Are you following your heart or the world?

If there is something that bothers me about the whole “living process”, that would be the formulaic way with which most human beings go about it.

Now, whether this is a by-product of modernity or a matter of fact since the creation of human beings, I do not know.

One thing that I do know however, is how destructive it can be.

I remember a song we used to sing in our childhood.

One of those catchy tunes you sing during physical education as you stand around in a circle. It told a story about a girl and a boy who got to know each other as children, naturally, they became enemies before eventually ending up as friends.

After that they fell in love, got married, birthed children, grew old together, and died.

Even at a young age the tune stank of morbidity to me.

Perhaps I was irked because of the lack of details that make up life, the excitement, the in-betweens. Or perhaps it disturbed me how close to truth those juvenile lyrics really were.

DIFFERENT REALITY

In my 8-4-4 thumping days, I did well enough as a kid raised in that system.

A lot of the time though it struck me how hypocritical it was that a vertical line of ABCDs could inspire a teacher to determine whether your future would be lined with roses, or whether you were destined for failure. I noticed things that made me uncomfortable.

There was this girl who, at the age of 12, was brilliant at complex sudoku.

There was another girl who was a great tactician, able to play games like chess and checkers with people way beyond her age. Another one—this time a boy, had a brain that nobody could quite understand.

He knew all the names and positions of all the ministers in the country, all the names of all the capitals in Africa together with their corresponding nations; and he was an ace at two and three digit multiplication tables, drawing the numbers effortlessly from his mind.

Yet, because he and the others always ranked somewhere at the bottom of the class, our teachers time and time again told them that they would never make it. It broke my heart.

The reality is, we live in a world where being different, while applauded whenever it comes about successfully, is also discouraged at every turning.

We are taught to be risk takers, but nobody openly encourages this unless it means big personal profit.

We are taught to make our own decisions, yet at every corner society openly defies us, taunting us to retreat back into safety.

Steve Jobs, who is lauded as one of the greatest thinkers of the 21st century knows a bit about this.

This great man who grew Apple into the success it is today, whose book we read and biopic we watched; was also a college dropout. Years later in 2005 after he had cemented himself as a success, he was invited to be give the commencement speech at Stanford University.

NETWORKING

This is a quote lifted from that speech; “Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.”

I wish that more people believed in the romanticism behind his words because despite how impossible they seem for some, he made it possible for himself.

As I have matured, I have looked around and acknowledged that some of the formulas the world throws at me have something going for them. Knowledge is power.

Networking will open some doors for you. Stepping out of your comfort zone is healthy. However, some things need to be done away with. For one, the notion that you have only one path ahead of you to make it big.

For another, the belief that your success is only viable if it is measurable by other people’s standards.

As I have learned, the burden of proof that you have made it lies not with the world, but with you, yourself and your God.