Ambition.
So I stayed in a hostel once, school hostel. These hostels had cleaners. I was, still am, an extrovert. I would speak to the said cleaners. One of them revealed to me, in a plot changing twist, how long she’d been working there. Here’s the raging plot twist, she recognized my mother from here undergraduate years. Note: my mother lived in the same hostel as I was. Let’s put this in perspective, for the entire time my life has been lived including those my mother was learning then dating then marrying my father, all she did day in day out was clean. Clean toilets, showers and floors. In numbers, that is more than 25 years, quarter a century, about three decades.
Now, of this I am certain, few would sign up willingly for this. You may even begin to wonder why someone would willingly spend 25 years and more of their lives doing the same thing much less cleaning yet you struggle with basic chores. Here’s what I know, it can’t be that she wasn’t able to find a way out, I mean 25 + years? Opportunity has to come from somewhere, right? Between 1980’s and 2015 a lot has changed, economies have shifted 3 presidents have come to power, children have been born and died, an opportunity was bound to come down like manna.
So maybe, just maybe, she is happy and content with cleaning for 25 years and would continue till the government forces her out. Just maybe, she likes the job and is okay with civic employment. Just maybe.
Ambition.
More often than not, we are asked to dream and dream big. Reach for the stars, they say. The sky is the limit. I don’t disagree, stretch yourself. But stretch yourself to your limit. Reach, but reach for your stars. The sky is not just the limit, your sky is your limit.
Without use of proverbs, what I say is this; ambition is individual. How I envision spending the rest of my life mustn’t be guided by societal norms of what my ambition should be. Case in point, as a student of Computer Science, coming up with the next big thing, the next Facebook, or the next Operating System, must not necessarily be my biggest goal. I may simply want to work in a cubicle on the 4th floor of a Corporate Company under the Tech department and one day be the Tech Manager.
Don’t get me wrong, I am not encouraging anyone to make their dreams or ambitions smaller, I am saying it is okay to have your ambition, your simple ambition. It doesn’t have to be grand, it doesn’t have to be starting an empire, or building a big corporate. It is okay to want to work for a corporate. It is okay to achieve your dreams, while building other people’s dreams. You mustn’t be selfish.
Imagine with me for a moment, if every other person held the one ambition of starting an empire, no, let’s say building a big corporate industry. How many corporates would be there? And who in the world would work for them if every other person is busy building their own corporate? It is okay to want to be a CEO, or a president, or a Business owner. It is just as okay to want employment, to want to be a Secretary, or a PA or a receptionist, or a government paid doctor. It is okay.
Or maybe it isn’t. But do think about it. I am convinced I am right. All ambitions have validity. When we say all dreams are valid. It doesn’t only apply to those seemingly crazy dreams, it also applies to those simple dreams, those seemingly small dreams. They are all valid.
Ambition.
Am·bi·tion (amˈbiSH(ə)n/)
noun
A strong desire to do or to achieve something, typically requiring determination and hard work
Signed: PseudoDr.
