Mediocrity : Our biggest Enemy

Before we talk of mediocrity, let us jump back into our childhood and imagine: what were the dreams you had back then?; how confident were you to achieve them or was there even the existence of any doubt in your mind?; how many things were you afraid of trying your hand at?; how happy or sad were you? Now, compare it with us in the present. Seriously, do it; It will hardly take a minute or two of us. Most of us probably know what I strive to accomplish here. Let us keep it to ourselves for a moment.

Let us jump years ahead by breaking the chain of thoughts of the past you were traveling in into our present. If you are living the life more than 85% of Indians are living, even then you must have a different story to tell. In every one of your(our) story, one element is common, for sure: Environment. Let’s get back to that later. There are two type of people among these 85% people: The first, who are not happy and content with the way they are living the life, who feel that’s not exactly they wanted to go about life or they wanted: a finer home with a garden surrounded by it all over or sea-facing one, a bigger and luxury car, a better job or their own business or anything they felt could be better if their life did not unfold the way it did; the second, who are perfectly elated and extend their gratitude to god for her grace for being so kind to them, live under limited resources they have without making any complaints.

Now, if you fall into the second category, it’s great, seriously, because, in the end, a life full of happiness and a positive outlook is all that matters.

If you fall into the first category, let us go back to that “environment” thing I mentioned above. It is highly likely to be influenced by the environment we grew in. Before the people in the second category got into the life they never wished to, most of them tried hard to pursue the life wanted. Every time, they looked for any sort of assistance from the already-living-mediocre-life people, they were told what they were thinking was not possible; it was hilarious to think like this; the business they were talking would not run well in the market or failure-is-certain kind of advice. Under these circumstances, after facing rejection after rejection, doors after doors being shut at their efforts, and more importantly, our conscious mind day-after-day believing more strongly than the previous day that the advice received was true: Yes, it can’t be done, leave it.

What if they tried more and more, and didn’t quit until the last door was shut at them; and of course, it is next to impossible to judge and identify the last door.

Img Source : https://flic.kr/p/fdnzzB

Mediocre environment will leave no stone unturned to fall you back to sit on the seat reserved for you there. The whole environment gets united to pull you back when you wanted to run looking for a better seat; you tried and, sadly, you sat on the seat you were first not willing to.

It has established itself well at the roots of many institutions across the country. Most of us are obsessed with Bollywood. Did we ever ask ourselves what was done by it for the nation? They could not even make a world-class movie even on Mahatma Gandhi, proudly called our national father. Though there are some great movies, which I don’t deny, the headcount is like a drop in the ocean. Why I brought up Bollywood here is it is we who promote mediocrity, encourage them to keep their crap running, which actually should be discarded completely. There can be innumerable examples offered, but I know you know.

In our society, most of us either don’t dare to think big and set small goals for themselves or they think big, make some efforts, and then submit themselves to mediocrity; Only a few of us reached their goals and crossed the milestone thought of.

Nothing can be done to them who made small goals, it’s their choice. However, for those who faltered after some time, there can be three reasons: First, they failed to understand they have to enjoy going through the process consisting of well-planned strategy, sheer will and unwavering determination, which leads up to the goal; second, they were actually small thinkers; third, and of course, sometimes, extraordinary circumstances serves the reason for it; but if it was the only reason, they highly likely bounce back stronger in the time to come.

There is a concept of “feedback loop” mentioned in the book “The subtle art of not giving a f*ck”. It basically means how our thoughts, ideas, expressions and emotions generate more the same pattern of these elements. Like, when we have been sad for some days, we are likely to recall some more memories from the past to intensify grievance, or we may simply get sad in days to come as to why we are always sad. 

The same pattern applies to mediocrity. Mediocre thoughts generate more mediocre thoughts. And a continuous loop of mediocre thoughts, if not broken timely, will lead to a mediocre mindset. Mediocrity promotes status-quo, same routine, same actions and, sadly, the same progress.  

For years since independence, we were following the socialist model of the economy due to its utmost outreach to every section of society on account of India’s poor population. It was resulting in a sustainable growth every year, but not making us any richer in absolute terms. Then comes PM Narsimha Rao, who in 1991 decided to liberalize India economically, coming out of the socialist model. It was risky. The country had to devalue its currency to promote foreign investment.

And the result was unbelievable : Before 1991, foreign investment was negligible, it went up to $74 million in the first year after the reforms took place, and stand at $ 284 billion as of now; India’s GDP stood at Rs 5,86,212 crore in 1991, which went up about 2900% to close to $ 2.8 trillion dollars now.

What if then PM had decided to keep the things in the same place as they had been for years?  We all know the result, right.

The same case is with us. Very few of us embrace changes when needed, while most of us tend to mould situations the way we wanted. If only it could work for us.

Our country is fighting against poverty, hunger, terrorism and so on. But elements like religions, beliefs, traditions weaken this fight. Today, we have to fight this mediocre attitude as a nation and as an individual to take it to glorious heights. Mediocrity can only be beaten by high thinking, great thoughts, extraordinary visions, big dreams and tremendous efforts. Let us all start thinking big to break the trap of mediocrity to achieve the greater prospects the life awaits.