Most People Have Jobs

Jordan Peterson is a famous professor of psychology and clinical psychologist. By Western standards, he is a conservative. He is known for advocating traditional gender norms and insisting there are, in fact, only two genders. Although I don't agree with a lot of things he says (no, Mr. Peterson, not all women are attracted to dangerous men, although we do collectively apologize for the phenomenon that is Fifty Shades of Grey), I must say there's something he said in a podcast that caught my attention in a positive way.

He said that before we go on to debate whether the right to have a career should be socially limited by gender, race or class, we must first acknowledge that most people don't have careers. They have jobs. Careers and jobs are very different things. The whole point of something being a job is that you're being paid to do work that you wouldn't do unless you were paid. I write this blog without any financial benefit because it's my interest. I go to architecture school in hopes of securing a job. I'm sure you can find the distinction in your own life as well. Therefore, Peterson argues, this glorification of having "careers" must be stopped as it is selling the wrong idea to people.

Children are taught that a) everybody has something they're good at and b)if you work hard enough, you can achieve anything. These lessons are taught in the context of informing their professional lives. However - and remember we're all either already parents or have a chance of being one some day - are we completely misleading the future generation? Are we feeding them dreams of something that does not exist? Because if you're an adult and you're reading this, how did following your dreams and going after what you want work out for you? I'm guessing not so great, unless you are very lucky. This is not because you didn't try hard enough or because other people are out to get you, it's because all sanity in the world depends on the rigged system in which there will always be more people dying to be actors than to be accountants, accompanied by there always being greater need for accountants than actors. It is economics in its purest forms. There are a lot of bright, talented people out there but unfortunately, there isn't a need for that many of them working professionally, which is why our dreams might not come true unless we are in the top 1% or something. You could be in the top 5%, which would practically make you a genius in your chosen field, and still not be equipped for astounding professional success in your field.

But let's be honest. We all knew this, right? That's why people go for the next best option to actually making a career out of their passion : going after the most socially valued positions. If you sat for the IIT entrance exams, you know what I am talking about. I find it hard to believe that every year, millions of students aged 17-18 all have the dream to become engineers because it is downright ridiculous for so many people to want the same thing. Yet, the two years preceding the exams, at least for me, were about being surrounded by classmates who truly believed that becoming an engineer was their calling in life. I remember thinking that if there truly is an existence of Gods and they are all fighting for supremacy, at least in India, Lord Bishwakarma had clearly won, inspiring more people than any other Hindu God chilling in the five-star abode of heaven. Same goes for top management positions as well, which is even more laughable when all those who were dying to become engineers just four years ago can't think of any valid career option that can be accomplished without going to management school. None of this has anything to do with passion, or dreams or even ability for that matter. It is about vying for positions achievable on limited means that offer the highest amount of social capital and you're doing it out of pure interest. Sure, there are some people who really do love their professions, but I think it's fair to admit that's a minority. 

The thing is that even the privileged 1% who do make their dreams come true aren't necessarily exempt from the frustrations of doing things they don't want to do. What we are not aught in school that most people we see to be financially secure (or rich) are not only the products of high salaries but of the decision to suitably invest those salaries, and trust me, most people don't enjoy the headache of buying and selling shares and property. Secondly, even the super successful aren't exempt. Just look at famous actors Shah Rukh Khan and Aamir Khan. Shah Rukh trained to be an actor with one of the most prestigous theatre companies in the country, and from what I hear, was pretty bad at academics during his time at Jamia. But now, he has to invest in a cricket team to stay rich and act in movies like Happy New Year (in spite of being capable of doing a Chak De India every year) just to keep the connections that would enable him to get better jobs. Even Aamir Khan, with his big words on cinema and society, has to watch Katrina Kaif do an acrobatic striptease in Dhoom 3 from time to time. This is all because even successful people are not bigger than the market they serve, and once again, we are back to simple economics. Perhaps there are people who change the world altogether, but they come maybe around once or twice in a generation, and I don't care how awesome you are, it would be arrogant to think you're one of them without substantial proof.

The truth is that we use our jobs to make ourselves look good, and judge others for their job. But ask any grown-up who has been in the workforce for thirty years or so and they'll tell you that jobs, even the most socially lauded of them, aren't all they're cracked up to be. Calling them "careers" is glorifying them and in spite of claims to the contrary, fueling a society where a people are valued mostly by the work they do and not by who they are, a culture where mere teenagers are pitted against each other to determine who is the "best." Wouldn't we be better off just admitting that jobs are what we do to make money in a legal, non-harming way, so that we have the luxury to pursue the relaxation offered by our passions?

I'll be honest, I have often be accused of having a very bleak outlook of life. However, recently, a close friend of mine asked me how I could stay unchanging and have a general idea of what I want. I was obviously flattered by the question, and here is my answer : I don't consider myself to be good enough to get exactly what I want. That is my starting point in any matter. I started writing stories as a very young child. I put up my own play when I was ten and wrote more than fifty emails selling my book to literary agents worldwide when I was twelve. My play was horrible and I still have the rejection letters from the agents. These experiences had a profound effect on me. Firstly, I realized I wasn't good enough just because I felt I was better than X.Y. and Z, which was disappointing at them time. But the reason I am one of those rare adults who is still doggedly pursuing their childhood dream is because with the disappointment and depression, there was a sense of pride in knowing that while other kids my age were thinking of becoming something someday, I was already producing written works, and I felt that if there was one thing that could one day help me achieve my dream, it would not be my superior literary talent (frankly, I don't even consider myself an avarage literary talent), but the fact that I was I was constantly producing something. And once again, it was production and not intention that put me at an advantage, because, well, that's just how economics works. But this is about more than economics. This is about how I choose to live my life.

Look around you. There are so many people who say they want to become something, but how much of that is transformed into action? This can most notably be observed in the recent phenomenon of a large number of young people wanting to have businesses in tech. How many boys who want to have startups are already looking for investors? Or coding a part of their program? 

Now, I am nowhere implying any sense of superiority. I am, quite evidently, average at best, and if I wasn't, I would have already had my dream so there's no logical reason for me to assume I am better than anyone else. But as I finish this post, I realize that I started writing about one thing and ended up writing about something completely different. This is because words like "dreams" and "jobs" and "careers" have now been so jumbled up that we are constantly trying to figure out what we want, which is the biggest handicap of our generation and what is keeping up from being proactive. We are not clear about who we are and what we want, reluctant to admit that the work we do isn't what we like to do or to confess our true notions of how important our work, on an individual level, really is. It is making us wait too long, hope for a career than may not exist for us, and encouraging in us a false sense of I-can-achieve-whatever-I-want. So perhaps it's time we take a step back and look at our jobs for what they really are, and give people a chance even if they don't have real careers as we define the term.