Current State Of Mind - 3/15/16

If you are hoping to find guidance, or direction in life, then please for the love of gawd backspace outta here! This is a canvas for the disjointed, undecided, and totally confused thoughts that have taken up too much residence in the prime headspace of my Craniumtown.

I have no clue what to do with my life. No, that’s not exactly true: I have too many ideas of what to do with my life, but no concept of prioritising, and plagued with indecision, which leaves me akin to a fat penguin, floundering on ice.

FLAP FLAP FLAP.

I think the problem comes from the fact that I’m too easily swayed. I talk to my family and develop a picture of a future with a traditional degree, stable 9-5 job, wearing ties, summer getaways. Exposed to my friends for too long, and I’m coming up with blueprints for our newest food sensation (Kabab Biryani, patent pending). Having an extended chai break with colleagues, and I’m either committing myself completely to work from that moment forth or thinking of immediately handing in my resignation and doing “what I really want” to do.

Trouble is, I don’t know what I want to do. Being the soon-to-be twenty-three old that I am, I am expected to have it all figured out: career; priorities, both professional and personal; long term goals etc etc. But I don’t, and that’s the fact. I’m rather defiant in my indecisiveness. Because that’s just it, I do want to do all those things. I want to be good at the job I’m in, get the degree my parents want, I also want to write, and cook, and travel, and get a phD! But I am told I can’t do all of that, and need to pick one path. And honestly, with age or maturity, or my increasing jadedness towards life, I’m coming to terms with that.

I’m really not happy about that.

Couple days back, I came across this article by a writer for the economist. In it he was comparing the working styles, and priorities of his generation and his father’s. I related heavily to it considering that the writer (Accountant Dad, Economist-Writer Son) was pretty much me from an alternate universe, with a few minor tweaks.

He talked about how his dad worked till retirement (just like my Pa) and that the financial reward from his job was his main priority. For the writer however, he wanted emotional satisfaction as well as financial gain, something which baffled his dad. And it’s true, my generation is very much focused on finding not just a job but something which has meaning, makes them feel important, that they are making something, or bringing about some change. That they matter.

I was fully on board with the writer, as he extolled the virtues of letting his work dominate his life, because it made him feel good and alive, he got to interact with interesting smart people, got to tackle challenging problems, live in a capital of the world, socialise with high brass, the lot. I thought that this is the good life that I want, this is what I’m working towards, and that society will appreciate me for it.

I shared this article with my fiancé-to-be, and she saw it in a different, and honestly mind-blowing way. She said that she saw it as an addict justifying his addiction.

I gave it another read, and I saw it as clear as day. The writer tried really hard to be unbiased and it showed: he wasn’t just preaching the virtues of his life-style, he was balancing it out with what he was losing as well. Every facet of life was dominated by his professional occupation. Everything from relationships, to moving to London from North Carolina to be closer to the Economists HQ, social goals, late working hours, were all motivated by and related to his career.

This made me think, when does hard work become workaholism?

For me workaholism would be slaving away day after day at a job that I don’t like or appreciate, where I feel I’m not making a change and that it’s ultimately pointless in the grand scheme of things. However, I would consider working day and night on my own business or project as dedicated hard work.

It’s all based on perception. Long working hours are the norm today, and society appreciates how work-oriented you are. It is considered a sign of having your priorities in order. We want our actions and choices to be justified by others, and what better justification is there than “everybody is doing it”. If you go against popular opinion, you are derided and punished because you call into question everybody else’s choices as well. And people are generally averse to introspection.

I asked my dad if he thought he was a workaholic, and he said yes. He thought about work most of the time, and it weighed on him. I asked him if he would have taken a lower paying job to get better hours and spend more time with his family or on himself. He said yes he probably would have but also that he gets plenty of time now.

He pulls a 9am to 7pm on average, and works at least another day most weekends.

I’m not saying at all that my father is an unhappy man, or that I’m judging him for his life. It’s this very life that has allowed me to live in utter luxury, which in retrospect may be the reason behind my predicament.

