The Cost of Success

Wanting to be respected, admired, wealthy, and successful is not unusual. But having the constant pressure to compete with your peers and sacrifice some of your best years just to end up behind a desk all day?  

Freire mentions that in the "banking" concept of education "The educated individual is the adapted person, because she or he is better "fit" for the world", meaning that this method of education emphasizes how to fit into the world rather than bringing change to the world (Freire, 90). Careerism in college aligns with Freire's words, as it pushes students to meet societal expectations, ignoring their passions and changing themselves to "fit" better into the world. As Isabella Glassman says in her essay, "Pre-professional pressure... is an inescapable part of the current college experience, ... it not only steers out life choices; it also permeates daily life and negatively affects our mental health" (Glassman, 1). Carrying the burden of pursuing careers in respected fields at big-name firms places extreme pressure on the student to the point where it harms the student mentally and emotionally. Living in a continuous cycle where you're constantly competing with your classmates, comparing yourself to others' achievements, and doubting your ability to succeed stresses you out. I believe that college is all about developing social skills, building new experiences, and even taking risks that could potentially result in growth. But if your mind and emotions are in a constant state of stress, worrying about whether you got accepted into the club, the internship, the leadership position, etc., you're not getting the most out of the limited time of privilege available to you in college. In addition, you lose out on the opportunity to feel a diverse range of emotions that you can experience only at this time in life. 

So why are we putting ourselves through all this? We all know that it only going to get harder if we continue on this path, but is it because we know that there will be success that everyone is going to respect and admire at the end of the path? I think that the value of the emotional diversity available at this point in time, and my mental well-being is too expensive to sacrifice it to meet other peoples' expectations. The cost of success is not worth putting in the effort to annihilate my consciousness and live an automated life.