On Societal Expectations
When I was in school, I was indoctrinated to study hard and become a useful member of society, whatever that means. Grades were an indication of how successful you were academically, never mind that it merely reflected your ability to regurgitate information verbatim. No one really questioned this paradigm. It was a given that the top students would go on to university and land high-paying white-collar jobs, while the rest would enter blue-collar trades and manual labour. Education only gave us the knowledge to graduate and become average workers. It never taught us the essential skills we needed for the job market.
I find it amusing that society puts young students on a pedestal, glorifying the achievements of those who scored straight A’s and showering them with scholarships. But the minute they graduate high school, when they finally put one foot into adulthood, society no longer cares for them. It is as if society collectively patted them on the shoulder and said, “Good job, kid. You are on your own now.” Young adults full of youthful optimism cling onto whatever hope society hasn’t extinguished within them. But once they enter the workforce, they are slowly moulded into submission, forced to conform and become another cog in the machine.
Society values those with respectable occupations. It needs doctors to heal the sick, lawyers to navigate the judicial system, teachers to educate the next generation, engineers to design infrastructure and new technology, accountants to balance the chequebooks and businessmen to drive commerce. These types of conventional jobs are coveted for their implied prestige and promise of high income, despite some of them requiring long work hours in high-stress work environments. But what if someone opts out of these jobs and pursues their passion, be it in art, music or writing? Are creative jobs that enrich the human experience through artistic expression any less valuable than normal jobs that keep society chugging along? How much human potential is wasted by incentivising profit at the expense of our innate desire to express our humanity?
In our increasingly atomised society, we value personal achievement over societal wellbeing. The goal of the rat race is to accumulate as much wealth as possible to live comfortably and gain social status to form the necessary connections to get things done. It comes as no surprise that the average person admires the rich and famous, who live decadent lifestyles of unimaginable luxury and are worshipped as aspirational role models. This shallow materialism hides the hideous reality that money and fame are simply poor substitutes for true happiness. As the divide between the haves and have-nots widens, the cracks in the façade are becoming glaringly obvious: more and more people are becoming disillusioned with poor job prospects, stagnant wages and nonexistent intimate relationships.
Most of us just want to fit in with society. We seek approval from others, no matter how superficial and short-lived that approval may be. So we mimic others, copying how they speak, the clothes they wear, the music they listen to and the movies they watch. We follow the latest trends and fashion in the hopes that we are acknowledged for keeping up with the times. All this clout chasing just to attract people’s attention. Personally, I have long given up on these frivolous pursuits. I prefer to keep a low profile and maintain a small circle of friends. The people I connect with the most tend to be genuine and honest with themselves. To the rest of society, I might as well be invisible. And that’s okay.
Many years ago, I came across an image that depicted the stages of life as a conveyor belt. Instead of parts being assembled, it was a bunch of similar-looking people being carried from one stage to the next: from birth to school, from school to work, from work to family, from family to death. But there was a gap in the conveyor belt: someone had escaped, sounding the alarm of the entire factory. I didn’t think too much about the image at the time, but I did fantasise about what would happen if I ever escaped this metaphorical conveyor belt. I’ve followed the pipeline and jumped through all the hoops just to prove my worth as an individual. Yet all I got was a bunch of certificates and trophies that amounted to nothing in the grand scheme of things.
At the end of the day, we are still members of society. But that doesn’t mean that we should succumb to societal pressures. Regardless of what society expects of us, we need to define happiness on our own terms. We are not defined by whatever arbitrary metric society has imposed on us. People will be quick to judge, criticise and condemn us for not conforming to society. But that is just a small price to pay to maintain our sanity and stay true to ourselves.