My father’s goal was financial gain, and he worked extremely hard for it. He provided for his siblings, and his family, to the extent that by the grace of god and the universe, we have never wanted for anything.

I’ve never been hungry, or cold, or faced even a shadow of poverty. My father did, and he worked his life to change that.

Maybe that’s why I don’t have the amount of motivation he does, I have never needed to struggle, and everything was given to me, so I don’t know what it is like to strive for something greater. It seems paradoxical, as most popular motivation theorists say that if your physical needs are met, you have the potential to work even better and accomplish even more. Yet I define my life with the same mentality of financial gain being the only worthy objective, and working being the only noble pursuit.

My father said that retirement scared him because he wouldn’t know what to do with all the time. I’m afraid of all my time being eaten up by things I don’t want to do. But I’m scared of taking action and changing my life around, because of the reaction of others, and how I would be perceived as a failure, or a quitter, as somebody who is deluded and doesn’t have their priorities in order. Financial considerations are also a factor, considering the social lessons of wanting more, more and more are ingrained in me from birth.

Wanting more is equated with surviving, maintaining the current standard of life. The only improvement to this situation is assumed to be more of everything. More possessions, more friends, more respect. We are terrified of the assumed alternatives, that we would lose all that we have acquired.

We don’t explore the full potential of our futures because again, we are scared of failing. Sticking to the straight and narrow, to perceptions and life-styles that are seen to be working is the safe thing to do. Sylvia Plath said it best when she described life as a branching fig tree, with each fig representing a path that she could take. But picking one fig meant losing all the others. Plagued by indecision, she waited at the foot of the tree, until all the figs fell off the tree, dead.

Being undecided is okay. Being inactive isn’t an option. I’m taking steps to get out of the slump I’m in right now, giving myself a platform from which to do something I want to do, when I figure it out. I don’t have to conform to the rules if I don’t want to. I have to be aware of that means though. Maybe I won’t have the same material assets that my counter-parts do, not the same level of social acceptance they would enjoy.

But I think, I would be happier.

And isn’t that what everything’s all about?

To Settle

The go-getting age we live in is focused on one capitalist construct: getting more. Be it more material possessions, achievements, accomplishments whatever, the idea that is pervasive is that “more is better.”

There is a fundamental problem with this. See, all our lives we are told that we have to accomplish certain goals in our lives to be considered successful. The social norm generally defines these goals as ranging from getting a degree, getting a job, getting a house, getting a spouse etc. And once you have accumulated enough of these, congratulations! You are now successful and happy!

Surprise twist! You are not happy.

Because the struggle never ends.

Once you have accumulated enough of these, let’s call them “milestones”, you see that woah, everyone else is also gathering milestones. And these milestones are “better.”

My excessive use of inverted commas is meant to highlight the subjective nature of these words; a whole separate debate can be head as to what constitutes “better” and of course people in different areas and with different socio-economic backgrounds will obviously have different milestones.

Back to it! Capitalism thrives on competition. It’s the underlying factor: that the best resources will be used in the best way to generate the best outputs. So apart from vying to be the “best” in terms of production and business rationale, this behaviour bleeds into all spheres of life.

Another factor, also the by-product of a capitalist system of economy, is the culture of consumption. The entire socio-economic landscape is specifically paved to sell you things. Bigger, better things.

Combining these factors creates a rather dangerous consumer mind-set. That there is no such thing as enough. There is always more, hence I must want more, because everyone else “has more”, and my social standing is determined how much more I have.

Bringing this back to the topic (finally), the concept of “settling” is considered despicable. To settle is to stop wanting more. Meaning that you are going against the normal social mind-set. So you are automatically considered a rebel, a trouble-maker.

Here is what I present: if you don’t settle, you won’t be happy. Rather you won’t achieve happiness.

Now happiness is considered a destination by most, and the counter ideology is that happiness is a way of life; happiness is found in your everyday routine, because “how one spends his days, is how one spends his life.”

