Educated Idiots

There are educated people.
Then there are overly qualified ones who speak complete bullshit.
They are known as 'educated idiots'.
These are the people that hold the highest position in the office or society and have access to or have used the media in one way or other to voice their opinions.
They may boast of degrees they got from studying in various universities outside the country and its probably their favorite topic of conversation with people least interested in hearing it.
Highly qualified, they are, educated to the point where its unnecessary, that too.
But the thing that they so lack is, common sense or any sort of sensibility when asked of their opinion on any sensitive issues.
 The media people are clever too, they won't go the one wise person who would say the right thing.
Instead they approach the ones they are sure would say something stupid and outrageous and later cover it up by saying their favorite English word that they stumbled upon in the dictionary, 'misquoted'.
Everyone knows what they really mean and it doesn't make any difference whether they change their statement and issue another one.
They know what they are talking makes no sense so they try to cover it up by blaming someone else.
This process follows until the media are themselves bored and find a new topic.
Then it all starts again.
Our country is not the only one where something like this happens, there are various others where its on a completely different level.
Coming back, what really is the problem, for that one has to go really deep.
The root of the problem.
I pretty much blame our education system.
They are responsible for guiding students, instead all they do is force down stuff that's not related or worth learning.
You learn what's in the book and in the exam you are expected to answer the way they taught you, word to word and if you dare write your own interpretation of the answer, they will fail you.
Our whole education system is hell bent on making us learn theories and focus less on practicals and projects that one day every youth in this country seeking a job will know what the job is about but have no knowledge on how to do that job.
Let's say an interviewer has to choose between two people, one who got straight A's in every exam and other who was an average scorer but did a lot of projects, the obvious choice would be the one who did a lot of projects.
While the straight A's student would be wondering why he failed the interview he would soon come to the bitter realization that getting high scores do guarantee you a seat in most prestigious college's in the country, but are totally worthless while seeking a job.
 Take another example.
A young man in his 20's, he's just graduated from one of the top university in US, comes back to India and applies for a job in one of the Fortune 500 companies, he clears the interview and though he doesn't get the position he wanted, he does get a huge paycheck plus some perks. 
In his first day at work or say a week later, he doesn't get to work on some big projects, instead he's busy on some assignments that according to him isn't on his job description.
He goes to complain about it to his boss who shouts an array of abuses that he has by his obvious reaction never heard from his friends or even people who hated him.
Dejected he goes back to his desk and starts questioning his career choice.
He left that company the next day in the hope that some other would let him do what he wants.
It'll probably never happen, but what does he know.
That's reality.
You see, in colleges we all are shown the big picture, but all the sacrifices and hard work that you put to complete that picture is hardly mentioned.
We learn the rules in colleges and at work learn to break them if we ever want to move forward.
I feel the best type of education one gets is when they are working.
Learning on the job is good and plus you are paid for it, who would complain about this type of education.
Here they teach you what is required of you and nothing more or less. 
The stuff you come across while working at times is even new to you and its fun knowing how it functions.
In no way am I criticizing the need of higher education.
For certain jobs and positions that kind of education is a must.
Say, if you want to become a doctor because you like treating wounds, then you can't become one just by reading medical books or books about the human anatomy and start cutting people up.
You'll kill them no matter how much talented you are. 
Another thing is language.
Many years back and even today in this country people feel that if a person is conversing with you in English then he or she is from an high social background or an educated person.
English is the global language.
If you can't speak it then it means you aren't literate or didn't receive enough education.
I think its stupid. 
The whole idea is.
It's like saying that every English speaking person in this planet is intelligent.
To me English is a language, a language used for communicating with others.
Language, in fact any language is supposed to be a means of communication.
What language is not, is a bar to measure your intelligence.
It should never be used that way either.
People who judged others based on that person's linguistic knowledge should really pay a visit to their shrink's cause something is really wrong with them.
There might be highly gifted individuals who can contribute a lot in this world but since they can't speak English don't get much recognition.
Then there are those who despise and ostracize others for speaking in a language that they can't understand.
If someone ever came up to me told me to speak in the language they understand and not the one in which I was conversing them with, I would humbly deny their request and if that leads to them laying a hand on me, I guarantee that it'll be the last time they ever raised their hand or even opened their mouth.
Nobody and I mean nobody has any right to tell me in what language I should talk in.
I speak in the languages that I'm comfortable with.
At home I'm comfortable in talking in Hindi, whereas outside or other places I use English.
Even the locals prefer the language they know rather than other which they have a lesser knowledge of.
Knowing other languages doesn't hurt but that doesn't mean one is supposed to know every language if they wish to travel to other countries or places.
It'll be a really long time when people come to this realization.
Till then one can hope that this country would produce more knowledgeable people and give less importance to those educated idiots. 

What's Luck Got To Do With It?

