part that matters to me now.

Yes, I gained skills. Yes, I learned how large-scale content machines work. Yes, it contributed to where I am today.

But I also learned something far more important: I never want to create at the cost of my humanity again.

No brand, no valuation, no title is worth chronic anxiety, blurred boundaries, or emotional disrespect. No company gets to extract creativity while ignoring the people it comes from.

If organisations like this collapse, it’s not tragic. It’s instructive.

It tells us exactly what happens when speed replaces care, when output replaces ethics, and when power is handed to people who haven’t done their inner work.

I’m not writing this to settle scores. I’m writing it because silence protects systems like this.

And because somewhere, someone is being told that this is “just how it is.” It isn’t.

You can build ambitious things without burning people down. You can demand excellence without normalising abuse. You can lead without spilling your emotional mess onto others.

I know this now — because I lived the alternative.

And I chose it.

I don’t like ending blogs on a negative note. It just means you haven’t reconciled with the experience yet. So yes, looking back at my time at Byju’s, I can’t deny that it was chaotic, stressful, and at times really toxic. There were situations and people that tested my patience and pushed me to my limits. But here’s the thing — I chose to focus on what I could learn rather than dwell on the negative.

I gained so much. I got Disney training, which shaped my approach to storytelling and presentation. I stepped into the writing world more seriously and discovered strengths in myself I hadn’t tapped before. I learned how to navigate difficult people, manage complex situations, and still keep my own values intact. I learned how to take in experiences — even difficult ones — and extract lessons that make me stronger.

At the end of the day, Byju’s taught me resilience, adaptability, and self-awareness. It wasn’t perfect, but it was mine, and I take credit for the growth I achieved there. I chose to look for the positive, embrace the lessons, and take the best from the experience — rather than letting the worst define it. And that perspective has shaped how I approach challenges ever since, helping me move forward with clarity, confidence, and gratitude.

.Divya