Not Just Marks

Study, Study and Study…. No other option for teenagers and youngsters. Is study alone enough to take us forward in the life?

Well, I don’t know. Do you know? Certainly, most of us don’t know.

Ok let me ask from a different angle, what’s important in the Life?

The answer is “Money”, obviously we can’t even think once without money. Now, new question arises, what are the sources to earn the money? Unmmmm, my view is passion and knowledge combo.

Knowledge; “facts, information, and skills acquired through experience or education; the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject”, that’s what google tells us. Now read the google definition of knowledge once more. Facts, information and skills are the main three components of knowledge. Now the question arises; what facts, which information and skills?  

We all are surrounded by millions of facts. It’s a fact that we are humans and we don’t know that who has created humans, but we all believe in the God and its again a fact. Fact is what we believe in, we know that this has happened, and its proof is available to believe. So, to understand the facts we need to study, we can’t say anything concrete unless we know the facts. “Knowing the facts” is part of knowledge.

Now, which information to absorb? we are living in a digital era and on daily basis we go through so much of information via TV, social media, books, newspapers and via verbal communication. The key is, that we should absorb the information related to our subject or interest only else we will be flooded with the unnecessary information which will not let us focus on the requisite level of information. To do it we need to identify the core topic. So, before we begin to get the information let’s identify the core area and know the sources to search the relevant information.

Next, skills. Usually we keep saying that I can do this, and I can’t do this. We often say that I can do it whenever any challenge comes to us related to our interest and we avoid the challenges which are not of our interest by saying I can’t do this. Here we need to understand that Interest is the key to gain the skills. So first we need to identify the interest area and then start gaining the right skills. Like we say, communication skills, negotiation skills, technical skills etc. These days skills are given preference over theoretical study because it’s considered widely that skills are tough to gain as compared to theoretical study.

Another aspect of knowledge is theoretical or practical understanding of a subject. We can read in the books that how to play cricket, but the skills will be gained when we do it practically. In corporate industry we use a term OJT very often, On the Job Training. Its like earn while you lean. Study can give us the basics, but we become expert by practicing it practically. So here “Practice” is the key, continuous practice always yields good results.

I have been talking to many students and youngsters who are majorly focused about career and sat down with them to hear their thoughts and challenges. Mostly from this segment lacks passion to do something as by now most of their focus was on studies only.

Passion is a powerful feeling and affection towards something of our interest. Passion tells us that this is what I like when I do it. Someone’s affection towards something becomes his or her passion slowly but by the time we realise it we are usually late. So, we need to develop the passion at early stage of life. Parents, teachers, coaches can help in developing a passion, but identification of the right subject is the important aspect.

Let’s read a small story, in the 3 Idiots movie, Farhan Qureshi (R. Madhavan) was passionate about wildlife photography but his parents wanted him to do engineering, so he pursued. After some time when Rancho (Amir Khan) has guided and helped him to pursue his passion, Farhan has left the engineering course and went for practical assignment, finally he became an established personality because he lived his passion. 3 idiots movie famous Rancho’s character in the movie was inspired by Mr Sonam Wangchuk, an engineer turned educationist who is shaping the lives of future generations in Ladakh through his path-breaking ideas and living his passion to do something for the society.

Study plays a pivotal role in shaping the career but the other activities which helps us to engage our self in developing a passion. Other activities can be anything mostly our favourite hobby like volunteering is my favourite hobby, yours can be music, games, innovation or other curriculum activities… Anything.

“Life is not just marks, Its beyond marks also” – Navdeep Singh