#childHealth – Penfluky

Congratulations! It’s a bartender!

Being born in India is like being born with a head tag that reads out one’s career. Right when the baby drops out or sometimes even before the sperm has hit the egg, they are destined to become something. “Hey, I want to have kids” both the parents talk. But it’s a bit different here, it’s like “Shit my favourite uncle died of cancer! Let’s have sex and give birth to doctor?”

The kid learns unscrewing a bolt, and the parents are already proud. They are pleased because they want to make the kid a mechanical engineer, and this unscrewing somehow makes them feel like it’s progress. Doesn’t make sense? Shouldn’t either! “I always wanted to make you a doctor, son” Come, one dad, I always wanted to be born in a mansion with 24 servants. I couldn’t choose my parents, neither can you determine what happens to me.

When I was a kid, I always dreamed of holding guns and standing at the border, chanting slogans of my country. If the tables had turned and my country was to be vanished and occupied, I would still be holding a gun, but I would be called a militant. Career is a joke! Professions are just labels we created to make things easy; they are only labels.

I felt relieved when my schooling was finished. Didn’t even know what those subjects had to do with my life, but I was promised that they would somehow help me. I happened to visit an uncle who lectured me for an hour. He said I should take engineering as my bachelor’s degree and also study my masters in some foreign university. I never knew why people would do those things. Like studying in international institutions, as they cost a lot! I thought they were going for the quality of education. But it was only later that I realised they needed quality of certification and not professional training.

An MA History from Danayya Institute from Dilshuknagar looks blech. But the same certificate with beautiful words and designs looks attractive. Who doesn’t “Woah” at a guy who had done ‘Masters in Liberal Arts’ at Stanford University? Did they feed him with diamonds? I don’t think so. But you can definitely buy diamonds with the expense of studying outside.

Many people talk only about what they studied in the US or the UK. They won’t tell you how they paid their tuition fee. “What are you doing in the UK, Kaushik?” “Ah! MS! The US not the UK!” they say. They won’t tell you how many drinks they served to the customer as a bartender. They won’t tell you how many windshields they have wiped to be able to buy the flight ticket home. Their struggle is real, and their pain is genuine. Just because a parent’s uncle died of cancer, they decided to donate their kid to health services. They had the kid brainwashed from school and pushed towards medicine.

While you sit here watching TV and telling your neighbours and relatives that your son is studying ‘Doctor’ in the US, he is cleaning pukes out of bar tables! Congratulations, It’s a bartender! The destined doctor you gave birth to had to see a hard life in a place that is not home because of your little fantasy. You could have instead donated your sperm if you wanted to help people medically! Maybe give something once in a while to hospitals? No! You had to have a kid that does what you can not!

Somewhere after realising that he actually wants to become a dancer, your son has already spent half of his life satisfying your doctor-doctor fantasy. You dream of your son becoming a top surgeon, buying you a car and a luxury villa. It is not wrong to imagine such things. But why doesn’t it strike to you that your kid has the mind to have some dreams too? What if he/she is dreaming of singing on a stage? What if she wants to be a stripper? That surely is a possibility!

Have a kid, if you want a kid, or your condom broke! Your dead uncle is dead. People who want to become an engineer will become an engineer. People who want to treat your madness will become a therapist. Just because you can’t fix your flat tyre, don’t have kids and make them a mechanic.

The Shenanigan Of Life

According to science, the probability of a human being born is one in 400 trillion! That is a pretty huge number and very rare probability. According to evolution, The first human ancestors appeared between five million and seven million years ago, and the present sized brain was formed 130,000 years ago. We used brain to be where we are now with all the luxuries and comforts. The primary work of the brain is the power to think and simplify things. But there are adverse effects on the same. So what is the Shenanigan (a devious trick used mainly for an underhand purpose) gift of the life? The human brain ability to think. Why did I call it a sneaky trick? Humans tend to use it with care at first, and then overuse it spoiling the purpose of it.

The vital part of thinking is finding a logic to deduce complex problems and convert them into simple solutions. So far it is good, when we overthink, we overcompensate the things, and instead of finding answers, we invent new complicated and unnecessary questions. By unnecessary questions, there come pointless methods to find solutions. What happens when we overthink about a situation in life? We feel stressed. Stress leads to loneliness as we do not want to talk to people when we are stressed. What happens if we do not speak? We become lonely, which leads to depression. Depression leads to much more mental health-related problems. And in the end, there comes that thought, which is the 4th leading cause of death for adults ages 18-65 that is “Suicide.” Even worst, it is the third leading cause of death in 15-19-year-olds.

