Nobler than a Nobel !

What dictates your life choices? Trophies, awards, public recognition? Or a desire to excel, fuelled by passion? Degrees, awards, honours, titles and Who’s Who lists occupy a pre-eminentposition in the Indian psyche. While we prize accolades and flaunt laurels won by Indians, especially those bestowed by foreign hands, we define‘success’in very narrow terms. During a child’s scholastic career, success is synonymous with marks a student obtains. However, even in adulthood, we continue to place a premium on external indices. The number of zeroes in a person’s salary is directly proportional to a person’s status in our social hierarchy.‘Success’in our country is synonymous with public recognition, and, at times, even adulation. By thus paying tribute to achievement, we fail to nurture genuine passions and intrinsicdrives. We motivate children to succeed by conventional standards, but do not necessarily inspire them to excel. Can conditioning stop? From a very early age, we instil childrenwith the notion that how they appear to others is crucial. So, when a test is returned in class, students vie for the book with the highest mark, not to read and learn how the topper framed her answers, but to see if they can haggle with the teacher for an extra half mark. Furthermore, when life-altering decisions are made, we give more emphasis to societal expectationsthan a child’s own proclivities. As a result, many students end up in fields that they are not ideally suited for. All top-performers in Board exams are expected to pursue engineering, medicine or economics regardless of their interests. As these coveted fields lead tojobs with lucrative salaries and high status, society expects all bright children to follow the beaten path. So when Jairam, a topper opted for history, he was derided by his family and friends.“What will you do with a degree in history?”is a question that he heard repeatedly. When Jairam emphatically stated that he wanted to bea professor and pursue research on ancient Dravidian scripts, he was scoffed at. Only when‘knowledge’is tagged with a prestigious award does it merit attention. Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, on his first visit to India after winning the Nobel, remarked thatprior to all the hype and hoopla surrounding the prize,less than 300 people attended his lecture in Chennai. However, following the Nobel buzz, over 3000 people thronged to hear him. The surge in ....interest was not due to a sudden spate of curiosity in science but with a mindset that createsand deifies‘stars’. The media further propagates a culture of glitz and glamour in every domain. Hardly any newspaper or magazine covered Ramakrishnan’s workbefore the Nobel; though after the award, they clamoured for his opinion on matters unrelated to his field of expertise. Predilections vs Prizes When a student asked Ramakrishnan how students could emulate him and win a Nobel for the country, pat came the reply:“That is a wrong question to ask…You can’t go intoscience thinking of a Nobel Prize. You can only go into science because you’re interested in it.”The student’s question points to a cultural climate where inherent proclivities and predilections are sidelined for prestigious prizes. When we overplay anaward, we present a distorted view of what an achievement actually entails. Perseverance and passion, the key ingredients for producing great works, be they in art,science or business, are seldom highlighted. The instant stardom thatan award bestows does not reflect the years of toil—the frustration, angst and sheer hard work—that go into producing a substantive piece of work in any field. In a state of flow In fact, a fixation on medals and trophies dilutes intrinsic motivation, the mostimportant catalyst for doing notable work. Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi coined the term‘flow’to describe themental state where a person is so immersed in an activity that he losestrack of time and a sense of self. A person in a flow state is so absorbed in his work that distracting emotions do not cloud his mind. Flow cannot be achieved if a person is averse to failure. Only when a person fails and is motivatedto try and try again, can flow be attained. In fact, a person in flow does not even think he is failing when a desired resultdoes not emerge, butfeels he is learning. Moreover, flow can be experienced in anyactivity—from gardening to parenting to music toruminating over philosophical conundrums. What matters is that the person is fully engaged in an activitythat is optimally challenging and feels in control of the situation