Last week my friend and I were enjoying a catch-up lunch — good food and great gossip. Two women sitting next to our table were enjoying the same type of lunch except their gossip was loud enough for everyone to hear. In between mouths of delicious dessert we over heard them discussing the topic of their children. “Did you know ‘B’ failed Hindi again?” said one of the very loud women, “Again?” gasped the other, “Do you think his parents will change schools? Luckily my son is doing well because of the IIT coaching classes, another six years and he can take the IIT entrance,” continued the other mother. At this point, my friend and I had shed all pretences of not listening and stared blatantly when we realized that they were talking about 12 year old children. I wanted to laugh because she sounded as though ‘B’ had committed a blasphemous sin by failing a subject and I was speechless because her 12 year-old son was, in my opinion, losing a childhood to survive adulthood. The ridiculous conversation between the two moms had me questioning. Since when did our society see a misstep in formal education as a slippery slope to failure? Failing a subject was not unfamiliar to me in school, I was constantly failing Hindi, however, I graduated with marks considered good and all was right in the world. From personal experience, I honestly believe those ‘failures’ motivated me to work harder when it mattered. When you know what it means to fail, you also know what it means to succeed. I honestly think that the clichéd phrase- failure is the stepping-stone to success, is true. Isaac Newton is a perfect example to prove my point. When he was in school, failure was a constant companion, fast-forward a few years and his work in science continues to prove to society that failure in formal education is not the end of the world. If a misstep in formal education is considered a misstep in life, Microsoft and John Grisham novels prove otherwise. Competition is fierce in our society — considering our one billion-population mark, however, to consider failure as a weakness is arrogant and ignorant on society’s part. After all, the way Bill Gates and Henry Ford see it — Failure is the tuition you pay for success.
The writer is a self-confessed sitcom addict and a college student