So here how it is….
I am 32. I have always wanted to be a flight attendant from the time I figured that it could be as much of a legitimate career as being an engineer, a medical professional, an entrepreneur, a teacher, a banker or like any other career! And that was almost fourteen years ago! Once I became a flight attendant with a domestic airline, my next goal was to fly for an international airline. And eventually I cracked that too. Now, that I joined a billion dollar airline, I wanted to grow as fast as possible in the corporate ladder, while proving my worth as a valuable asset to the company through my managers. As easy as it did sound at that time, it got harder and harder as the years went by. I was about 20 when I started, and I was so positive that before I hit 30, I am gonna have that big promotion and get all that extra perks and travel in business class all over the freaking world, and what not! I assumed ten years of hard work, dedication, sincerity and my excellent job skills were enough to get me there. It took me those ten years and another two additional years to realize, that the corporate ladder worked in different ways! Much different than the one I was planning to take (hard work, dedication and all that jazz) to reach to the top (not the ultimate top obviously)!
Long story short, even if I have one of the best jobs in the world, I still am nowhere close to the career goal that I targeted to achieve in all these years. Despite putting my one hundred percent every single day at work, and getting a decent amount of recognition from people who have experienced my service, my boss doesn’t really care about any of that! Bosses keep changing from time to time, but that doesn’t change anything either. So in essence I have come to the conclusion that professional growth is more of a company initiative rather than an individual’s ballgame. No amount of self help books were gonna help me in achieving that. I have also come to the realization, that I know and understand my limitations as an individual at work! Limitations like, I probably would never have the right contacts to push my position through to the top, or certain other nationalities will always be preferred than others, or I am not an ultra go getter who would sacrifice every fiber of their personal being to get to their goals no matter what! So no amount of ‘Self-help’ books can sell me any of that shit anymore! If I think that I can be a millionaire by reading a book that has been written by another millionaire, then I am completely fooling myself! Collaterals, factors, frailty, everything comes together to create the end result as much as hard work, contacts, skills, and luck do!
So, instead of lamenting about my weaknesses and shortcomings and why I can’t be the next billionaire, and trying to crack the code by reading and researching the other billionaires, I have learnt to appreciate my life, professional and personal, as it is. Because no matter how much harder I try to be better at work, it would probably never be enough for my bosses! I would become miserable in the pursuit of the impossible! However, if I concentrate on the positives of my lives, both professional and personal, then I have no competition with others, but just acceptance and gratitude within myself.
Instead of reading books on how to chase the next big thing, or how to become the next biggest seller, or how to be the top executive of a company, I read stories, novels, fictions, poems, and write one occasionally too. They provide me with the much, much needed escape from this hard hitting world that is so ever booming and expanding and is always on the chase for the next big thing!
So, on the same note, how has your priorities changed through the course of life?