Is it worth it?

 After another random spell of reading motivation, and a lot of stress surfing around the career questionnaire, I've come back to a question I had thought I'd escaped and left far behind, but maybe that isn't always the case. Is it truly worth trying so hard, stressing so badly that you start to feel numb, and even going so far as to romanticise the struggle to make it bearable? I haven't come up with an answer to that on my own, and that may be for a reason.

You see, the world is apparently much different from the one we had seen growing up. I don't exactly have someone old enough who would sit and give me an answer to the question legitimately, but surely I'm not the only one who feels that the modern-day world, especially after the pandemic, is much different, involving far more suffering and, in general, far less tolerable than the world we knew before the pandemic. Now that's a perspective nearly anyone would agree to.  

Although the pandemic, or the world is changing, none of that really comprises the reason behind this blog post - so we can maybe atleast introduce it now - The question of whether or not a person starting today with their career and their future - which we deem very important for obvious reasons - would find it worth working their whole mind off, knowing of no certain return. 

Now, while that last line about no certain return may sound off-putting and weird, I personally feel it to be the grave reality we have to somehow accept. The climate is changing, the economy is worsening, basic human rights are in danger, tax brackets keep getting worse, income gaps keep increasing, and on top of it all, quality of life, in fact, even security of life, is no guarantee. Is it really worth trying so hard in such a place where you have no apparent certainty of what's gonna happen next or what new challenges might be coming? 

I have no different viewpoint here than the rest of the crowd - and this is the biggest problem - we don't have any say in it. And while in their enthusiasm to make a change, many would be hurt by that line - it's not wrong. It's a truth in our lives that we have no other option than to accept it somehow and move forward with it. 

That's that - and it is still not my main point in this one piece. This comes from a helpless student who has to stand strong in the face of an uncertain career and a life where there's no guarantee. Apparently, and this is what inspired the whole spiral of this post, the newer generation, or Gen Z as we love to call it, are facing the highest competition in terms of education. Let me explain that the older generations (excluding millennials here because I honestly feel bad they don't get to validate their struggles, which may or may not be the same) usually could go out into the world with one or two degrees, mostly in a higher post and earn a decent wage. 

The thing here is, it's not bad that they could do that; in fact, in their time, education itself was very rare. I've come to realise that "they" is in fact the generation right before me, too, at least in most prospects. But it is kind of horrifying when combined with the very lovely levels of economic collapse, and also -  a population rise, which might just be only my problem as an indian youth or a general problem - nobody knows. 

The shift is huge, and nobody is to blame for it. You can't blame people for striving further than what they're born into; everybody does that. It is still very unfair that even for a starting row general position in today's time, you need to stack a master's or even further degrees on top of an already specialised education. 

The issue isn't just in the candidate pool, though - it's also equally ingrained in the education system. Until I had graduated from school, I used to have the vision that while school curricula are getting outdated and could use a lot of updating to add practicality, imagine the shock when I realised, in fact, college-level education is even worse on those cards. 

In the modern world, thanks to degree inflation, education truly doesn't make much of a difference. Although in some cases, the source of the education may make some difference, the candidate pool otherwise remains nearly the same, all having bachelor's degrees, topped with super specialised master's degrees, to no good because lack of true skill in the industry. The reason here is apt, and in no way can you deny that it is, in fact, the right and logical decision. 

This is where we see the flaw in education. A degree is not meant to be simply a polish over your name or a new piece for your wall of achievements; it is meant to teach you and essentially ingrain in you the skills and expertise you need to be able to perform your job properly. I may not be the best at putting out my point here, so let's take an example.

Take a graduate student, say from a business school, this person has spent their 3-4 years in college working and negotiating terms, learning plans and management techniques beyond the course and curricula, by working at multiple workshops, building internship calenders and growing their skill set. This person ends up with an average CGPA at the end of terms though. On the other hand may be their own classmate who has a higher CGPA but lower work experience. In case of academic competition, one may be ahead of the other and get chosen for a better grade, while the other may not have been chosen for a higher grade, but for having significant work experience and learning.

Although this little case is pretty unreal because neither of them is going to be happy with the entry level wage and lack of further skill training, one key takeaway here is in prior times, you would not have had to go stack a bunch of internships, work experiences and what nots to be getting in at entry level and be called th lowest in the heirarchy. The lowest in the hierarchy at a previous time would be right out of college, ready to learn and explore, not an already half-explored person.

And while all of this may or may not have been bringing out an already well-noticed point in education and modern-day career planning, an empathetic part of me feels we've villainised the older generations here. (Rightfully so, it's all thanks to their unconscious behaviour that we have to face and tolerate such absurd profanities in the name of culture). The people before us didn't exactly have a life of luxury - Economies crashed, wars happened, and they had seen job crises too. What changed here is that our generation has the internet to read, write, share and discuss. 

The world hasn't necessarily grown unstable in a day, while it may be at its most unstable right now, that is the effect on long-running struggles of many before us, and will be for many even after us (if the planet survives that is, if even we do). The generations behind us had a fixed structure to navigate - school to college to job to retirement. With low return degrees and increasing competition, that structure has, in fact, fallen short. But it's not the end of the world, because even without that structure, many of us are exploring, wandering, really LIVING. 

It is the lack of structure and extra awareness that makes you map out your whole life in one go and really wonder if shit can truly work out in the end. The previous generations probably faced uncertainties too; maybe they just didn't have extra connected networks reminding them very now and then of that uncertainty. Modern day with its modern problems i guess. And none of us ever has an answer to whether stuff will out right in the end, and nobody of now can, because so far we know of no one who's seen the end. Maybe it all goes to shit in the end, and we're all just lying in poop after so many morning quotes to start the day. (failed attempt at being funny, couldn't help it)

And I truly have no answer to that question; maybe trying hard is worth it, maybe it's not. So the conclusion I've reached a thousand times before is, if it feels worthy of trying hard, without the worry to make it all perfect, we go in without a second thought. If not, or in whatever other case, we've got barely sixty-something years left on our own term, better live them out. 

Does that truly answer the question? no. But then, not all questions need to be answered
to give you something new to think about.

Love Love, 

Rashima <3