ESCAPE THE CAREER TRAP

For a very long time after I graduated, I desperately wanted a job. Actually at that time I needed one too- for financial and emotional reasons. But as things happen, I could not get any job. In that time I managed to keep afloat professionally and personally.... And right at the time when I did not need the job, I got one. Of course, I wanted it- very badly so I jumped into it. It made me happy for exactly 5 days. After that I kept hearing ‘this is a job not a career’...’this is a career not a life’......’this is work not passion’. The day I understood what all these platitudes meant I gave my notice and quit....and escaped the trap called ‘career’.

For the last 50 years, men and women, boys and girls have been brought up on the myth of a ‘career’. The word evokes such a mix of accomplishment, status, affluence and sheer snobbery that a majority fall for it. Everybody is supposed to decide and understand something called their ‘identity’ and stick to it. Young women with little babies become depressed because they have been unceremoniously shut out of their ‘career’. Kareena gets a thumbs up because she does not let motherhood interfere with her career. Men are expected to relocate to wherever their jobs are because they have a career to make. This is not a gender issue at all....the myth affects all who are naive enough to be drawn into it.

Gender equality is the phrase used to fire young women into giving up everything in the service of industry. Men are expected to settle for no less than 16 hours of work and aspirations to be the CEO. So even if some people would rather choose needlework or to spend time with family, they are made to feel stupid about these choices. To assuage their guilt we invent childcare centres with cctv camera, quality time parenting, certified elder care manpower, spouse- dating and art exhibitions. Actually all these amount to nothing if you are doing it just to further your career.

A career is meant only for three categories of people- people who are competitive by nature need it to remain sane. People who have poor social and financial support need it to make something of their lives. And a third category is people who have nothing else in their life to look forward to....this last category need career only for a while though. All other folks should look at education only as a means to acquire the wherewithal to do what they like so that it can start paying them. Then proceed to work as few hours as possible working to earn money and rest of it to enjoy the work. One must be able to cut down on the working hours to be able to do anything that one needs to do or wants to do....including non-remunerative tasks like being with one’s children and parents, or doing embroidery or painting one’s bicycle.

A person without a career could be a lucky person.....for this person has a life