It’s Okay to Not Know!

Today is one of those rare days. Already reeling from two Marketing and a three-hour Interpersonal Growth Quiz in the first two days of the week, you are able to chill a little. A strong probability of a Probability quiz tomorrow notwithstanding, plans have been made to play football and order biryani.

Apart from academics, the most prevalent thing on the minds of two-month old first years is the upcoming Summer Placements in November. Hyped up beyond any sane metric, these are carried out over a week with all the big-wigs in finance, marketing, consulting and general management queuing up to hire the best talent from this reputed college. Unlike at IIT, resumes are the only way these firms shortlist candidates, so students are expected to refine their CVs as much as possible. Typically in August, you’d find an IIM PGP-1 student fretting about the next FRA (Financial Reporting and Accounting) quiz or complaining about arranging for proofs for points in his CV. Consulting is currently the darling of most, due to the relative lack of jobs in the finance sector. A handful of students know they are set out for Marketing or General Management, but the rest compete vigorously (and sometimes viciously) to get a Consult/Fin shortlist.

 In walks a fresher like me, straight out of the peace loving environs of IIT-KGP. The primary reason for coming here was a complete lack of idea about what I wanted to do with my life. I had a decent job offer from one of India’s most reputed conglomerate, but I thought (and still do) that I was far too young to work. At IIT, placements were barely given any importance in the first three years. You were free to join societies, play sports, or choose to do nothing at all. During placement time (final year) you’d normally end up having done enough to land up a decent job offer. In many cases, you wouldn’t give a rat’s ass about the firm you are supposed to join and would just have the time of your life smoking up the entire final semester.

Here, the biggest problem a fachcha like me faces is not knowing. I barely have an idea about how consulting or finance or marketing works, and perhaps what I’d really like to do doesn’t fit in any of these options. For a person like me, life is usually lived on short notice, and it’s almost always about what I want to do in the next few hours, not in the next few days (let alone months and years). It is indeed interesting, and on occasions bemusing, to see fellow batch mates, several straight out of college, talk about consulting as if they were born to do that, when a few days ago they were as clueless as you. Even more interesting is when they talk in the same breath about finance after a few days.

The point is, no one wants to come across as saying, “Look, I don’t know what I want to do with my life. Some days, I feel like hiking up a mountain, other days I feel like building a castle”. Initially, I was also consumed with the all consuming notion of knowing what to do with my life, but of late I have reconciled myself to the fact that it’s okay. It’s okay to not know. It’s okay to not know now, it’s okay to not know after a couple of years. Really, it’s okay to not know never. I mean, it’s not as if at the end of our existence, there will be a quiz-master (call him Shailesh Gandhi, if you will) to judge us by our ability to know what we did with our life.

Perhaps this post reeks more of self-justification than logic, but you will agree that there is an excitement in not knowing, and a freedom to explore not afforded to those who are set out on a definite path. Yes, there is the risk of being less successful, having lesser money, perhaps a smaller house. But then again, what if you measure success on a day-to-day basis? What if you feel success is waking up everyday to a world full of possibilities, to a range of new avenues to explore?

Enough gyan for today. I am off to mug Probability play football.