Academic excellence doesn’t guarantee financial success
Since childhood, I have been given examples of academically successful people. Although my father is a businessman, he never talked about great businessmen like Tatas and Ambanis. Instead, he always talked about people from IIT or who cracked the civil service. Maybe that path has the highest probability of reaching a respectable stage in life. I don’t blame him for his mental model, as every parent looks for sure-shot paths for their children. Setting targets to become an IAS officer or an IIT graduate who grabs a 1-crore package is the most aspirational thing he can do.
However, I disagree with him when he says that people can only become successful if they are academically strong.
Since fourth grade, I have excelled in my studies and was always a top-ranked student in my class. However, in one instance where my rank was not as high, even though I scored over 90% for the first time, my father was not pleased. I’m not sure if he understood that reaching from 80% to 90% is much easier than reaching from 90% to 95%. I started sacrificing other important things in life, such as outdoor games, when I started aiming to fulfill my father’s wish.
Very few people understand that living a life that comes naturally to you can help you lead a life without fear and anxiety.
My desire for praise from my father also served as a motivator for excelling in my studies. However, while I enjoyed being at the top of my class and receiving praise, I failed to recognize the things in life that I was neglecting. In addition to playing outdoors, I loved writing couplets during my childhood.
Like any other child, I also had the ability to live life in the present, which I slowly forgot.
During my childhood, I also attempted some competitive exams but was unable to clear them. My uncle, who is ten years older than me, was able to clear most of these exams. As a result, my father often compared me to him, expecting me to reach his level. My father believed that scoring good grades in class was easy, but clearing competitive exams proved one’s true worth. However, my uncle, while a brilliant student, did not achieve as much success in life as was expected of him. This is an example of how academic excellence does not guarantee financial success.
After completing secondary school, I cleared some competitive exams like the NTSE, which raised my parents’ expectations. They believed that I could and should clear exams like the IIT JEE. However, given the way I was living my life, clearing such tough exams was not possible for me.
Unfortunately, things were not viewed holistically, so pushing harder without taking care of my physical and mental health was the only option.
I was unable to clear the IIT entrance exam or get admission to any top engineering colleges. These incidents put a lot of pressure on me to prove my worth. At that time, the only way to do so was by excelling in my studies. Therefore, I began to focus on earning good grades in college, as it is the only measure of success in Indian society. In fact, I did well during my first year of college and was able to switch my major to Computer Science, which I had always wanted to study.
Although I began to put in less effort after switching my major in college, I still remained the highest scorer among my close friends. This led me to believe that it was enough to be successful in life. However, at that time I didn’t realize that school or college mainly taught us how to do a task really well just one time, and then move on to the next task, i.e., learning one subject, taking an exam, and moving on.
The real world, on the other hand, values the ability to do the same task over and over again, while improving every time. People like me, who become accustomed to picking up newer tasks and doing decently in them before moving on, get bored with the monotony of real life. This is when the guarantee of success based on our academic achievements disappears.
The sooner you understand the game of life, the faster you’ll find success and contentment. Unfortunately, many people are unable to grasp this concept, leading to a life of anxiety. They can’t comprehend how someone who excelled in their studies can fail in life.
Furthermore, measuring success solely by the amount of money you earn puts immense pressure on a lot of people. This is because their childhood experiences taught them that success means being praised. So when these people start their careers, instead of focusing on earning a lot of money, they focus on doing a lot of work. They believe that working extra hours will bring them praise. In reality, few people acknowledge it.
Now, to prove their worth to society, they start chasing money because that’s what society considers the true measure of success. This leads to a lot of anxiety, which makes the situation go from bad to worse. As a result, they become unsuccessful both in their own eyes and in the eyes of society.
Success is not directly proportional to how much you are earning
There are three reasons why academically successful people may not be successful in achieving financial success:
- They are good at doing a task once and moving on, but they are not good at doing the same task repeatedly to improve their skills. There are two things they should do: either understand that repeating the same task is necessary to achieve monetary success, or stop measuring success solely in monetary terms.
- The pressure to be financially successful because you were academically successful causes anxiety and hence reduces productivity.
- Individuals who have been praised frequently since childhood tend to put extra pressure on themselves to continue receiving the same level of praise. However, merely receiving good feedback may not be sufficient to be financially successful.
If you don’t get praise you thrive for it. Once you get it, you thrive harder to protect it. This is the vicious cycle.
In short, the measure of success changes once you start earning, and this is something that should be understood. Either you can accept that earning money is not the only measure of success, which goes against the belief of the majority of the world, or you can become good at doing the same task repeatedly without getting bored to excel in life monetarily. The choice is yours, but I believe in the former, although it can be very hard to convince yourself to believe in that philosophy.
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