Let us go by the academics of student life for graduation ( The reason I’m talking students is most of the suicides occur at age 15-19). For suppose there are 10,000 good seats of engineering which include top colleges and universities, and the student who writes the exam to get selected is 10 Lakhs. First and foremost, this equation is very illogical and dangerous. Illogical equation because, how is it a students fault when there only 10,000 good engineering college seats in the whole nation? Isn’t the responsibility of the colleges and the government to improve the standards? Dangerous equation because the student is literally compared to all the objects in the universe by the parents, relatives, etc., and it creates a trauma. These people never question the government or the university to improve the standards.

Let us consider a scenario to understand the difference between thinking and overthinking. What is the basic concept of the exam? Some professor, who is located in some part of the country, prepare a question paper, which he feels is necessary and asks students these ten lakhs students to answer, from which another professor evaluates and picks the 10,000 candidates. For suppose a student is not among the group of 10,000. Logically a student has to think in the following way, “according to 2 people from the 7.8 billion people in the world, think I’m not eligible for this course, for the questions I answered this year. Let us give it another try or try a different one.” But is the student thinking in the same way? Nope, they Complicate it and think, ” I’m useless compared to 10,000 students who got the seat. My dreams are shattered! Everybody got the same questions, then why didn’t I get the seat?” By this overthinking and added parental pressure, their suicidal tendency increases and some of them end their life.

There are other causes of suicides in youngsters as well. A couple of them are love and career choices. Why do people commit suicide due to love? What is love? You like a person because of their qualities and want that person to be with you forever because it makes you happy. What should anyone think when their love is rejected by the other person? They should think, “I’m rejected by this person because they didn’t like the qualities I have. I’m living with these qualities since all the past years. I’m sure I will find the one who likes me.” But they complicate it and think, “I’m rejected by the person of my dreams! What is the purpose of living? I cant face reality any more.” Same goes with the career. In a company, one manager by this knowledge thought a person is not eligible for the promotion and rejected them. They take it personally by overthinking and end their life. We always say that people should have opinions. What is an opinion? It is an idea on something which you developed by your own knowledge and thinking. Why are we not applying the same opinionated thinking before ending life?

In the end, any problem in life has a simple solution if we think logically, but we complicate the things and spoil our mental health. As I said at the start, the probability of a human being born is 1 in one in 400 trillion. Let us not spoil the beauty of the formation by ending it abruptly. Let us find the right solutions for the problem by thinking and not overthinking.

Links for reference:

W.H.O on suicides: https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/suicide

The Divine Possession

The priest is walking back to his house. It’s midday, and the sun is burning his shaved head. He put his both palms on his head, trying to cover the heat. “We need more trees here” he thought and started walking quicker as his feet were burning too. He finally reached his home, which is in a spacious land, but a small cottage. It has a big lawn with a Tulsi plant in the middle. “Manga!” the priest called his wife out. There is a water drum placed outside the main door. The priest washed his feet, hands and head. His wife rushed out with a towel. “Where is Ambika?” asked the priest. “She is at Devi’s house, writing homework” Manga replied passing the sheet to him. The priest started rubbing his wet body and walked into the living room. He sat down, and Manga put a half torn banana leaf in front of him. He took some water into his hand dropped a few drops around the plate and chanted some mantras while Ambika walked in. He looked at Ambika leaving her slippers un-organised and coming in. “Wash your legs, fool!” he yelled. Ambika bit her tongue and went back to the veranda. She put her hands inside the tub and started playing with the water.

“Use a mug, Ambi” her mother yelled from inside. Ambika giggles and dipped all her hands inside the tub. She took a handful of water and looked at the mosquito larvae swimming around in the palmful of water. Manga peeped through the door and saw Ambika still playing with the drum; dipping her hands in. Manga started running towards Ambika; as soon as she reached Ambi, she spanked her so hard that Ambika fell on the ground. Manga did not intend to hit her that hard, she started trembling as Ambi is not moving. “Ayyo” Manga began to yell in a rather horrific way that made Seshulu jump. Seshulu left his plate and rushed to Manga. “Why is Ambi on the ground? What did you do?” he cried. “I don’t know dear. Please wake her up! Please do something!” Manga started moving back shaking. She did not want to see her daughter wounded or dead. She started regretting beating her. Seshulu bent closer to Ambi and held her both arms. “Ammulu, are you ok?” he asked, but there is no response. He turned her around, facing the sky and took some water from the tub. He sprinkled some drops on her face.

