It is worth noting the hysteria around board exams and college admissions doesn’t have to be an inevitable condition; it’s something we’ve chosen. Hectic planning for some unknown outcome has become a default setting so even children are busy nowadays, every hour accounted for with extracurricular activities.
An Indian techie working in New York, earning the equivalent of Rs 88 lakh annually, created a stir online by saying she’d move back to India in a heartbeat for the same salary. On the Instagram page @salaryscale, this computer science graduate with a Master’s in supply change analytics shared that her income just about covered her basic expenditure saying, “I am always looking for more”. From an ambitious young Indian’s perspective, a software job in the US is viewed as a dream come true, even if all it allows for is a hand-to-mouth existence. But is it that wrong that a confident new generation expects more out of life than just financial security? Most of us would have been better off carefully evaluating the trade-offs between high salaries, growth opportunities and free time, while planning our careers.
Instagram and YouTube are full of dramatically inspiring speeches by super achievers on leadership and how they made it. “The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do,” declared Steve Jobs. Many of us grew up on the belief that we must constantly be striving towards something bigger; the proverbial mountain top is the ultimate aim to understand the kind of magic Jobs was talking about. With all the dreaminess of youth, we imagine standing tall on that peak, looking down and advising those on their way up. Maybe, the world is far too dangerous a place to stop and savour the moment. But the problem with always thinking there’s better ahead, like a compounding savings account, is that by the time you dip into it comes the deflating realisation that delayed gratification has its limitations. A secret, nagging thought emerges that some joy could have been had earlier.
The thing is, no one’s ever fully “done” and everyone doesn’t want to change the world. This is something that Gen Z and Millennials have instinctively gauged, there’s no perfectly inclined path worth chasing madly, at the cost of everything else. Having enjoyed the fruits of their parents’ diligent labour, the post-Independence generation when work-is-worship was the abiding mantra, the main takeaway is—money will come, money will go but time once gone is gone forever. Rather than writing off Gen Z as entitled slackers for not having the dogged perseverance mentality we did, their lackadaisical approach suggests they know, that rarely does life pan out exactly as planned.
For instance, tens of lakhs of professionals moved to Goa during Covid to explore a cheaper, and better quality of life. Though four years later statistics suggest only 30% stayed back, what would have been considered opting out of the rat race a decade ago has come to mean something entirely different—that not everybody has to slave away in cities like Gurgaon and Bangalore. There’s no one way to live; there are many and they’re all correct. If people are coming up with innovative ways to maximise and enjoy their time, more power to them.
This is a small but profoundly important mindset change since every day the newspapers are carrying stories of some wretched student hanging himself in a hostel room, distraught about the pressures the future holds. It is worth noting the hysteria around board exams and college admissions doesn’t have to be an inevitable condition; it’s something we’ve chosen. Hectic planning for some unknown outcome has become a default setting so even children are busy nowadays, every hour accounted for with extracurricular activities. Besides taking the fun out of learning, people are exhausted by the time they enter the workforce. If academics and careers could be seen as marathons not sprints, with zig zag routes and circles, some ups and downs, we may even relish the adventure.
The writer is director, Hutkay Films
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First uploaded on: 03-11-2024 at 04:00 IST
