Whenever someone asks me about my career, I feel disturbed and always I end up having a sleepless night. A lot of questions arise in my mind every night that why am I here? What is the purpose of life? I overcome every time and perpetually join the club of others who do nothing but put more emphasis on thinking and usually end up feeling disturbed, without getting to know when they fall asleep. This practice of getting questioned has had been a regular exercise since the day I entered into the club of unemployed youths of Kashmir.
It is pertinent to mention that there are no answers to the unemployment rates, only one thing that is becoming more evident: the stress and the questions which people ask to these unemployed boys and girls of Kashmir.
I shall come back to the main topic. What is success? I usually ask this question to myself. This question prompts in my mind every time whenever I analyse myself. I end up considering success with a capital and bold “S“. Our society has already put so much emphasis on the value of success. For them, they define Success as more capital. The more the capital you possess, the more virtue you get in this capitalistic society. By this way, they have also defined the levels of being a successful person. The growing problem is: success has been linked to capital. In our society being successful is to possess more capital, attaining more wealth and to prove these things we end up admiring those who construct a luxurious multi-storey house, and own a costly car. The limits of attaining an individual’s goals have been restricted to this module only. Moreover, we have restricted ourselves to government jobs, civil services. Our society admires those who prove that they have the ability to attain more wealth or make it some sort of government Jobs.
That is the reason, every day we have to witness a role model who had actually qualified some Government exam. We respect the people who either have more capital or have a government job. This is how we disappoint our children. This way, we seal the fate of those people when fail in some exams. Moreover, we mark them as incompetent ones.
When we take a closer look at some of the greatest personalities of the world, we come to know that they have crossed milestones despite failing numerous times. Sadly, the concept of failure and defeat has been hijacked by some persons who believe in a particular notion of success. We know that being failure creates immense pain, disturbing the mental balance of a person. But it gives us a lesson on how to meet challenges. When we fail, we learn some extraordinary lessons.
There is nothing wrong with the concept of success itself. But I am depressed with the way we have defined it. Why link it with the getting rich in short time.
Although, I am not saying one should go on with becoming a failure. I am just pointing out that failure is also a lesson. It is an external event which designs our life. Something like it allows us to learn things that shape our lives. It motivates us to discover our abilities and drives us to our goal. It’s a force which helps us to know more about ourselves. It is a force which elevates you towards your goal.