Losing Something Important?
Social Media Apps, Influencers, Content Creators, Digital Nomads and whatnot-these were some of the words that I, and supposedly many of you, would have been listening to for the past few years. One of the Biggest changes that have influenced Online and Digital Content Production and Consumption was the Pandemic, COVID-19. Post the Pandemic, the Online activity of many people has increased by two to three folds, and even, the Number of Creators producing content has increased to a really large number in the past few years. On average, we are spending around 7 hours(I think this is still less than what actually might be Average Screen time), just scrolling and surfing through social Media Apps, and most things that require the least Attention and are MERELY to GIVE US THE FEELING OF BEING ENTERTAINED(not denying, many people do use the Internet and all to create a better change in their Life-but that would be a small fraction of people-say around 15% to 25%). In short, this large chunk of your day indirectly decides what you feed your Mind, and what Sub-Conscious thoughts you create in the back of your Head, which would indirectly affect your Behavioral Patterns, Thinking and your overall Life.
Can’t relate or Understand what I mean-here is what I meant; before the year 2010 or say 2015, did you ever hear the words like SATURATED, or BURNT OUT from Students or Employees? But hearing all that now(as in the past few years)leads to two possibilities-
Firstly, and most Unlikely-the Work Patterns of Millions of People SUDDENLY changed, and all SUDDENLY feel the same thing, at around the same time.
Or, the Second, and more likely thing-All of Us have fed our Minds with the same Non-sense that the“People” have been Posting on the Internet, and sub-consciously, we attracted the SAME FEELINGS towards our work, and try to FIND WAYS to MAKE OURSELVES BELIEVE THE OF THE FALSE NOTION that we too are BURNT OUT!
Just a small introspect, and you would know HOW YOUR LIFE IS INFLUENCED BY ALL THIS-and in all this, we are LOOSING OURSELVES-the actual us, the personality which differentiates each and every one of us from the Rest of the world!
IT ALL STARTS WITH A POOR APPROACH
When was the last time when you were asked something NEW, something unheard of; and your reaction to that was NOT GOOGLING it out, but rather thinking hard, and trying to get to that in your way? To the Students out there-when was the last time that you pondered on a Difficult Question for Hours, rather than giving up your Thinking and deciding to GOOGLE it out, and MEMORIZE the method to solve such sort of Questions? I am pretty sure, the answer to this is NEVER! In this fast-paced world, all of us are in the chase of getting things done fast. We want to get Healthier Fast, We want to Recover from Injuries Fast, We want to learn things Faster, We want to get Rich Faster and whatnot. In the present world, Seeing other people’s success, we too want to get that as soon as possible. But by JUST GETTING all this, we are losing something very important and crucial-something that is worth more than that FAST GAINED SUCCESS-we are losing the ability to Ponder, to THINK and the Ability to CHASING THINGS! With the Internet being the Home to all the Knowledge of Humanity, it has become really easy for us to search for things and know that. Not denying that now every person who has access to the Internet, can learn things and grow smarter, but the fact is that when we use it in a way that Deteriorates our Thinking and growth, it is not worth it.
I have often found this to be true, and I am sure you all would agree too-when something is for free, or something is attained with ease(in short, with Less of our Inputs/things at stake, or being spent), its VALUE falls! The best example of this is in Economics-when Government is short of cash, it PRINTS more of it-and when THIS “MORE” MONEY comes without any WORK OR EXCHANGE, the VALUE OF THE CURRENCY falls, causing INFLATION! Similarly, when this Knowledge comes with almost no Self-Input from our side, its value falls. This is what crumbles our APPROACH to things. The moment we are unable to find something, to get a reasonable and logical answer to something, we Search it out; over sitting there, thinking and pondering different ways to get to it. People, and especially students misunderstand the real MEANING of Education(well, I wouldn’t blame them to be true). Education and Assignments don’t mean JUST SOLVING QUESTIONS, and HANDING IN GOOGLED PROJECTS ON TIME(sadly, this is what the Education System is becoming nowadays-a Shear System of Producing Mindless, yet SMART living Workers). The main objective of all this is to help you Sharpen Your Mind, to let you EXPLORE different paths, and teach you the APPROACH of Chasing something until you have found it on your own, or with the help and Contribution of Ideas of your Fellow Mates!