Ammulu opened her mouth and started making weird noises. Seshulu looked at his wife, Manga with a confused expression. “Ammulu” he called her and shook her to wake her up. Ammulu opened her eyes rather dramatically “You fools!” she yelled in a coarse voice. Seshulu got shocked and is just staring at Ammulu standing up. Ammulu sat down in a manly way. She started shaking around, making weird noises. “Arghhh” she shouted, and Seshulu’s jaw dropped. “Mother!” he said. “Manga, it is the mother goddess, she possessed our ammulu, call the neighbours!” he yelled. Manga started running out; slipped and fell near the gate. Neighbour, Basavamma saw Manga fall and rushed to lift her up. “Ayyo Manga! Why are you in a rush?” Basavamma asked while she is holding Manga’s hand and lifting her.

“My daughter, Basu. She has been possessed by the goddess. Please come inside. Help me call the others, will you Basu?” Manga moaned standing up. “You go inside Manga, I will call everyone” Basavamma said and rushed towards the others. Manga walked in and peeped through the door. Seshulu is applying turmeric on the face of their daughter as she is shaking. Manga went in and started rubbing turmeric too. Seshulu started murmuring few chants as Manga put a big blob of kumkum (saffron and turmeric) on the forehead of Ambika. Ambi kept shaking and making a weird noise as the villagers started rushing in one by one. Basavamma brought neem leaves and put them in Ambika’s hands. Ambi caught them tightly and moved more vigorously. “Is everyone here?” Ambi asked randomly. “Yes, Mother” the people yelled. Ambika started calling names of the people suddenly. “Yadagiri” she called and Yadagiri got excited “Yes, Mother” he said. She began calling names of everyone like she is taking some attendance. After calling out many names, she looked at Basavamma. “Basavamma! Call the ones who have not turned up. Tell them Mother is calling them” she said and closed her eyes again, but she remembered something suddenly. “Don’t call Chanakya, he is a disbeliever” she said. “Why don’t you call themselves, Amma? We even have telephones in all our homes” a voice asked from the main door. It is Chanakya! Ambi closed her eyes, “Kick that fool out!” she yelled. “Get lost you atheist scum, this is no place for the likes of you” Basavamma pushed Chanakya. Chanakya bent on his knees and started praying her. “After witnessing this miracle with my own eyes, I have turned into a believer. Please accept me, Mother!” Chanakya requested. Ambi thought for a while and let Chanakya in, and everyone started asking questions to the mother. “When will the crop yield this year, Mother?” Rajappa asked. Ambi thought for a while and said “When the birds fly low to the south, crops will sow. The crops won’t wither depending on the weather” she said, and Rajappa got confused. “But, Mother?” he asked as the villagers were clapping and praising for her little poetic answer. “Why don’t you help un-intelligent people like I and Rajappa by answering in straight lines, Mother?” Chanakya asked, and Ambi ignored the question. The next half an hour passed with more questions and poetic answers followed by praises.

Chanakya lost his chill and started pushing people in his way. He sat in front of Ambi as she gulped. He observed her gulp. “Mother, will you help me with my problem?” He asked. Ambi looked at him and gestured him to ask. “What is the equation of Force?” he asked, and everyone is shocked. “Hey, physics teacher! Get out and let us ask real-life questions” Ramulu yelled. “For me, this is a real-life problem, Ramulu anna (brother)” Chanakya said politely and looked at Ambi. “Mass times the acceleration, my son” Ambi started shaking. “Good mother. So you do know physics!” Chanakya clapped. Seshulu got angry and pulled Chanakya closer. “Fool! You are talking to the mother goddess. Be wise and ask helpful questions!” he shouted.

