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- The prize to fit in has to be paid by not being yourself.
The prize to fit in has to be paid by not being yourself.
Sarvesh Jakati
March 04, 2025
It is no measure of health to be well-adjusted to a profoundly sick society
You’ve made it in life. You’ve won. Yes.
No, you’ve not hit the tick on all your checkboxes,
it's just that there are no checkboxes needed to tick for you to feel alright.
The thing is the list you’ve made, you do not even really-really mean it, it's a list handed by your parents (since they want your future to be secure), society, or whoever and they handed it out to you the list and said “When you tick mark all the boxes on this list, just know you have made it, now you are a success, and now you're worthy of love and respect and if you fail to tick the boxes then you have failed” and might be looked down upon.
Now why would you want to be praised by these people?
Is their respect or insult of any significance to you?
Do you really need validation from these people? Do you need their permission to let you be yourself? will you sacrifice your individuality to this crowd who clearly doesn't give a fuck about your well-being but is obsessed with the image to maintain in this violent society. Violence need not be physical, there are layers to it. It could be emotional and psychological too.
Relatives pressure you to marry since it is the “right age” to do so.
Family and peers make you feel guilty for not wanting to have kids.
Weird ass advertisements sell you products by saying how others are having fun while you are missing out. And many subtle ways in which we are taken away from ourselves so that we be a part of a certain group and feel safe and secure.
The prize to fit in has to be paid by not being yourself.
What upsets me is people throwing away their lives just to tick boxes so that they don't feel left out.
There's no audience to perform to, You owe an answer to no one but yourself. You owe an apology to no one but yourself. Don't cheat yourself. You might lie to the whole world but at least be honest to yourself. Don't bury your voice. Don't do what doesn't feel right. Don't sacrifice your intelligence for acceptance, respect, or comfort. Because In the silence of the night, your choices will haunt you.
Be responsible for your life. It’s YOUR life.
There's this quote I like which I would like to throw on your face. Don’t dodge it. Let it hit you.
Take the responsibility into your own hands, it is your life. So do whatsoever you like to do, ant never do anything that you don't like to do. If you have to suffer for it, suffer, but don't do it; do only that which you enjoy. If you have to suffer for it, suffer for it. One has to pay the price for everything; nothing is free in life. Then that is the price.
If you enjoy something and the whole world condemns it, good! let them condemn. You accept that consequence because you like it so much, it is worth it. If you don't like a thing and the whole world says beautiful' it is meaningless, because you will never enjoy your life. It is your life - and who knows? tomorrow you may die. So enjoy it while you are alive!
It is nobody else's business - neither the parents nor the society's nor anybody else's. It is your life.
And when you die the society will continue, so don't bother about the society.
When you die, only you die - nobody dies in your place. Your death will be absolutely individual. Death proves only one thing, that each individual is individual. And death is going to be yours, so how can life be of somebody else? You cannot live a borrowed life; you have to live your own life.