All of a sudden, everyone's become an expert on me. Rahul says I'm smart enough that I have no excuse for not scoring straight A's, and that I ought to get off my lazy rump reading fantasy novels and put my nose to the grinding stone. My brother was not so mild; he said that with only 3 courses and no TA/RA responsibilities, I'd better score straight A's - or else!!
I guess 5 years of academic humiliation in an IIT has taught me to lower my expectations. That's wrong, isn't it? If you don't aim higher, you'll never go higher.
So, I stow away my novels in the bookshelf, keeping an eye out for the due date. I have only one computer game installed on my machine, and I've lost the heart to play it for now. My plans for buying Civilization IV have to wait till the winter vacations. No bridge this week, and only once a week for the 3 weeks after this.
I'll blog again during the thanksgiving break, but until then, I'm keeping to the grinding stone. Ouch! My nose....
Cheers,
Prashanth.
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7 comments:
All the best :)
watch the nose..( not Vc's .. but urs)
U dun wanna grind it too hard and make it disappear... tc
A teeny weeny question..what the hell happened to that post about people bearing a grudge against you?
Intern,
I will be popping by now and then even if I dont put up any post. Besides, thanksgiving is just a week away!
Tipsy,
Thanks! I need all the luck I can get...
Divya,
"We all sail where the wind of life takes us"
The post on grudges disappeared into thin air.
Jay-san,
Funny, but I had such thoughts just after I entered IIT. During the JEE prep period, I worked so hard that I started asking myself why I had to continue doing that and miss out on life. The fact that I was suddenly a slightly-above-average student rather than a topper encouraged me to "vindicate" my GPA by doing all the things that "normal" people do, rather than reduce life to an academic rat race.
Now, years later, I find that I am ashamed that I gave up so easily. I never did study for anyone's sake other than my own; when I stopped studying for my own sake, there was suddenly no reason to study at all. Don't you see the fallacy here? I made a conscious choice to become an engineer, and wanted to get into the best institution for that. Now, I have made a conscious choice to go to grad school rather than take up a job back home. If I don't strive to be the best at something I've chosen for myself, where is the meaning in life?
The grinding stone, it is. I have to set expectations for myself, at least along the path I have chosen for myself. Other peoples' expectations govern my life in some ways; but to not set my own expectations as well is to lose direction.
Kaushik,
Perhaps you should send me an email every month or so reminding me about my priorities in life :)
Jay-san,
Forget humanity. What is your goal? If your goal is to live life to the fullest, I say that is not a goal. You made the decision to go to UIUC for a reason. Within limits, you must do your best to do justice to that reason. If you did it because everyone else is doing it, or you wanted to escape a stifled existence back in India, then you are under no obligation to stick to the grinding stone. You can life your life to the fullest, and be happy in the process. In my opinion, that won't last long and in the long run you are better served by having a goal and setting your priorities on that basis. Keeping to the grinding stone 24x7 is, of course, not good for health, including above mentioned much-victimized nose. But it must be done when it must be done; there is still ample time to sample life's diversities.
Pacha, nice to touch base again..your blog looks so cool and frank..mail me @ kumar.navin@wipro.com
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