Dear All,
I am a big believer of the Power of Youth. History is full of evidences that the energy and the strength of youth if channelized properly, can create wonders. In this series, I like to share some of my thoughts that I have learnt over the years with my young friends. I hope readers will find them useful. I welcome any comments or suggestions to make it more helpful.
In today’s fast pace life filled with numerous opportunities and unlimited choices and a life that is packed with competitive spirit, many times we find ourselves confused as to what is right and what is wrong or what should we do and what we should not. In this blog I like to cover one of the most important advice that will help you lead a successful and more fulfilling life.
BE DRIVEN BY YOURSELF
Each one of us have many influences in our life that make us who we are. Initially most of us take parents and teacher’s guidance during schools. Which is very important and necessary. Later, friends, colleagues, relatives, society, media etc. play their roles.
However, my advice to you is that, you should be in-charge of your life not others. Take some time to understand what you like, what you enjoy, what are those things or activities which make you forget everything like time, sleep and hunger. Remember, those are your callings and you should follow them.
At every steps you will find people who will give you free advice on what you should do for your future. Listen to them but do what you think is right for you. Remember, it is never too late. I changed my direction after few years into my first job. Since then I have been trying to follow my heart and have taken some very significant decisions that have played very important role in my career and life. I am very happy and satisfied with most of those decisions. These events have made me learn and experience what I am sharing with you today.
Most of us normally link money with success. In my opinion, between a life with lot of money and a life that we happily look forward every morning, the second option is much better. I am not saying money is not important however, hiding your inner voice under the shell made up of money is not a good idea in long term. We will talk more about wealth in the future blogs.
About the society pressure i.e. ‘Log kya kahenge’ (what will people say), I have a very simple advice, Ignore them! Unfortunately, society’s success parameters are very shallow and flexible. Today they may not have good things to say about you but it is very possible that tomorrow they might be proud of you.
Let me share some well-known examples. The popular Cricket Commentator Harsha Bhogale did his MBA from IIM Ahmadabad, a premier management institute in India. He could have easily gotten a high paying job but he followed his passion and we all know how successfully he did it. Kalyan Verma was a well-paid Yahoo India’s software professional. However, now he is a world renowned wildlife photographer. The list goes on and on. These examples also indicate that we many not find our callings early on. That is just fine. What is important is to keep looking for it.
In summary, my advice is to try to know yourself and have your priorities clear. Here are some simple tips on how you can go about it.
Take a diary and write down following
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What activities you enjoy doing in your free
time
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What you like
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What you don’t like
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What future events will make you very happy like
travelling, awards, promotions etc.
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What are those things that make you lose track
of time, hunger, sleep etc.
Don’t finish this process in one sitting, it will not be complete. Keep adding to it whenever you think of sometime. You may also consider going through lot of information and help available online.
I am very confident that the list that you prepare will give you a very good idea about your passion or it will have some common themes which will be the reflection of your inner you. Try to analyze and come up with a plan on how you can ‘connect the dots’. That direction will give you much more pleasure, satisfaction and success than something that you force onto yourself. It will help you find the goal, the direction and on top of that you will enjoy this journey.
At the end, I do want to mention that I try to follow what I mentioned above as much as I can, however, there are still many things that I have not been able to do or in other words not been able to connect all the dots yet. I am work in progress.
Good Luck!!
