The things they never teach you at school
You just completed your high school, and ready for college. For the twelve years of your life you spent respectively in primary and high schools, all you’ve been taught about is History, Languages, Art, Mathematics, Science — maybe even Music and Life Orientation if you are fortunate enough. You maybe even more fortunate if the Life Orientation curriculum they taught you on will apply in the real life situations and the harsh realities of adulthood.
The limited narrow path
The unfairness of education is that it gives you the straightforward theoretical knowledge about all the subjects set for you that the system presumes are good enough for you. The system does not teach you to think deeper than the knowledge it feeds you. Thinking outside of the set information is often deemed abnormal or even worse, rebellious. The twelve years of primary and high school are the most crucial years of your life therefore the information you get fed has critical implications for your life.
One time I had a discussion with a friend about the importance of entrepreneurship subject in primary and high school education curriculum. The system just gives you a long list of subjects that are either not going to help you to be independent in the long term or are only going to benefit the employment industry by making you a suitable employee. Why teach about entrepreneurship at tertiary level when it is too late in the student life for this to be assimilated in the consciousness? After twelve of being taught to be a dependent employee, it may not be that easy to transform your mindset to an entrepreneurial one overnight while tertiary education lasts for few years then you go into the job market. This is a trap so that you do not get enough time to even get ready to be learn to be self-employed.
Do not hate the player, hate the game.
When I was in grade one I remember how excited I was about starting school. I would count the years left before I get to tertiary level or college, then work, get married, have kids and maybe have a happy ever after life. At just the age of six, I already ‘figured’ life for myself. However this is not the life that each individual makes a conscious decision to have but the system teaches you this narrow and limited path of life. Because unfortunately in most cases we just take it as it is and when we later wake up from this dogma, that is when we truly begin to live. By middle age, you realize that there is more to life than what you have been fed especially when life set by the system does not work for you. Whether it is too late or not, you realize later that you can start all over again. That is what we call being born again. It is not about the religion born again. It is simply unlearning what the system taught you and relearning what you are truly meant to be.
An Open mind is a gateway to greater opportunities
Being open-minded will help you adapt to the ever changing world and economy. There are still many individuals who believe that the only key to success is education. I live around this type of people, some I work with and some I do extra mural activities with. Even with that limited mentality, they further narrow it down to think you have to be employed to be successful. What about being self-employed you may ask. Most people are so programmed to think being employed is the only way to generate income in such a way that being self-employed does not even cross their mind. They always think self-employment is for the rich and the wealthy only forgetting that they also started somewhere not rich. This is by far the highest form of self-slavery, much harsher than the peak of slavery age in the 1900s.
1. You can be successful without education even though it is advisable to have one as it serves as a guiding principle in most areas. But it is not the only key to a greater and successful life.
2. Being employed should not be the only form of generating income. In fact working remotely while employed is much better than waking up to the boring office life. You can be self-employed and make a success out of it, you need to educate yourself how to. There is a lot of information available online about being self-employed and the many business ideas and ways of venturing into it. Also try to find out what is it you love which is the first good step to take venturing into business, doing what you love.
3. There are many ways of making a living nowadays with the fast development of technology, many online work available, trading with forex or investing with cryptocurrency. You can make money while you live your best life without the one that was set for you by the system. You can do so much with the internet from selling products online, being software developer does not mean you have to work for a company, you may freelance or even being a blogger on Medium or other platforms.
Just as the Scottee Waves said: “Stay open minded. Things aren’t always what they seem”.
Limiting beliefs on success
Success is not measured by standards set by others for you but by those that are set by you for you. That is success! It is okay not to tick all boxes of the set criteria of success formed by the system. It is okay to grow up and not need to get married or have kids and not all of us are designed for corporate careers. As soon as you decide what is success to you, what the rest of the world says slowly becomes less important. We will have more happy people and fewer ones lying in hospital beds dying of depression or anxiety disorders because they do not meet the set ‘success criteria’ or they do not meet societal expectations. Before you decide that something is important always ask yourself if it was you that decided it is important in the first place or if it is the voices of others playing in your head.
From the famous words of Michael Josephson: “ You are the captain of your own ship; don’t let anyone else take the wheel.”
