Follow Your Own Path

My first conscious memory is of me falling off my grandmother's bed while playing and busting my head open. It did not faze me at all and I continued playing while my family froze in shock seeing blood pouring out of my head. I still have the scar next to my right eye, which is convenient because otherwise I would have no identification mark to mention in my passport application. That fall must have knocked a few screws loose because I was never able to fit into the mould that society has created for me. 

My second memory is of me talking to a penguin. Not a real one - there are no penguins here in scorching Mumbai other than the ones in Byculla zoo - but one of those giant trash bins shaped like a penguin. Someone had tattoed 'USE ME' on this being's chest which was as tall as me. I delivered a monologue explaining that I would be happy to throw trash into it's gaping maw if that would make it happy. I realised after turning around that everyone around was watching me talk to this visitor from Antarctica. It was a rush to be quite honest, it felt great to be the centre of everyone's attention. The chatty personality I had back then slowly got crushed trying to fit into society's mould. 

In my childhood, I had dozens of colouring books which my grandfather had bought for me. The books had all kinds of illustrations - dinosaurs, fruits, animals, portraits and more - but what was common between these books was that I didn't colour within the lines in a single one of them. Not just the books, but my entire house was a canvas! Armed with crayons, I had covered all the walls in my house with various doodles expressing whatever was in my mind at the moment. Ironically, I hated Drawing period in school. In my colouring books, I could be as crazy as I wanted. A stegosaurus could be pink (maybe it really was, but I digress), a banana could be blue and a clown could have skin-coloured make-up. My doodles could be as abstract as I wanted. But Drawing period was all about being forced to learn a skill instead of giving an outlet to my creativity. You had to draw what the teacher had drawn on the board. You had to colour things the way the teacher told you to. The sky couldn't be green, the river couldn't be orange and the trees couldn't be purple. Not following instructions would elicit beatings and a one-star grade using the scary red pen. School turned arts and crafts into another way of forcing children into the mould. There was barely any difference between following the rules of Maths and following the rules of Colouring in the pursuit of scoring three-stars and an A in the report card.

Posing proudly with my creations

There was one subject where I found I could still be myself - English. Along with colouring books, my grandfather used to buy me a ton of story books. In fact, he used to read me stories before I could even start reading on my own. So, I had a head-start in the language and it was easy for me to express myself in English. For all intents and purposes it's my first language. English period was the most fun class all throughout school. There were no rules to follow except the rules of Spelling and Grammar. I could write sentences and essays about whatever I wanted as long as it had the words that the teacher wanted. There were fun exercises in creativity, like trying to form sentences around given words, writing a whole story to arrive at the given sentence and writing essays about my experiences. It was also a huge confidence boost when my sentences and essays would be read out aloud for the class to learn from. English was the only subject where I felt like I didn't have to fit into a mould. 

But for the one subject that excited me, there were seven others which were squeezing me into conformity. Having little interest in other subjects meant I was never the class-topper that my parents could parade around, nor did I participate much less excel, in any extra-curriculars. I never felt like putting in anything more than the minimum effort in academics and spent most of my time with my new-found love after growing out of colouring books - video games. Immersing myself in video games was a great escape. My imagination could run wild exploring new worlds and doing things which are impossible in real life. My closest buddies at the time were online friends living in other countries united by our love for video games. I felt alienated from my classmates whom I barely shared any interests with and felt like I couldn't relate to. The lack of connection I felt to the people around me made me quietly recede into a shell, which drove me deeper into video games and junk food. My falling grades and ballooning size were shattering my self-confidence and it didn't help that my parents made me feel guilty about playing video games. They blamed the games for my lack of interest in school instead of the fact that the education system is designed to churn out homogenised drones and pays little attention to nurturing skills and talents. 

Slowly, I gained some self-awareness and started finding myself again. I had suppressed myself for years because I thought no one would get my thoughts and jokes. But it turned out that they did appreciate my observations and quips, and I started making friends again. It dawned on me that I am not disconnected from my peers. When you make people laugh, you can make friends easily and it was like discovering a lost superpower. I also recognised that writing brings me joy and had some aspirations of becoming a journalist. My confidence was back, there was hope for the future and that friendly, funny kid who talked to the penguin was returning.

