Saturday, January 29, 2005

Where am I and What am I doing?

Or is it We?? I think this is one thought that troubles most of us. Where am I, What am I doing and do I really love what I am doing?? I think these are the questions to which every MBA or a post-graduate student would like to have an answer to.

I came in here to a reputed B-school hoping to find my unique purpose in life – unique as we all are, or so I thought. Let me generalize the tone of speech and shift to We. Once in I don’t think most of us have managed to resist the charm of being one among the crowd, being accepted by one and all. Isn’t it amazing how all of a sudden all our dreams, all our aspirations seem the same – different as we all claim to be? And what is more amazing is how predictable a life we’re all set to lead – busy, cash rich, with no time to spare for anything but work.

We’ve turned into disinterested youngsters who treat the classroom as though it were personal rooms. We treat the professors as though we’re doing them a favor by listening to them. We treat attendance as the be all and end all of existence. Lectures hold as much meaning for us as an advertisement that we zap through disinterestedly. Better still; lectures are where we catch up on our sleep – the busy all important souls that we are, its impossible to catch sleep back in our rooms. And of course the great communicators and thought-leaders that we all are, we never miss a chance to criticize a lecturer for his flow of thoughts or the matter/manner which he speaks.

What is really sad is that not all of us were like this when we walked in here. But to be accepted as one of the crowd it is important to blend in – to do what the majority does. The few of us who do want to stand by what we believe in end up being ridiculed by the rest. After all being conscientious is so uncool! And staying awake in class – you have got to be kidding! What kind of loser are you if you stay up through class – and god help you if your reason happens to be sheer respect for the elderly individual who is teaching you (Talk about Moral dilemmas!!).

And what have we learnt by making lots of presentations, project, assignments?? How to put in header and footer, insert bullet points, make a colorful power-point presentation and never mention the help that Prof. Google does for you. Google is compared to God for copying and pasting information, Microsoft an Angel to make presentations and talk about real Stuff – u got to be joking, who is going to listen to us anyway.

So how do I evaluate myself and move from this situation to a much better one which I love. I am looking for some serious answers. I just hope I would answer them before I finish my MBA….Think!!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

hey, thats my post-graduation in supposedly one of the best schools...how did u even dare to peep into my campus and watch the happenings...picture perfect!!

- karthik

Adastrian said...

I finally see your thoughts clearly. There have been many moments of fun , frolic and repartee..but among all these I had always felt the need to know this facet of yours.
The cardinal questions put by you can be extended to any individual who wants a purposeful existence. Yes, the examples are more pertinent to the PG folks but probably the crux remains the same. Have been seeing all my close friends pursuing PG saying the same.
All said and done... all your posts have been pretty varied and good read. Happy blogging and am sure you will be able to conquer these quandaries and find the Ultimate Truth.