Education? Education.

By Caelean Aleena Tavares

There are various questions that have haunted me while growing up. Questions about my future, my career. "What stream are you going to opt for?" "What do you want to become once you're older?" "Which line are you getting into?" The same questions worded so cleverly each time that they come from the different people that they come from. I don't like being a teenager. But what I hate most ardently about being one is when I'm asked to answer this question about what im gojng to do with my life. Hey, I'm only 16!

Irrespective of the number of times that I've answered this question, my answers have always been indecisive and fleeting. At this juncture where we are preparing for our board exams, the pressure that society has placed on our shoulders, the so called 'POTENTIAL' that we have within ourselves now feels more like a burden, than a belief. When I was five I wanted to be a princess, when I turned seven I wanted to be a cowboy and when I turned eleven the only dream I harboured was of being an Academy Award winning actress, I'd be lying if I said my aspirations have changed since. But surely, one can always dream?

But back to square one, my answer is that I don't know. I don't know which career to choose or which subject I want to major in. In this moment my only worry is to get through the next year and a half and pass my boards with flying colours. We have been fed with this notion that the primary purpose of education is money. We can then live lives of luxury with Rolexes, Mercedes' and penthouses. The secondary purpose is that at least you'll have a fulfilled life. But boy of boy,  are they wrong. The primary purpose of education is to kiss every horizon that life has to offer. Grab every opportunity that we can get our hands on. It is to learn how to live and not to survive.

Careers are a big worry for people of all age groups. Now we see parents more bothered about their childrens' futures than the kids themselves. I'd like to state that I speak from experience here. Instead of worrying about the next Physics or Math C.C.E, I want to be worrying about the fate of the US Government, Kim Jong Un's nuclear missile threat, whether or not Ranbir Kapoor will leave Alia Bhatt for another pretty newbie. I want to worry about feminism in India or the upcoming Infinity War 2. But, just not upon how my life will crumble to pieces if I flunk my Vocabulary Quiz.

I what to make mistakes, and then make some more mistakes, and I wnat to feel calm and collected enough to lean from those mistakes. Because it is my age to do just that. It is my age to learn how to get back up on my feet, and not drive myself into an anxiety attack because society demands me to be an A Level perfectionist. Last of all, I want to be responsible for all of my actions, I want to have carried a message from my past actions for future reference. But what I want more than anything is to live out my adolescence without having to constantly worry myself about thoughts of the imminent future.