“What’s Bernoulli’s principle?” he asked, and Ambi pretends like she didn’t listen to it. “Move away, imbecile. Are you testing the goddess?” Seshulu shouted angrily and pushed Chanakya. “Don’t hurt Ambi! Treat her carefully! She is my manifestation. As you have wasted my time with silly questions. I’m hurt and leaving. If you treat Ambika good by giving her what she needs, I will be pleased to revisit you sometime” Ambi hissed coarsely and fell on the ground. Everyone began looking at Chanakya angrily, and Ramulu dragged Chanakya and threw him on the ground. “You wasted all our chances, you dumb man!” Ramulu yelled and spat beside Chanakya. Everyone is pushing him out as Seshulu shouted angrily. “Everyone leave immediately!” Seshulu demanded.

“Chanakya, you stay!” he ordered. Everyone touched Ambika’s feet and moved out as Chanakya stayed back. “Why did you ask her specifically about that one question?” Seshulu asked as Manga lifted Ambika and took her inside. “Because Ambika failed to answer that in today’s class. In fact, I came to your home to tell you that she is terrible at physics. I wanted to ask you if you can permit me to tutor her in your home. People like Ambika are creative, and they need to be taught creatively. You saw how she convinced you all that she was possessed by divine” Chanakya laughed “She’s smart and got wits” he added. Seshulu is shaken and couldn’t accept the fact that he got conned by his daughter. “I don’t believe you. You are an atheist” Seshulu said in doubt. ‘If God existed, he would definitely know the Bernoulli’s principle, because he wrote Bernoulli’s fate and guided him right?” Chanakya asked, and Seshulu is blank. “It is ok. Regardless of your belief, it will be useful if you allowed me to teach her in a way she understands or she will get crushed in the system that respects marks than wit” Chanakya asked once again. “It’s late, I better go” he started leaving as Seshulu fell in a dilemma. He went inside and looked at Ambika lying on the couch watching TV. “What happened with me, nanna (father)?” she asked Seshulu. “I don’t know, Ammu” Seshulu said and went back to his room as she continued watching TV.

She is watching a Telugu film about a goddess in her human manifest.

Scared Heart That Never Left The Closet.

Goutham is a simple kid with big curious eyes and a heartful smile. He is a very pampered child and an angel to the family. He is a very active kid who loves playing with his cat. It is the summer vacation, and Goutham couldn’t go out as it was scorching. Goutham is petting the cat, and his mom walks to him, kisses him, and says, ” You are turning 7 tomorrow! It just feels like you were born yesterday. Thanks for choosing me as your mother and your dad your father. We love you so much. Your dad is on the way, he is getting you some cool cloths.” After hearing this, Goutham is very excited and is staring at the entrance door for his father’s arrival. In the evening around 5, his father comes with a bag. Gotham’s eyes glow at the site of his father. His father enters the home, sees Goutham with his cute surprised eyes, kisses him, and goes in. Goutham runs behind is the father. His father keeps the bag on a table and starts unpacking things.

Goutham imagines that some magician is unraveling stuff from the magic basket. There were chocolates, biscuits, and many more party items. Goutham’s face glows like a moon in the sky, but his eyes are searching for his fancy dress. Finally, the dress comes out, and it is a suit. Goutham’s eyes were like glowing stars. The dress was beyond his imagination, and it was beyond perfect for him. He hugs his dad, kisses him, and they all go to have dinner. After dinner, the house members decorate the house with color papers, flowers, etc. There is a big “Happy Birthday” banner with Goutham’s precious smile. It is absolutely stunning, and Goutham loved it. It is late at night, and Goutham was not able to sleep as he is very excited for the next day. Gotham’s father comes to him, and here is how their conversation goes:

Dad: Dear! Why are you not sleeping? And did you like the decorations and your dress?

Goutham: I’m excited about tomorrow, and I liked them very much.

Dad: As you are not sleepy, let me show you something.

Dad finds a paper, comes to Gotham, and starts folding it.

Goutham: Dad, it looks so cool! What are you making?

Dad: I’m making a paper boat. A fantastic paper boat you can play with when monsoons start.

Goutham: Dad, it looks incredible, please teach me how to do it.

Dad takes Goutham on his lap and teaches him, and as usual, his eyes are sparkling brighter than Sirius A (The most shining star in the night sky). They complete the paper boat, and Goutham is very happy with the outcome. Goutham carefully places them in his closet and gives a good night kiss to his dad. Before sleeping, Goutham says, “Dad one day I’m going to a buy a real boat which is as good as our paper boat, and we all can go one a fun trip around the world. I will sit between you and mom” Dad gets emotional, hugs his son, and waves him goodnight.