This is the reason why the Renaissance was the Golden Era, there was a Growth in Connectivity and Social Interactions among People, yet it was Limited in the RIGHT AMOUNT, that people shared their ideas and Grew altogether-growing their Self Knowledge by learning from others as well! Human Interaction, and learning from Your Mentor Like Colleague is what “MINED THE GOLD IN THE RENAISSANCE”-but we even have to be Cautious of excessively IDOLIZING the people around us!
IDOLIZING PEOPLE or IMITATION INITIATION?
Pick up any dictionary and search for the Word AUTHENTIC-I am sure, most of them would describe that as, “Something Genuine”, or “Original”. Well, every one of us was born different and has y Unique identity. But, as we grow, things change. We have our experiences, we meet new people, and there is interaction among fellow humans. Some of the interactions are casual, some end up with Debates and Arguments, but some of them seem enlightening. The thoughts of some other person seem to resonate with us and this is where we start to look up to that person-calling him our “Idol”. I certainly have no problem with that- as a matter of fact, there are many people whom even I look up to and learn many things from them, which I try to implement in my Life. The thing with which I have a problem is that the Admiration rises to a stage where we start to lose ourselves and start to IMITATE the one we consider our ideal. Well, here is where the problem starts. Slowly, we start to copy the things and hope that if the thing and the habit worked for him, then sure enough it should even work for us and when it doesn’t, we stop even listening to some of the good advice from the same person and feel that No Advice could Help us Grow-carrying wrong learning. Well, I would not completely blame our MINDS and our Thinking for this a Great Role in causing this is Social Media! Agree or Not, Social Media has emerged as one of the BIGGEST INFLUENCE which has changed the Course of Life for many of us. Seeing the IDEAL life of others, Listening to the THOUGHTS of other people, and SEEING SOME RARE CASES OF THEM HEADING TO SUCCESS; all this Culminates in the Back of our Sub-Conscious Mind which triggers us to just FOLLOW the path and learnings of those people, hindering us to Explore the True us, the actual personality that was ABOUT TO BE CARVED.
I believe that Social Media fools us to see only a Small Part of the Truth-and one of the things that eat me the most is when people say that MAKE YOUR PASSION your WORK. This ain’t the blog to talk about that, so yes, I would surely tell ya Why Making Your Passion Your Work is not the Most Right Decision! Like, For all these talks where people say- “I left my Job at XYZ, and I chased my passion, and here I am. . . . ”, this is the most misleading thing because those people are a very small fraction of the one who achieved that. Many people don’t see the Selection Bias behind this and GET HIGHLY INFLUENCED to take Decisions which they Regret life-all because THEY WERE TOO SMART TO FOLLOW THE PATH OF THEIR IDOL, WITHOUT GIVING A THOUGHT THAT their LIFE AND HIS JOURNEY are WAY DIFFERENT!
YOUR QUICK TAKEAWAY
So yes, don’t take this Blog out of Context and make up your mind not to listen or following to the bits of pieces of Advice given to you by the People you adore and the one’s who genuinely care about you(in case you do that, well then, you read this Blog for nothin!).
I truly believe in the fact that Life is not a Straight Path to Your Desired Destination, but a rather branched PATH which has infinite ways and infinite sub-paths.
So, every person’s path is going to be different than yours and the fact that his learnings and his experiences were a cumulative result of His Thinking at that time, his surroundings, the Societal Expectations and Influence, and the fact under what conditions, and with what pre-text and circumstances did he take what type of decisions! Thus, we should learn from everyone, and take those learnings as ONE OF THE PROBABLE WAYS TO DO, but at the end, your life experiences are surely going to be Unique, so why not give a Shot of your own-why not Explore a New Face of the Journey, a face that nobody has ever seen-what fun is living and following the Footsteps of someone who guides Millions; the real fun of learning and Seeing yourself grow is Choosing your Own Unique Path, and wandering and exploring different aspects of life, as well as learning more about Yourself!
So, until then, keep Exploring, Keep Learning-Adios😄
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#The Blog was Originally Published by me on 22nd April 2023 on My Website
