๐ฃ๐พ๐๐๐๐๐พ๐ฝ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ผ๐บ๐๐๐บ
The way the society has configured our minds to believe that without achieving specific things we have no place among our peers or in the society at large is alarming. it makes us feel the need to race ourselves beyond what is considered ordinary, a crazy race of what to achieve and when. It is something known to almost everyone that in this present generation or era the value and worth of a every human is now measured on the scale of materialism Character and attitude is no longer considered as basic necessities for humans to posses, it has become a secondary value that comes after accumulation of wealth.
It might not have occurred to you but someone out there is looking down on you because you don't seem to matter based on the fact that they believe there are some material possessions you should have obtained. there is a popular adage among my people which says Olowo soro Tanika sope ohun ni idea, Wu idea wo ni Tanika Fe ni What this means in English is that When a wealthy man speaks and the Poor says he/she has no nothing to add or idea, what kind of contribution or idea do you expect a poor man/woman to have This translate to the fact that in the congregation of people, only the wealthy is valued and the poor has no place in it.
This act occur in every sector in the society including social media and web3 platforms such as hive. Have you never experienced a case whereby some celebrity or Whale on hive says something, it doesn't matter if its makes sense or not everyone will be in total acceptance and submission to what he/she has said and anyone who dares to speak, even if the person happens to be the wise one, regardless of the knowledge and wisdom of such person he/she becomes the enemy despite speaking the truth.
Does this not upset you? To be aware that you know so much and have a lot of talent to bring about development in the society but yet you are not acknowledged or given any respect you deserve because you do not belong the the prestigious league of the wealthy. This act of lack of acceptance in the society has forced a lot of youths to commit a lot of dubious atrocities in order to seek societal validation. it is so sad that being human is no longer enough to be acknowledged as being alive.
This materialism pressure created by the society is the reason why most people work so hard to achieve financial stability and independence. sometimes it is not because they don't have enough to feed their families or keep themselves sustained despite the hard economy, but a lot of people still go extra miles to achieve financial stability just to get acknowledged in the society, it has even gotten worse to the stage that some families now consider the wealthy among them as the most important and significant.
It is a known fact that humans are social animals, socialising is our birth right and we deserve to be accepted for who we are but what happens when we get segregated from the society by the society because we are judged by what we have and our possession. is that not not enough to inspire an obsessive behaviour towards achieving financial independence as a result of being so desperate to be accepted as a significant member in the society?
As an individual, I have always been able to plan my day ahead but today something occurred to me or should I say a weird thought crossed my mind. I take a look at the activities I have scheduled for today, those have planned for the days yet to come and those activities I have planned for in the past, they all have something in common. this daily planned routine are filled with a pile of long term and short term goals & objectives to achieve broken down into smaller parts to make it easier to accomplish. that is all there is in all the activities I have planned for now and for the future.
Just goals, plans and that is just it, this got me wondering, is that all there is to my life? is this all have been doing? is there more to life than this specific things I have set out to achieve? if there is more, am I the only one not aware of it? this questions kept bothering me and on my mind, I'm unable to let it go. I had to stay idle for hours just to find a way to sort out some answers that will satisfy my curiosity but no matter how much time I spent pondering about it I couldn't get the kind of answers I was expecting or probably a more direct and simple answer. every other answers that pops up in my mind led to another series of questions and it just went on and on.
I got a little sad for a moment because it dawned on me that I might never be able to find answers to this questions, the funny part is most of this questions have crossed my mind before but I never paid any attention to it because at that moment they just didn't matter or probably because everyone around me also does the same thing.
A friend of mine and a mentor wrote a post months ago about work-life balance this write up gave an analysis on how an individual can achieve a balance life. we all know that when it comes to a human life, there are a lot of things involved but there is a particular activity that takes most of our time, WORK We work all our lives for different reasons but mostly to ensure financial independence or stability. a goal that might take forever to achieve, I know you must be thinking why will it take forever to achieve financial independence/stability?
Financial independence in the simpler sense means having source of income that makes you less or not dependent on others for survival, it is mostly for those who are trying to elevate their status from poor to rich, this is achievable as long as you are able to secure a good paying job and manage your finances but financial stability on the other hand is a little tricky. financial stability simply means ability for an individual to ensure a balanced financial status, it is for the rich and poor but mostly for the rich who are trying so hard not get broke. Now here is how it relates to the topic of discussion.
Financial stability is a continuous process of trying to maintain a financial record/status and one of the ways to ensure that is creating an avenue for passive income and managing your finance vigorously. Knowing how unstable the financial world is anything could happen at any moment which could jeopardise the aim of a person to achieve financial stability and the position of such person in the society. the moment you get carried away by this thought you become a ghost of your self, obsessing over it and forgetting all other important stuffs that matters in life just ensure financial stability.
Getting carried away by this obsessive attitude of what is needed to be achieved seems like a forever journey and to make things worst the world of finance has a longer life span than humans, which means eventually when you are gone your worries will no longer matter all that matters are the memories you left behind, which you might have failed to create due to your obsession over aims and objectives towards earning societal validation, which the society happens to be the greatest advocate of this obsessive attitude.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying being passionate about your aims and objectives is wrong, there is nothing worst than having a life without a purpose but I'm just trying create awareness for how much influence the society has on you which the reason behind your fixation towards your finances. They say life is what happens while we are busy making other plans, to an extent this proves that we have very little control over our lives, so which means we need to make the best out of those things you can actually control instead of being so obsessive about finances.
I have come to realise that, in those daily plans I have set out to achieve, have I really set any time aside for myself, when last did I go out for a break or have a family time, when last did I visit the restaurant to make myself feel good, when last did I meet up with my friends to joke around and smile probably grab a couple of drinks. they say delayed gratification is a necessary sacrifice to achieve extraordinary things but they never mentioned that time has to allies. there will be a time, probably when I have finally achieved all I needed which is not really possible because there is always something to achieve, so I would say probably a time when I have finally found a way to be content with what I have achieved or should I say when I finally get the societal recognition I'm so desperate about, there might be no time to engage in other stuffs.
To an extent, I do not have control over the rate at which the society influences us to be obsessive towards our finance objectives because this effect as been at work before I was born, which means all this while I have been going along with flow like a robot. Our roles in the society seems to be dictated by what we have which I have no say in the matter but I know that even if I am unable to change the perspective of the members of the society, I'm more than capable of reducing the societal pressure on me which is all that matters right now.
This write-up was inspired by weekly featured content titled "Societal pressures" in hive learners community.