Life's a gamble and I gamble a lot.
A nice metaphor if you ask me.
Though I'm not even close to be called as gambler, the topic for today does involve gambling a bit.
Luck, a thing most people need and most people think that it is the only thing they need.
Some have good days and some have bad days, but there won't ever be a day where people won't stop cursing their luck or praising it.
Nobody can give a detailed explanation on luck, but they do know that it has to do with certain situations that they chance upon.
Whether you are going for an interview or giving an exam, someone will wish you luck, it has nothing to do with you performing well in the exam or clearing the interview, all it does is give you some hope that you won't fail miserably, obviously the outcome is different but luck plays its part well.
Take flipping coins as an example, you never know which side the coin lands on, but guessing the outcome is what makes it fun.
It can be heads or tails or on those rare occasions the coin lands straight without falling on the head or tail.
You try all the tricks in the bag and still can't figure out what side the coin lands on.
If your luck's good then you'll guess them all or most of them right.
Poker is one of the card games that I like playing online.
I'm not into betting games but poker is fun.
The rules are pretty simple and luck plays the bigger role, in fact take any card game and luck will have a role to play.
You either bet everything and win big or lose everything.
There will be times when you can't stop winning and times when you can't win anything.
If I was given a chance to play poker at a proper casino, I'd never play since anything that involves me putting my money  where there's no guarantee that I'll be able to earn more and a possible chance that I'd lose it all doesn't sit well with me.
Another thing is that, while playing poker in real life, you have to maintain an expressionless face also called the 'poker face' otherwise people will know that you have a good hand and won't bet much.
Luck plays its part from the moment you get the cards till the moment the last card is drawn.
You can go from losing the hand to winning the whole pot or vice versa. 
Another form of luck that isn't known to many but exists is called 'rookie luck'.
I'll explain with this example.
Stock market or you can call it the investor's playground.
You invest your money by buying shares or selling them, whatever dividend you earn is your profit over the money you invested.
Here you wake up in the morning as a millionaire and go to sleep at night completely broke.
Anything can happen, absolutely anything.
There are even people whose job is to speculate whether the market will rise or fall.
Imagine a certain individual whose been investing in the market for more than 20 years, he one day comes across a young fellow whose just out of college and knows absolutely nothing about the stock market and watches as he puts all his earnings that he got from doing part-time jobs into the market and buys some shares of a no name company.
That man may smirk thinking on the mistake that kid committed and goes over to the young man to give some professional advice.
 He has hardly taken a few steps when the market goes up and the company that the young man invested in earns big.
He's shocked and looks again, the company he put the money in doesn't gain much but that young man in that instant has earned more than what he has earned in his whole career as an investor.
The young man didn't knew whether that the market will go up neither did the old investor.
Since it was his first time doing this, we can call it as rookie luck.
First timers, whether it's in guessing games or stock market investments or sports betting have a good chance of winning since they aren't aware of the whole system and just do it as they have a feeling that luck's on their side.
That's rookie luck and it only happens when you're new to those things.
It's a one time phenomenon that's all.
Moving on.
People often confuse luck with fate.
Fate has nothing to do with luck.
Fate is something that is already written and changes by the course of action an individual takes.
Luck is something that follows their fate, if their luck is good then whatever path they chose was best for them otherwise they made a big mistake.
Best way to put it would be like this statement.
Everything that you did today, every action and every step you took has led you to this point where you are reading this statement.
That's your fate, incredible isn't it.
So the final question, what's luck go to do with all this?
Everything. 
You can't escape it but accept that luck plays its part in your life.
Science or religion may have their own theories regarding luck but both are far from the truth.
No one knows how it works, but it does and that's what matters.
That's luck.

Conquering Fear

As I walked into the room lost in my own thoughts, our eyes met.

It was up there in the wall stuck like a sticker out of place.

It made the first move and crawled into hiding.

Me, I shrieked like a little girl and ran, I ran and ran until my feet stopped.

It was a harmless creature which didn't belong in my room.

It knew that as well.

It was a lizard, a house lizard.

Now, most people don't mind these things, even I who doesn't care if a cockroach or a spider passes by, but lizards, they scare me.

My family gets a laugh whenever I spot one of those things in any room.

I fail to see the humor in this.

Its not a child's fear of lizards that I have.

I'll tell you what happens to me when I spot them.

First, I freeze, dropping everything that I'm doing and run as far as I can.

The next thing, my body starts shaking, cold sweat forming over my head, my heart starts beating faster than normal.

I cannot think, I cannot talk, but cower in fear.

They may laugh but once if I ever get a panic attack, it'll wipe the smirk off their faces.

Then I guess they'll take it seriously.

The thing is I am not afraid of other lizards like a chameleon or an iguana.

In fact I don't mind the presence of an house lizard in my room.

I just don't like the way it moves.

Its movement has a faint resemblance to another reptile that I have a phobia of.

Snakes.

The fear of snakes that I have is way bigger than my fear of house lizards.

I get chills even if I look at a picture or drawings of them.

If I ever come across one, I'll faint the moment I see it and might even die without it biting me.

That's why I'm using the term phobia instead of just saying I'm afraid.

Everybody is afraid of something or the other.

Some fear the dark, some fear ghosts and some even fear god.

The last one is completely stupid according to me.

I believe, if you are afraid instead of feeling blessed by the mention of an entity, you cannot call it a god.

Another way to put it is, they are not afraid of god, they are just afraid of the wrath they will face if they do something wrong.

But that's my opinion.

Anyways, fear is something everyone has, if someone comes up to you saying they're not afraid of anything, they're lying or just are yet to come across the thing they fear.

Having something that you are afraid of shows that you are normal human and that's saying something with how weird our world has turned into.

It doesn't makes you a lesser person, all it does is shows that even the toughest among us has something that they are afraid of.

Conquering the thing that you are afraid of starts by accepting what you are afraid of.

Let people mock you and laugh at the thing you are afraid of.

Cause if you see it, you'll realize that they are also afraid of certain trivial things but haven't told anyone.

It's completely okay to be afraid of a lot of things, just make sure your enemy isn't aware of what you fear.

As that day will come when you realize, the thing that you fear so much is all inside your head and like everything, a figment of your imagination.