By the end of secondary school, I had gained back my confidence. By now, my eyes were also open to the cruel joke that school was. But I still wasn't smartened up that the entire education system is a business at every level. It was time to take the next step and choose my path on the forked road, with the options presented being Science, Commerce and Arts. Because of my love for words and interest in humanities subjects like History, Civics and Geography, it would have been a no-brainer to join the Arts stream. I never had an interest in numbers so Commerce was out of the question. I was led to believe that the Arts stream is for mentally-deficient adolescents and delinquent losers, so there was no way I was going to join Arts. In the great tradition of Indian culture, a son follows in the footsteps of his forefathers and the same was subconsciously drilled into my head. With granddad being an Engineer and dad being a gold medallist in Chemistry, I felt that it was in my genes to pursue Science.

The two years of Science weren't bad at all. Creativity is a big part of science and learning about the laws and reactions that governed the universe were quite interesting and eye-opening. I also had an interest in scepticism since the time I found out that the Loch Ness monster was a hoax and scientific learnings helped me think independently based on facts and evidence. The problem started after those two years. 

After graduating in Science in XIIth, students have to continue on the conveyor belt of the cold and industrial education system to be led into either the Engineering or Medical field. The lie said out loud is that which box you are dropped into depends on your marks in the entrance exam. Teenagers kill themselves after scoring low marks because they have been beaten into submission till they believe the fiction that their grades determine their entire future. The truth which is discussed only behind closed doors is that your entry into Engineering or Medical depends on how much 'donation' your family can afford to pay. After I bombed pretty badly in the Engineering entrance exams, no one in my family even had a passing thought that maybe Engineering was not the right way to go, including myself. The horse-blinkers that we had been adorned with led us to blindly trot forward on the path that society says will bring success and happiness. Thanks to a generous 'donation', I got into Engineering and my gut told me it was a mistake from the moment I stepped into the college to fill the admission form. Turns out that feeling was as accurate as a World Champion in Darts. The next three years were a nightmare that I shudder to describe. It was crystal clear that there is no future for me as an Engineer.

It took me three years to finally quit Engineering. If I knew from the first day that it's going to be a debacle, what took me so long? It was the same googly that supporters of ruling parties throw when questioned why we should repeat an obvious mistake in the next election too, "If not this, then what?' It took me 3 years to find a suitable answer to the question because 'Anything but this' was not acceptable. Since writing was seemingly the only thing, other than playing video games for 7 hours at a stretch, that I was capable of, it made sense to pursue an Advertising degree and try to build a career as a copywriter. It took me some time to muster up the courage to put forth this proposition to my dad. My frustration with Engineering had reached a peak and the moment came naturally. 

I will forever be grateful to my family for accepting my decision. Many of my classmates were in the same hell that I was going through, but thought their parents would never be open to giving in to their wish. No parent wants to see their child unhappy, but sadly, some parents are so consumed by their egos that they would rather let their child suffer than risk inviting taunts from their neighbours and relatives. I feel blessed to have a family which showed their faith in me through their support.

The day I went to college to withdraw my admission, I felt like the hand which was suffocating me had finally let go and I could breathe again. Not a single day since then have I regretted the decision. It was, without a doubt, the best one I've ever made considering my contentment with how life turned out after.

While there is no use crying over spilt milk, it is important to recognise and admit your mistakes so that you can learn from them. My biggest mistake was ignoring the frantic voice in the back of my head warning me that I was heading for disaster. If I had been bold enough to not follow the herd, to not force myself to fit into the mould of what society dictates is success, to not follow the advice for getting rich given by people who themselves are stuck in the middle class, to not try to get the key to happiness from those who themselves are miserable and to listen to the person who knows me best - myself, the whole unpleasant situation could have been averted. The silver lining is that no experience is wasted if you learn something from it and though it was a horrific period, it taught me a lot about the world outside and inside. 

The mistake was not mine alone. Every teacher, friend, acquaintance and relative who knowingly or unknowingly reinforced the pressure to adhere to the norms of society is to blame. The biggest disservice you can do to a person is to not let them find their own way to success and contentment, or worse, actively mislead them. Everyone has their own journey in life and there's a compass within which can guide the way.

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