If you are consumed by the never ending quest for “more” so that you can look good in the eyes of society, your happiness is already being determined from external sources. So there goes your sense of inner strength and peace. This is against the happiness is a way of life idea.

If you are never satisfied with what you have, how are you ever reaching that promised land of happiness? And this counters the happiness is a destination idea.

So with either ideology, consumerism kills happiness.

 What I propose is that “settling” is not something to be maligned, rather embraced.

I get the difficulty of the task, because me saying that word right now is making me grimace.

It has too much bad juju attached to it.

So, let’s use an un-biased term: attaining.

I believe once you have accumulated a certain amount of milestones, the quantity and quality not determined by external perceptions but from a true introspective view, then you have attained and happiness is within grasp.

See its simple, once you have attained, you are no longer struggling, you don’t have the nagging doubt that you don’t have enough milestones, because you have the confidence that the milestones you do have are enough for you and your needs.

Obviously developing that independent view is hard work and frankly impossible for some. Not saying that’s a slight on them, but the way that society operates is so conditioned to a specific lifestyle that it just doesn’t tolerate new ways of thinking.

I think that material possessions, and let’s be honest, most settling is in relation to acquiring material goods (better car, bigger house, hotter spouse you name it), material possessions lose their value the more they are acquired; a curve of diminishing returns in other words.

You must have experienced this for yourself: you work hard in the pursuit of a certain goal, and once acquired, it loses its value rather suddenly. This is because the expectation that you build up during the pursuit to keep yourself motivated to keep going, seldom lives up to the real thing.

Some people relish that chase, and don’t find peace and solace once that goal is attained.

If you stop chasing, and are satisfied with what you have, your milestones will have that much more value to you. You would value the car you have, the house you live in; because first, you won’t be comparing your belongings with other people’s, which removes the stigma you might develop for your own stuff; and because your mind would be freer from materialism, and focus more on other pursuits also crucial to you being a well-rounded person.

Hence, to conclude (rather lamely, I know), settling is not a sin. It should be the way of life. Settling means that you have found, or at the very least trying, to find peace and make a home with what you have, beyond mindless competition. Most importantly, that feeling comes from within you, making it all the more potent and eternal.

“And I settled for her. And she settled for me.”

-          Passenger

Chaye Khaana Scene On

Another meaningless incursion away from the office. I would welcome such distractions if they were not so mundane.

We entered the posh and quite pretentious establishment a little after midday. The cheap lighting and the faux-wood flooring greeted us with an air of forced artistry.

Chaaye Khaana, the name itself dripping with bourgeois sentiments, is a favourite haunt of a certain class. Mostly iMac wielding hipsters. The mature, pipe-puffing intellectual reading away at his international newspaper is also a fairly common sight.

The lads from the firm and I took a seat which provided a wide angle of the cafe. People-watching was quite an enjoyable past time for my compatriots. I was impartial to the sport myself, but their company was amusing at the very least.

One of them started. "Yaar woh bachi check kar!"

The rest swivelled on their seats eager to get a look at the targeted prey.

Another piped in, "bara tight piece hai yaar."

A roll of my eyes, and I return to sipping the sad brown slop which they have the audacity to call an espresso.

Mr. T, a likeable fellow I must admit, changed the subject. "Oye, match dekha kal raat?"

The ensuing babble bored me. I turned around and inspected the adjacent bookshelf. I snapped my head back in disgust as my retinas were assaulted by pretentious tile after pretentious title.

The Secret? Really? I can discover self-actualisation on my own, thank you very much. And if it was that easy, that it could be condensed into a remarkably thin volume, you'd think we'd be inundated with superpeople.

Eleven Minutes by Paulo Coelho. An entire rack of Paulo Coelho. Huh. Arson had never sounded so appealing.

After we had finished off the sad fare, the bill dispensed off, we took our leave of the ostentatious cafe.

"Good scene tha, yaar. Phir aaye gaye."


- published in the first issue of Exist Magazine on ________