QUIT

Since childhood we are all told that ‘quitting is for the weak’ and that ‘only those who do not quit succeed’. We are consistently encouraged to ‘keep going on’ and ‘finish what we started’. In fact, the aversion towards giving up is a part of our culture. As a result, most of us are conditioned to never give up on things, no matter how unhappy we are and that applies equally in our personal lives and our professional lives.

Choosing a career is one of the most difficult choices one has to make. To find something one is good at and is genuinely interested in and passionate about, in this world filled with hundreds and thousands of choices, is daunting to say the least. People spend years and years of their lives to build a career. They study, write exams and work hard. A lot of blood and sweat goes into the making of a profession or a business. So what happens when realization hits that the chosen career is not your cup of tea or it is not making you happy or both? What should one do? Should they give up or should they keep working at it, trying to improve themselves and putting in efforts to renew interest?

A lot of us would continue and maybe many of us are already in jobs or situations that make us miserable and yet we do not take that one decision of changing paths. Why? Well, to start with, most of us are scared of the future. We are afraid that the other path too might not work for us and we will end up with nothing to show for the years that we toiled. Also, we believe that if we just persevered and stuck onto it, everything will be alright. The fear and the attachment prevent us from taking any radical decisions. After all, change and uncertainty are scary. Come to think of it, in many ways, a wrong career choice is akin to a bad relationship. In our heart we may want to get out of it, but our mind plays the role of the devil’s advocate and overwhelms us with all the practical, worldly and logical reasons as to why continuing would be the best option.

I am not saying that at the slightest sign of failure or obstacles, one should just quit. If your career really makes you happy, content and satisfied, then no mountain should be able to force you to give up. But if that is not the case, then maybe an in-depth analysis is needed to find out which other options are available. The switch, of course, requires a lot of courage and guts. But if that is what feels right, and one will know it in their heart when it is right, then they should go for it. All I am trying to say is let’s not spend any more years of our lives doing things that don’t bring us joy, just because we spent years getting there. Maybe the journey was meant to teach us some things and having learnt those lessons now it is time to move onto something better.

I will end this piece with a quote mentioned by the famous modern monk Jay Shetty in an interview, “Detachment is not that you own nothing. Detachment is that nothing owns you.”