Living out your priorities

This episode is inspired in part by the story of a close friend who has been in a constant struggle with his emotional composure for the past year or so and the rest by a midnight group discussion in the office premises with a bunch of confused colleagues and/or friends that lasted for almost four hours amidst high-running emotions…

Well let’s start with a question! How many of us exactly know what we want to be seen as, say a decade down the line? When I ask that question, I am strictly referring to the professional aspect of life. Very few ‘Yes’ answers I expect and out of those few, how many are really in a place where they are actually taking some effort as a part of the game plan to accomplish what they want? This time I expect only a handful to stand up! Now I guess it’s easier to figure why so many of us hate our jobs… We all know that we Do Not want to do what we currently are doing but very few of us know what it is that we want to do! I am definitely not one of those few…..

The modern India has so become that the so called Generation Next of fast thinkers with big dreams and strong ideologies end up working in jobs that seldom puts the mind to work. And it is not that they don’t realize that this is what is happening to them and perhaps, that is the sole reason that they want to leave the place that they are in right now. But then what is it that is stopping them from doing the same? No prizes for guessing the answers….Money! Every person with some amount of maturity and experience in life knows that money is not everything in life. But still it ends up being the deciding factor when it comes to selecting the kind of life that we want to live…

The emotional trauma that every Indian youngster in the age group of 20-30 goes through in establishing the career that they have planned for themselves is unbelievable and nobody knows whether they will actually end up being what they want or the combined pressure of social pressure and the stronghold of money will force them to compromise… or even worse… make them believe that this is what they wanted in life and create an illusion where they forget what they planned in the first place..

A small brief on what goes through in the mind of an average person in our target population who have just completed their education and landed up in a job because that is the only thing that they were programmed to do ever since they can recall… “Here is what I am going to do. Get into the job that I want to in the next one year or so (which will for sure be a high paid job!!!) then work hard (by working hard, I mean for 100 odd hours on average over a week) for the next 10 years, I make the money that I wanted, and then I leave the job and take up a much lower-profile job, both in terms of money and the insane work hours, and then I will carry out all my passions of life for I will have the financial strength to back it up… (The passion may vary from person to person from travelling, adventure sports, photography, art or just being content with a family). Perfect!! Sounds like a plan…”

But will it really work that way?? Given that it is a high paid job, where you make so much money that you have gotten used to a lifestyle that cannot be altered so easily, how many of us will have the maturity and courage to stand up and say that this is it! Let’s stop here and do all the other things I wanted… Will that moment of dawn ever come? Will we not have reasons throughout life to stop us from taking up our dreams…? Giving the best to the people who love you, fame, power, money or in an improbable case, falling in love with your job, and many more millions of excuses that will convince us to say, “Let me just stay in the job for another couple of years!” And probably this “couple” will turn into a decade and by the time you sit one day to think of those dreams that you wanted to realize, they would actually have become just a dream!!!

Guess the ideal time to live those out is never going to come, however strong your “game plan”!! So well…what’s the conclusion??? For me (and you all are allowed to make your opinions and share as well if you are interested!), there is never going to be a time to “live life”. It’s now! Your career may pan out the way you want in a few years or it may not. But to live out the aspects of life that you call as your dream or passion... this is the time. Let’s at least make an effort to kick start today! At least I am not going to wait for the right time to come :)