I've always believed that happiness, family, love, respect, satisfaction are my primary motivators. I love to take a sip of coffee, draw and paint at my whims, chat with my Papa early in the morning while reading newspaper, share thoughts with my Mom while strolling on the terrace at night, talking and sharing with my friends and people I love and care for. With all this, I am also passionate for studying, reading new subjects, working hard, being a part of the teams where I can learn, which slowly worked to drag me away from my Engineering into MBA. And then, when I think about the kind of environment I would be in, after MBA, it looks like a mismatch with all that I love.
I then, think about a concept called Impossible Trinity, taught in my most favourite class, and I think Luxury, "Love for life' and Ambition are the three things I cannot achieve simultaneously. It's an impossible trinity and I've to give up one of those whether I want or not. But then, controlling your "love for life" involves several distortions and satisfaction is highly correlated with the other two variables - either in the short run or long run for different people. Theory rejected!
My next thought - Okay, may be I can have a perfect mix of the three; A balanced life with (1/3,1/3,1/3) mix of each of the three variables. This would be something similar to Mixed Nash Equilibrium where you've all the strategies in an appropriate mix which maximizes your happiness. However, game theory assumes people and rational - and that's not true, of all the people even more for me.
Then, I decide not to apply any theory. After all, theories are supposed to make life easier but for me it was getting worse. They are making me think "Have I chosen luxury and ambition after giving up my so dear "love for life" ?".
But, if ambition leads to a work environment that is
energizing, developing, open for new ideas, and well balanced; if ambition is realizing your potential and doing all you can with due dilligence; then ambition it is! Luxury cannot be a motivator in itself and love for life but without ambition is almost meaningless and probably even, unsustainable in the long run.
But, all the combinations of these two, could be or more so "are" phases in a long career, beautiful life and a deep love for life :) :) !!
4 comments:
Amazing Priya! Loved it! :)
Hi Priya, Nice analysis, i must say. I would love to read more about how would you fit this dilemma (or "trilemma" ;))into game theory. Anyways, i came up with a theory that might do justice to your situation. Lets name it "The Rubber band theory". Your happiness is tied to your desires by a rubber band and the irony is that your desires lie at 3 corners of a triangle called life. Whenever, you go towards one, you feel the straining pull from other two. The equilibrium point is the point of contentment. But achieving that point is no cake walk. Till then cherish the little drops of respite. It can be found in, lap of your mom, Bear hug from your dad , sense of proud in your teacher's eyes or even a gossip session with your girlfriends :):):) ciao
@ Jahanvi: Thank you :)
@ Ravi: Superlike for your comment.. :) Yes, I would love to apply more game theory too.. So, next time you happen to meet me in hostel, we're going to piss off my roomies with the game theoretical analysis of this problem :D :P
BTW, the underlying assumption of "The Rubber Band Theory" is that the three vertices of our triangle are not correlated which means that when I go towards one, essentially I am straining others instead of increasing the length of the sides resulting in a new state and a new equilibrium point altogether. This makes my equilibrium point pretty dynamic :O
Very well written and very well analyzed... and the Rubber band theory discussions are awesome.... Excellent
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