Finally, the big day has arrived. Everything is ready for the evening party. As it was the summer holidays, many guests attended the party, and one of them is Goutham’s uncle Jagan, who is a manager in the Biggest M.N.C. All the guests arrived at the party, and there are laughs, happiness, dances, singing, and many more lovely moments. Goutham is enjoying each and every sight of the party. Finally, the moment has come to cut the cake, Goutham’s eyes sparkle as he is blowing the candles. He gave the first piece to his mother, then father, and it went on till Goutham’s face was like a chubby baby elephant. The sight is very adorable. The guests have dinner, and they all went home. It is one of the happiest days in Goutham’s life. Little did Goutham knew that it might be his last.

The next day evening, Goutham has to go to his Uncle Jagan’s house, as his parents are going on a business trip for a couple of days. Goutham is happy as he loves his aunt so much. Goutham is dropped at Jagan’s house, kissed his parents, and waves goodbye. Goutham enters the house, and his aunt hugs him, feeds him dinner, and as it is late, they go to bed early. The next day Jagan takes leave as he has a headache, Goutham’s aunt gives instructions to Jagan on how to take care of Goutham and leaves for work. Goutham sits with his uncle and is playing with his toys. Goutham’s uncle says, “its time to take a bath Goutham, lets go.” Jagan prepares the bathtub with lukewarm water and undresses Goutham and keeps him in the tub.

Now Jagan undresses and enters the tub and starts touching Goutham repeatedly. Goutham is not aware of what is happening with him, he looks around with the eyes of help but couldn’t find a ray of hope. Then Jagan starts kissing Goutham vigorously, it is so extreme that Goutham is breathless. Gotham’s lips start to bleed, and Goutham starts crying in pain, but there are no ears to listen to that. After some time, Jagan stands up and starts exploiting the upper part of Goutham’s body sexually like a monster. Goutham has no clue on what is happening with him. Then Jagan exploits Goutham’s lower half of the body, and Goutham starts bleeding. Even at that sight, Jagan’s monster instinct didn’t stop. He starts hitting the child and has a maniac smile on the face. Jagan warned Goutham that if he going to tell his parents about this, Jagan is going to kill them.

Goutham has no clue that he was sexually abused. The injuries were faked by Jagan saying Goutham hurt himself while playing. After a couple of days, Goutham’s parents come back to pick him up. He is not the same active kid anymore, he is alone most of the time, not the same who used to hug his father or sleep in his mother’s lap. He is suffering from huge Trauma. Summer holidays are complete, and schools reopened. In school, Goutham is standing up involuntarily due to pain. His teachers are always questioning him on the same. He became weaker in studies and sports. The abuse didn’t stop either, it became so worse that Jagan used to bring his friends to abuse Goutham. Goutham tried to convey this to his mom by saying that he is bleeding, Goutham’s mom thought it is due to the heavy consumption of mangoes and stopped him from eating them.

The monsoon has passed, and the paper boat never left the closet, in the same way, that Trauma never left Goutham. Goutham was assaulted for 10 years. Every day he was assaulted, his cat used to come to him and lick all his tears and cuddle with him. The only support the Goutham got is his cat. One day, when Jagan came to assault Goutham, Goutham gathered all the courage he could with the support from his cat. Goutham kicked him and shouted, “NO!” From that day, he was not assaulted.

Even today, Goutham is suffering from Trauma. He gets scared when a person suddenly comes from his back. He cannot talk freely to people, especially strangers, and has very low self-esteem.

According to W.H.O. ( World Health Organisation) Nearly 3 in 4 children – or 300 million children – aged 2–4 years regularly suffer physical punishment and/or psychological violence at the hands of parents and caregivers. One in 5 women and 1 in 13 men report having been sexually abused as a child aged 0-17 years. 120 million girls and young women under 20 years of age have suffered some form of forced sexual contact. I mean, what is wrong with people? It is depressing and very worrisome.

In the end, If you are a parent and if your kid is giving any sort of signals on a particular person, please assure them that you are with them, you will take serious action against the person and take action as well. If you faced sexual abuse as a child or any kind of abuse, my friend, we are all with you. It is not your fault. We are here for you with our open arms to console you and share your pain.

