When Reasoning takes a Backseat

When civilization started, the concept of marriages took place and men were required to take care of women because they were physically less strong, (mark my words- not weaker). Slowly men started thinking they were superior and chaos started happening in society.

Last week, I asked my friend who was chopping fish in the kitchen for frying,”Hey why do you cut the face and the tail of fish before putting it into pan?”

“I don’t know. My mom does it like that.”

“Ask your mom and tell me” I asked her,

Yesterday, when we met, I asked her again.

She told me that her mom learnt it from her grandma. Before I could ask further, she herself told me laughingly, “And my grandma told me that in their times pans used to be shorter, so they had to cut the fishes.”

And slowly it became a ritual.

Likewise, wearing business suits gives a sense of confidence to many but there would be an equal percentage of people who might be comfortable wearing a business suit.

Steve Jobs did not like wearing suits at all. When asked why he was such a suit hater, he replied, “’I am not a suit hater, I just could never think of any good reason for any sane person to wear a suit in the first place.” He even asked, “Exactly what purpose does a suit serve? Why in the world are so many people required to wear a suit to work? Do the clothes make the man or woman in the western world today? Does wearing a tie make us work harder or smarter? Or are we all just lemmings following a standard that we all know make zero sense, but we follow because we are afraid not to?”

There are many more dumb rules in our society. Becoming a doctor or engineer just because everyone is trying to become one is one of them. Thinking that one should go for arrange marriage only is one of them. Doing a job and not starting your business just because everyone in your family has been a service-man, is one of them. Learning Bharat-Natyam and not Ballet or Salsa, just because somebody else thinks you should do it, is one of them.

Do what you want to do and back it up with a sound reason. Don’t do something just because everyone-else is doing it.

As they say, smart make the rules, dumb merely follow them.

And when you make rule, don’t make just because you want to, back it up with a sound reason.

Ask ‘why’?

It might do wonders.

Somebody had said it right- the purpose of life is to find good questions and not always good answers.

Priyaa Arora

http://www.meintheblogosphere.blogspot.in/