“You eventually become what you think what you are in your head”

I heard someone saying that at an event and I just flipped and said “Damn in few years I am gonna be a high profile bollywood celebrity”..  Oh Yes! I know its funny. But that’s what, we have an image of ourselves in our heads and that how we try to behave. I do not know if the statement made by that over dressed lady is true or not, But yes it definitely clicked my head that we always tend to make our image more better (rather much higher) than what we actually are. Some people start living that fictitious image 24*7 in a manner that people like me when we actually see them and we are like “hai kaun ye, samjhta kya hai apne ap ko”. That’s the moral, whatever that person samjhofies himself is completely not in sync with what he/she actually is. Trust me about it, this behavior is so damn irritating!

I do not mean to say it’s bad to make an image in our head and start living that way. I think it is good but it depends on what image are we carrying. I see people in small towns living in a polished manner and talking in an effluent English which is very unlike the surroundings they are raised in, it is just the image of themselves in their heads that has worked for them and probably that defines the way they are today. On the contrary, I see some guys in their porchest of cars on the Saturday nights in the Haus Khas Village Parking and they behave like as if they haven’t been to the school ever and have been raised in a zoo tough they happen to have residence at the porch location. It is nothing but a difference in the matter of what image they have made in their heads and they work to live that way.

In life, it is very easy to look down upon someone basis how they look, what they speak, where they come from but its very hard to appreciate what they have become and how they have changed. We all have our respective stories and struggles that we are fighting without talking about it. It is very important to be competitive in the good spirit to win your way but equally it is not healthy to look down on the one who succeeds. There are times we see our ex with someone new and we talk all crap about the new face beyond the fact we do not even know him/her as a person or there equation but judge that new person basis what we know about the ex we have dated in the past, which is not fair actually. In the same context, when you sit for group discussions, interviews and you think basis your CGPA and class reviews that you are above all but you end up not going further in the interview and blame the interviewer on his/her hiring skills is actually sad because we tend to judge people basis on the stereotype in our head, we do not think logically that maybe the HR was looking for more of subtle people or he/she matched the job profile better that what I did. We won’t appreciate the points that they made during the G.D but will bring down on what we have seen them in the class as or in/around the campus. The HR person comes to the college without any preconceived image of the people who will be at the interview and makes the choices basis the content they come across. So before judging who is deserving and who is not we should just go by who is the better fit as per the job description and hence we will get our answers right. This takes me back to the instance when I got through Star TV and a geeky girl happened to congratulate me while crossing each other at the college stairs. As always I thanked her with a pleasant smile but she being sarcastic enough left me with a remark saying that “tu toh intelligent hai, hum kahan” knowing the fact that I have a CGPA which just allowed me to sit for the interview and blessed with the Grade sheet like D D E B D C which I had to fight clearing. But above all, the time you start celebrating someone’s happiness, the moment you grow as person and soon you have a story to share.

I know for the fact that no matter what, we humans can’t stop judging. It comes natural to us. From someone’s clothes at a wedding to the way they dance, their spouse we have to judge it all. Wish it could stop there, we carry the same traits to the college and work as well. Someone got placed in a better company, he/she doesn’t deserve because she flunked in that subject, she has bad oratory skills, we have to judge it all. Rather than finding out the areas that we need to work on and why we did not make it we would insist and talk more on “How could she?”. Most of us carry this at work when we find some one getting appraisals at a faster pace, we judge them too on their subservient attitude with seniors rather than having a look at the work they deliver. I don’t mean you to clap and dance at people success like a saint, but respect someone’s achievement in life post when you have been a part of the race where they succeeded rather than judging their success as a matter of fate. I do agree that no matter how much someone tells us not to judge but it comes natural to us. Maybe we have a better opportunity knocking our door by the virtue of time. So we should rather celebrate other’s success so as we have people by our side when we have our moment.

Contributed by Rahul Wadhwa (Class of 2013, IBS GURGAON)