Let us all unite to preserve the innocence of a child and strive hard and make sure a child carries no trauma.

Links For Reference:

W.H.O. on Child maltreatment: https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/child-maltreatment

Roll Number 50

“What do I do now? I didn’t want this shit to happen. But it did. I should have sought out for help in the first place,” Kiran was murmuring to himself.

“Roll number 32!” The teacher called, “Please come and take your progress card.” Madumitha, Kirans’ favourite teacher was giving out progress cards to everyone. Kiran likes Madhumitha not because she teaches Hindi classes very well but because she was the only one in the school to make sure that kids of Kirans’ class eat well daily. Kiran being a kid, doesn’t know that Madhumitha is their class teacher, of course, he knew that she was their Class teacher, but he didn’t know that her job itself is to take care of those kids. So he always felt her warmth. Besides, she had a beautiful smile for which Kiran used to go to school regularly.

But today, Kiran isn’t focusing on Madhumitha; he is just biting his nails, submerged in many questions. “I know my friends are idiots, but they could have at least helped me in writing the exams well. I could have copied and got good marks. Now I don’t know what my marks would be.” Kiran was freaking out.

“Roll number 50! Please come Kiran.” Madhumitha called. For the first time, Kiran was feeling panicked instead of feeling shy as Madhumitha called him. “Kiran, what are these marks? They are declining each time. What is the problem? Ask your parents to come and meet me tomorrow. You are getting ridiculous each day. You have also been misbehaving. Many teachers have complained to me against you. Now take your card and go.” The teacher shouted angrily at Kiran while he stood there, weeping. Kiran took the card and went back to his seat.

“Trrrrring!!” School bell rang, and kids started rushing out from their classes. Kiran wore his school bag and began strolling towards the school bus. He didn’t even say bye to Madhumitha today. He sat inside the bus and kept murmuring to himself, “After all, it’s my mistake that I couldn’t listen to the classes properly. Or I would have written the exam well. How do I tell Mom and Dad about this now?” His stop came, and he stepped out of the bus.

Entering the house, he sees his mom is cooking snacks for him. “Hi, baby! How was your day?” Kirans’ mom, Indu asked. He didn’t answer and walked up to his room. Indu saw Kiran leaving to room sadly. She went to his room and saw Kiran sitting on his bed, crying. “What happened little one? What’s the matter? Don’t cry, my baby. See how your cute puppy eyes became red.” Indu said, wiping his tears. “I got my grades,” he said. “Show me your progress card,” Indu asked. “What are these marks?” she screamed. “Let your dad come.”

Kiran got afraid by her moms’ reaction. He locked his door and didn’t come out of the room. It was 7 in the evening and his dad, Anil, came home. “Hi. Please fresh up and come quickly. We need to talk.” Indu said. “Okay. I will,” said Anil and left. He came back and asked her, “What’s the matter?”

“It’s your kid. He has been getting bad marks continuously. I don’t know what to do with him. Look at this progress,” Indu showed the card to Anil. Anil sighed, “Hmm. Call him.” “Come out here. Your dad is calling you,” Indu shouted at Kirans’ door. Kiran opened the door and went to his dad. “What are these marks? What are you thinking of doing with them? Are they teaching well at school?” Anil asked.

“I am not able to concentrate,” Kiran said. “What did the teacher say?” Anil asked. “She asked you guys to come and visit her. But daddy, please give me one more chance. I will do good this time” Kiran pleaded. “No more discussions. We are coming to meet her tomorrow. Now eat and go to bed,” Anil said. Kiran left to his room, crying without having food and slept with an empty stomach. “Don’t knock his door. Let him be,” Anil said Indu when she went to ask Kiran for dinner.

The next day morning-

“C’mon. Get up and get ready. We are going to your school,” Anil woke up Kiran. Kiran woke up and got ready with a long face. “Kiran, come for breakfast,” Indu called. “I don’t want,” Kiran said in a low voice. “Come. Eat up.” Anil said in a firm voice. Kiran ate the food, and they all left for his school.

“Why do they do this? Am I going to get beaten up? Will they treat me bad now?” There were so many questions in the innocent brain of Kiran. They reached school and met Madhumathi.

