India, Dec. 20 -- I think of myself as young. Not by the arithmetic of years, but by the internal certainty that youth is a room I never stepped out of.

I enjoy the company of people in their twenties and thirties; their looseness, their energy, their unbroken faith in possibility. I believe I blend into that crowd, as if my mind has quietly refused each passing decade. But then life arranges a moment that refuses soft focus.

Mine came on a recent evening in Mumbai, at Kasauti (Hindi for Test or Trial), the annual celebration day of The Akhaada, my gym.

The event was held on the turf of a college ground. I had eaten breakfast early, skipped lunch, and downed some electrolytes and protein bars. My head felt clear. My body felt ready. Th...