The class X, encountering the first conflict

I was excited to get an invitation from the career counselor at my daughter’s school. The objective was to help my daughter to decide the career stream in class XI.

The counselor was sitting on one side of the table and we were on the other. I told the counsellor about my daughter’s various interests, “Vrinda enjoys mathematics and also likes other subjects. She is good at dancing and painting, that makes her happy. Psychology is her newly found interest”.

Based on the data and our talk, the counsellor concluded that Vrinda should take Maths, Economics, History, Political-science, and English as her main subjects with psychology as a sixth subject.

Painting and dancing, she could pursue at home as a hobby. The possible prospects would be teaching, mass communication, journalism, and civil services exams. We happily returned home. For the next two days, I kept thinking about it.

When I was in class X, I had no clue about my interests, likes, and dislikes. Science was out of my league. So I took up commerce, which looked to be the next prestigious option. Later, my grandfather was told by his friend that a career in computers was an attractive upcoming prospect. That means more and quicker money. So he made me join the most reputed computer learning institute. I did my graduation in commerce and computers. I learned something, but what, I don’t know?

I was still confused. The joy of dancing was the only thing I remembered since childhood. But I had no courage to talk about it in my big joint family. It was an alien concept. I took up a computer-related job that made my grandparents feel proud; at least someone was happy.

After deleting all the files from the system I was thrown out of my first job. I took it as a challenge and learned about computers from my own mistakes. It was totally different from the course I had learned. In my third job, everyone appreciated me and got a good raise. Suddenly, one day I realized that I want to learn dance.

This time I was sure. I left my well-paid job and joined dance classes. My grandmother was so mad at me and called me a fool. She also influenced other members not to support me so that I should get back to the practical world of money.

I was flying in bliss after every dance class of Bharatanatyam by Sri.Justin McCarthy. That decision gave a new beginning to my life. I followed my interest irrespective of outcome, money, and ambition. Life supported me in all possible ways, and the magical journey continued.

It is not easy to know what we want, at the age of 50 we are still struggling and what to expect from a child. The next day, I asked my daughter about her perspective on dancing and painting.

She innocently said, “I like it very much but there is not much money in it”.

I smiled. She continued, “I like Maths too”.

I said, “Hmm… What about history, political science?”

She said, “I like that too”

I said, “What about psychology”

She said, “I heard from many children at school that it is an interesting subject.”

The next day, before going to bed she said, “Mom, I have decided my main subjects – Maths, economics, English, political science, and painting.”

She continued, “All these years in school whenever I was stressed, angry and tired, I used to go to the art room and paint. It always refreshed me. Maths and other subjects are mentally satisfying. I will have painting as one of the main subjects. Our school has the best art facilities and it could be a scoring subject too.

Dancing I will continue privately. Psychology can be taken in college if I remain interested. Moreover, college-level psychology is very different from what it has been taught at school.”

I was happy to see the clarity of her thoughts. My daughter prepared free-mindedly for her X class exams. Before her results, she came to me and said, “Mom, I want to take science. I know I can do it.”

I was glad to see the clarity in her thoughts again.

We are changing all the time according to our age and experience. Our likes and dislikes change too. In childhood, we liked orange drinks, in teenage cola, and as grown-ups, we have a totally different taste. But some decisions in life make us feel proud of ourselves. Often, they are when we follow our interests. The inner clarity gives us the courage to do so.