You know what’s surprisingly hard? Studying something you have absolutely zero clue about, while simultaneously pretending that it might be useful someday. I know, shocking revelation. But hang on, let me explain.
We all went through that school-college-career assembly line like factory-fitted mannequins. They gave us three shiny tools—Math, Physics, Chemistry—and told us, “Here. Go figure out life.” And just like obedient citizens of the Indian education system, we dove headfirst into entrance exams that felt more like spiritual battles than tests.
It was never about what you loved. It was about your rank. You cracked the code (or didn’t), and that code decided whether you’d be building bridges, fixing wires, or writing code in a cubicle that looked like a sad sandwich shop.
Let’s be honest. Nobody asked us, “Hey, do you even like Computer Science Engineering?” The only metric was whether that degree could get you placed in Infosys or not.
Your love for the subject? That was about as relevant as last year’s viral Insta Reel.
So here we were—assigned specializations like you assign chores to kids—completely random but done for the sake of it. You studied subjects you didn’t understand with tools you didn’t know how to use for jobs you weren’t sure you wanted. The system hoped you’d figure it out along the way. Spoiler: most of us didn’t.
And the problem is, these aren’t just subjects. They’re worlds. You’re thrown into Electrical Engineering, and suddenly you’re decoding signal systems and semiconductor physics like it’s the Rosetta Stone. You don’t even know if you care about how electrons flow—but congratulations, it’s your life now.
In retrospect, I wasn’t broken. The system just handed me the wrong tools and hoped I’d build a spaceship.
Cut to 28 years later—I’m neck-deep into personal finance, obsessed with how people spend, save, and sabotage their own wealth. Human behaviour + money = my nerd paradise. And I had to live three decades, slog through degrees, jobs, and identity crises before I even discovered that this is what I loved.
Nobody told me these tools existed. Nobody gave me a taste of these subjects. It’s like giving everyone a screwdriver and telling them to fix a car, when the real issue is that they needed a spanner. Or hell, maybe they just wanted to build a bicycle instead of a car.
And I can’t help but wonder: what if we all knew early on what we loved to study? What if we weren’t just trying to win a rank-based lottery with borrowed tools?
What if education actually introduced us to all kinds of tools—finance, design, philosophy, filmmaking, coding, psychology—before asking us to pick a path? Wouldn’t that be wild?
Maybe we’d take the right route. Maybe we’d even choose the right vehicle.
Because to truly enjoy the journey… it’s not just about the road.
Maybe, just maybe, it’s also about knowing whether you were meant to walk, drive, or build your own damn spaceship.
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