"A man without an aim is like a ship without a radar"....does that ring a bell???? Well, I know we are transported back into that classroom where this phrase was supposed to be the clincher and get us a good score in Essay writing test. But in our enthusiasm to be the best, we forgot that everyone was using that same Essay Book. The best part about the phrase was that it fitted into any topic. After all, the truth of life is that a man without discipline or punctuality also loses direction like a radar-less vessel. And interestingly, almost all the publishers were making Essay..oops Easy Money by selling the same content under different names. "My Aim in Life", or rather "My Aims In each year of Life" helped me and my friends score good marks for sure but for us it hardly mattered. Our age didn't let us bother about the complexities that lay in the depth of those words. Our understanding of the subject was superficial and its importance was at par with the physical attributes of a cow or life of a great man.
If we recall the various aims that we were juggling at that innocent age, most of us would be able to locate a sheepish smile in the mirror. Only my engineering friends would be able to proudly say that they aimed and they hit the Bull's Eye. But they were somewhat lucky as the entire Education System seemed to be designed to encourage Engineers. There was a time when if you threw a stone in the crowd, it was most likely to hit an engineer. However, a good number of engineers have been investing their hard earned(read ragged) engineering know-how into management institutes for returns in the form of a career in investment banking. The most popular aims that one could hear in the classroom were Pilot, Cricketer, Doctor, and Engineer. There were some strange ones as well like Truck Driver, Chartered Accountant and IAS; the former choice being the most honest of aims while the latter was of course an attempt to be different. I say "strange" because we were kids then and our choices were supposed to echo what our ears were exposed to. Eyes and the brains became functional a lot later and ironically, by that time the teacher had stopped asking "Son, what do you want to be when you grow up????". In hindsight, the most fitting answer would have been "Clueless". A friend of mine though had replied to one such question in this casual manner....."Saaaer
Daaktor". He meant "Sir Doctor" but his khati(read pure) sylheti was too crude for an English class and the teacher assumed that the strongly built kid actually wanted to say "Dakaait" (robber in sylheti). The teacher felt very embarrassed and perhaps cursed himself in his heart for aimlessly ending up as a teacher in a classroom. Today, one can only marvel at the foresight of that poor kid when the family Doctor writes prescriptions more for the medical representatives and less for the patients. Teaching used to be the most popular aim for girls though and quite expectedly so. "To be listened to" is in their birth right and traces of it can be found out in their DNA should any aspiring Nobel Laureate take the pains to spend some quality time with a lady in the otherwise boring laboratory.
Personally speaking, I gave a fair chance to most of these options(except Medicine and Engineering) and still ended up being a Banker. At this stage, it would be appropriate to add that I am not done as yet or so would I like to believe. Life would be too dull if I spend a lifetime in balancing Debits and Credits. My life so far has been like a ship that enjoys the uncertainties of the ocean rather than the predictability of the shores. If life was a maze and I was asked to trace my path back to that very classroom, most certainly I would fail for my journey so far has been very interesting and least bit predictable. My Aim in Life was to be a pilot initially. Next year, I wanted to be a cricketer and the following year, an IFS Officer. A year after that, we moved to more difficult topics for essays and so Indian Foreign Service became My Aim in Life by virtue of being captured by the brain as the most recent left-brain activity. It was nice though to dream about representing one's country and to travel far and wide around the globe. But the dream gradually got lost somewhere the moment I entered the serious phase of school education. A student has to tackle so much in the present that the future assumes a vague shape that can be moulded into anything distinct through hard work, management and a little bit of luck.
I embraced commerce to avoid science and arts. So, CA was obviously worth a try and I tried it like people try smoking for the first time. I coughed out a little and didn't pursue it further realizing that "Come Again" was not exactly to my liking. MBA was the next big thing for graduates and that bug bit me quite hard. And here was I at the Main Gate of the National Institute of Fashion Technology with my father while the pretty girls cat-walked past us in short skirts. My father promptly reminded me of my new aim and that was to get the maximum out of this Management Degree.......... only intellectually and professionally of course and not in any other way. This degree got me a job in a profile that hitherto had been a "No Entry Zone" for me. I was happy though at cracking the interview without having any clue about the subject. Two years of Visual Merchandising, night outs with lifeless mannequins, skipped lunches, lots of pizzas and I was convinced that my true calling lay somewhere else. But Banking was not the obvious answer and it was a last minute decision to jump from fashion to finance. Destiny played its hand and now it seems that all the events happened so that I could be led to my wife in this over populated and vast country. Now that this has been achieved, I can quit the banking industry as well....lol. On a serious note, life has surprised me on more than one occasion but I have taken decisions and I stand by each of those decisions. I have a long way to go and the journey here on onwards would be even more interesting. I do not want my life to be dictated by any aim but the fulfillment would be achieved if I am able to aptly deal with whatever destiny has in store for me. It would be very childish to think that all of us can have an aim in life and achieve it as well. Neither we are God nor Life is that simple and then there is something called the Law of Demand & Supply as well!!!
Kids should not be asked about their aims in life and they should be asked to experiment and innovate instead. One life and so many options. How can one decide on one option without trying other options???? As long as you are curious, you are alive. Let's teach them how to live life. It is more important to teach the kids the importance of accepting with humility what life has in store for us and then getting the best out of such opportunities. "If the wind will not serve, take to the oars"!!!!
I am happy to see my ship fight the rough whether and then bask in the glory of bright sunshine. I am not ready to hit the shores as yet. There is too much to explore and experience in that vast ocean called LIFE!!!
