Baffling benchmarks
In India, there’s a famous concept used by parents, called “Sharma ji ka beta” concept. Basically, whatever you accomplish, will be compared by your parents against the accomplishments of someone else’s son or daughter. They also set those as the benchmarks for you, thereby making your life a living hell. I’ve not experienced this per se, but I’ve heard a lot of people feel bad about themselves, just because their parents compared their achievements to mine at some point of time. (yeah, I used to top my school and was great in extra-curriculars back then, and I perceived a lot of such occurrences — of parents comparing their kids to me).
Someone recently gave me some very sensible advice on how not to flounder unnecessarily on trivial stuff like “benchmarks”, and instead just maximize the execution of what is actually important.
Why are we moulded in such a way that we somehow need to perform on par with a predetermined benchmark? Isn’t it just an arbitrary aggregate set by our peers, that just amplifies the pressure on ourselves? (To put it in RJ Balaji’s slang, “PRESSURE ON THE BOWLER”, Lol). Circling back, This is the case everywhere, be it academics, sports or even a stupid Instagram post. People tend to get all sullen and dejected when the number of likes on their social media posts takes a dip. This is ruthless. Why bother keeping up with a benchmark if you’re not sportive enough to handle its consequences?
Everybody has a different clock. Some attain success early and some get there quite later in their lives. But there’s absolutely no need to compare and torment ourselves to keep up with those fatuous “benchmarks”. The best we could do is perform like it’s our only chance and without having thoughts like “a benchmark score” or “a better performance than our peers” chiselled to our minds, for those notions are surely of no help. We all read quotes like “Be yourself”, “Make yourself your competition” very often but we so do not follow them, instead we just practise the exact opposite. In a nutshell, yes, being competitive and successful is crucial. But so is taking care of our inner peace and well-being.
