Before I first landed on the IIT campus, I thought it would have a really glitzy atmosphere. After all, most professors had PhDs from US universities and would have seen a good life.
But instead, I saw them all moving on bicycles, wearing shabby clothes and chappals. The shabbiness of their dressing was only exceeded by that of the students!
A natural conclusion would be that these academicians didn’t care about worldly possessions and had sort of achieved ‘nirvana.’ But is that true?
It is not that they did not care about ‘owning things’, but the ‘things’ they cared about were the number of papers published, getting research grants, and other academic distinctions.
As simply as they lived, they were not renunciates but their currency was different — it was academic glory and reputation, not money or fashionable clothes.
On the contrary, much later, when I had friends working on Wall Street, their currency was only money (and more money).
For an Instagram influencer, the currency is their follower count. For an entrepreneur, the currency is their startup valuation. For fashion models, their clothes, skin, and looks are the currency.
For my former batchmates in the Civil Services, the currency is power — all they care about is who holds which influential position.
If you put value judgment aside, we all have currencies we obsess over.
And when you get overwhelmed by FOMO and envy, remind yourself that the thing you are obsessing over is like dust for someone else.
We all live in parallel universes and assume that ours is the real one.
– Rajan