“Hello, Ms.Madhumathi. How are you? We are here to speak about Kiran,” Anil said. “Hai. I am good. Yes, please, let’s talk.” Madhumathi said, “I have seen his grades declining by each time. Is he studying at home? We are trying to put full efforts, but he is not picking up.” “I understand. What is he good at then?” Anil asked. “Sorry. But he isn’t good at any subject,” Madhumathi said. “How wonderful! You are a teacher, and you don’t know what he is good at beyond the subjects you grade.” Anil said.

“I am sorry. But we are meant to grade them for only these subjects.” Madhumathi said.

For which Anil said, “We all know it is not just these seven subjects that make a persons’ future. We all have struggled for what we want in our lives because of the lack of awareness in our parents. But with generations, our ideology must also change. I know he is not good at these subjects, but he must be good at something. We don’t send our kids to school for them to get validated consistently and get pressurized but to understand what they are good at and hone their skills for the same. We all have been there already; let’s not get the same situation to our children. I have been hard on him yesterday because I know that education is essential for everyone and he must understand its value. But I want him to do what’s best for him and what he loves. Please understand this.”

A few days later-

“Mom, Dad, I got first prize in story writing!” Kiran came running, screaming in excitement. “Wow. Very nice. Read it out for us,” Indu said. “Yes, sure. I would love to. Here goes the title- We all have been there,” and Kirans’ story continues.

The Shattered Dreams Of Creativity!

From the first single-celled organism to the fully formed adult human, from the amino acids (building blocks of life) to fully developed immune system and a brain, we humans always differentiated from other species with the power of thinking and creativity. We invented fire to keep us warm, to cook and give us light. We discovered many things to make ourselves more and more comfortable and cope with the environment.

The modern age humans discover new things from the initial inventions. As the human brain evolved, we needed more things and became very creative. From the Bronze age to Iron age, there was a radical change in how the modern mind sees the elements and make them look beautiful and sophisticated. From surviving to living, we have had a tremendous journey. If you think how did we become such creative, the answer that rounds up the procedure is “curiosity”. Being curious is what made humans creative.

Coming to the current generation, most of the people lack creativity. According to the recent survey from CROP ( one of the biggest polling firm in the world), 78% of the world population on an average is not creative. They just do the things and get out of it. On a counterpoint, in a survey conducted by HBR ( Harvard Business Review), only 24% of the people are curious about their work. As you can see, the numbers match very close. As people are losing creativity, they are becoming decidedly less creative. So what is killing the curiosity? I believe there are 3 stages where curiosity is killed.

Childhood: The most curious people on the globe are children. Their mind is always curious and has a lot of interest to learn things. Most of the adults get irritated when kids ask different types of questions about the same thing. Imagine a scenario, a mother and a kid are walking home. There is a small mud pond, the kid mind is so curious that it wants to jump in that and have fun. The mother stops the kid from doing it. We do not let kids try simple things and make them curious. In that way, we are killing their curiosity in turn, killing creativity.
Schooling and College: A school is a place where we should preserve the child’s curiosity and innocence to learn. They must be taught ways on how to be creative and how to learn things interestingly. But are children learning that in school? They are just determining to get good grades. They are never grasping things. Parents force their children to get good grades. They monitor them 24/7, literally prohibiting them from doing different things or being creative. Once the school hours are done, extra classes and tuition are killing the interest of child forever. The schools nowadays are literally taking in children and making robots out of them.
Working For an Organisation: 70% of the curiosity is killed during Schooling, the rest 30% is sucked by working for an organisation to earn a living. We are literally working on the same thing created by someone. If you are working for an MNC, it gets worse. The rules are set there, you can never move out of it, and they will never change it. It is like they want you to work like programmed robots. The companies might pay well, but creativity is being sucked out. At this point, people will have no interests or no hobbies. They just wake up, go to the office, work, come home and sleep, and the cycle continues. Forget creativity; it adds extra pressure on individuals to keep up with the ridiculous goals they get. At this point, curiosity completely dies. Imagine a person without curiosity. It’s bizarre and unexplainable.

In the end, if we keep teaching the kids what to think instead of how to think, we don’t need a robot uprising. The kids will turn into robots, and I can assure you, you won’t find any difference.

Links of reference:

CROP on creativity: https://www.crop.ca/en/blog/2017/178/

HRB on curiosity: https://hbr.org/2018/09/curiosity