Introspection

The idea of taking risks is almost an alien concept in an Indian context. We are basically brought up with the notion that you should work your ass of today so that your tomm can be secure. This is taken to such an extreme that, at some point (which will be in your late 40's), you look back and realize that, the much promised tommorrow never turned into a today, that can be lived and enjoyed.

For that matter, I think in general no one really talks about Living it up or enjoying your life. At least not in my family. Parents never tell their kids to live it up, go do what your hearts tell you. Its more about - do this now so that you can do that tommorrow.

We are socially hardwired to work hard and work self sacrificially. We work hard in school for grades, we take up subjects that have very little to do with any actual inclination you have ( I remember sticking to math because I was pretty ok in Math, which is a pathetic excuse to go on learning something), we go on and pick college courses that have very little application in real life and much less significance overall (Multimedia Programming or Multivariate Statistics!) and then we graduate with very little idea of what we want to do in life. We are constantly prodded by either family, parents, older cousins, friends or peers who always seem to know what we should be doing. We always seem to get the memo at the very end.

I did the same routine myself and there are so many times even in single day where I question myself and everything I have done so far in my life. I also wonder what could have been if we had spent some time in our teenage and adolescence introspecting what we want to do or what we have an aptitude for. I like the concept of experiential learning and gathering life experiences where possible that prevails in the western culture. I think it lets the kids dissociate themselves with pureplay academics and evaluate what they want to do for the rest of their lives.

And rest of their lives a big deal.