Figured It Out: My Journey from a Math Phobe to Storytelling with Numbers

If you’d told ten-year-old me that I’d one day describe myself as a finance specialist, I’d have laughed, panicked, or—more likely—developed a mysterious stomach ache to avoid the conversation. Because for the longest time, math and I had a toxic relationship.

The kind where one party (me) kept showing up despite the trauma, and the other (math) kept throwing tantrums in the form of angry equations, unending word problems, and worst of all, angrier teachers.

My early school years were defined by the soundtrack of red ink scratching “Rework” across my math notebooks and teachers sighing with the weary frustration usually reserved for failing technology or Mumbai traffic.

I was what they’d politely call a “slow learner”—not because I lacked curiosity, but because I froze the moment a teacher’s patience wore thin (which, in those days, took about 5 minutes). I still remember one math class where the only takeaway was how my teacher’s eyebrow twitched every time I asked a question. 

Spoiler: I stopped asking.

But life, in its mischievous wisdom, threw me a lifeline during my board exams. Our school switched math teachers, and the temperature dropped from volcanic to room temperature just like that. The new teacher, let’s call him Mr. Calm-and-Clarity, was firm yet kind.

He broke things down without breaking our spirit. For the first time, I didn’t feel stupid. I didn’t fall in love with math, but I stopped being afraid of it. This felt like progress for someone who had always approached numbers like wild animals.

I thought that chapter was closed. Done. Dusted and buried in the last pages of my math textbook.

But fate had other plans—and a sense of irony. Cut to a few years later, and I found myself in the thick of financial journalism. That’s right. Numbers. Data. Balance sheets. All the things I had once sworn off.

But this time, the setting was different. My bosses weren’t yelling or judging. They were mentoring and encouraging. They handed me annual reports like treasure maps. I learnt to read between the rows and columns. Profit margins, debt ratios, revenue growth—they stopped being scary. They became clues, context, and characters.

Somewhere along the line, I had a lightbulb moment: Numbers aren’t cold. They’re compelling.

I began to see what ace financial journalists already knew—every balance sheet tells a story—a story of ambition, risk, and resilience of a company making a much-deserved mark. And I was trained to find stories, so I leaned in.

Fast-forward to the era of big data, where numbers are everywhere and storytelling is more powerful than ever. My journalism background now feels like a superpower. Data doesn’t intimidate me. It excites me. Behind every statistic lies a potential narrative—one that can move minds, open wallets, or spark change.

Take the example of a mid-sized recycler we worked with recently. They came to us for an investor deck—straightforward enough. But when we dug deeper, we realised they were massively underplaying their sustainability efforts.

They had made significant investments in green tech but weren’t boldly talking about it. We checked the numbers, matched them with real impact, and reframed their pitch. Suddenly, they weren’t just a profitable company—they were a purpose-driven one. That change in narrative caught the attention of investors aligned with ESG goals. New doors opened—all because we looked at the numbers differently.

So yes, I now call myself a finance specialist—and I do it without flinching.

From sweating through math class to scanning spreadsheets for story angles, I’ve come a long way. I still don’t do math for fun. (Let’s be clear—Sudoku is not on my weekend agenda.) But I’ve made peace with numbers. In fact, I’ve befriended them.

The real lesson? Never say never. What once felt like a monster under the bed turned out to be a misunderstood ally. And let’s be honest—not having to appear for a math test ever again certainly helps the relationship.

When you stop looking at numbers as problems to solve and start seeing them as stories to tell, magic really happens.

But this story would be incomplete without a few acknowledgements.
To my math teacher in the final years of school, thank you for showing me that patience and clarity can change everything.  To my early bosses in financial journalism (you know who you are!)—thank you for your faith, for never letting me feel small, and for making balance sheets feel less like punishment and more like possibility.
And yes, to those who didn’t believe I had it in me—thank you too. That doubt became fuel. It pushed me to try harder, to stay curious, and to rewrite the narrative.

Long story short: I figured it out. And if I could, anyone can.