Santosh was a good child to his parents. He was good because he scored good marks; he always secured 1st, 2nd or 3rd rank in his school. He was known to most of the teachers in the school. He won awards & was very obedient. He mugged up everything well, remembered it & reproduced it in his exams. He rarely asked his difficulties to teachers which made his teachers too, very happy. He was an ideal obedient student as most of the teachers wanted

Santosh came home once with the report card bearing high rank. When he showed it to his mother, she immediately asked, "Who is the first?

Santosh :Suresh is the first.

Mother: And who is third?

Santosh: Mahesh.

Mother: But that day you said Suresh did not write history paper well! Oh! I am sure he must be taking tuition from Mrs.Leela. But who is the highest in maths?

Santosh : I am .

Mother: In science ?

Santosh: Mahesh.

The conversation continued for some time & ended without taking note of the fact that Santosh had secured second rank. Without appreciating efforts of Santosh the conversation ended with the suggestion ,"I think you must have made some silly mistakes in science paper. Don’t do them next time ." Child may get the message that others’ success is more important for his mother.

After each result similar conversations took place , exam after exams. Whenever Santosh was first, his mother discussed about the subjects in which he was not the highest. How unfortunate this is ?

The scene is not different with most of the rank holders in our society except a few lucky ones.

There are thousands of Santoshes in our surroundings who can neither appreciate others nor enjoy being appreciated by others. They learn to worry about the future & forget to enjoy their successes. The definition of success for them is catastrophic. They feel that success is being able to do what others could or can do. They focus their attention on what others are doing and on what they can not. Exactly the opposite condition is required for happiness. Whatever they may achieve they are not happy, they don’t enjoy their achievements. Hence they may take a mask or a facade of a successful person. When children like Santosh grow ,they may have developed jealousy beyond a dangerous limit. Till they are in their schools they do maintain their ranks but if they get through to get admission to a professional course & in a very good institute then the problems may start. Each student of the class has been in first three or five in his respective school for most of the time, however this can not continue as all of them now are in the same class. Someone has to be tenth ,someone twentieth, someone thirty-fifth. This is simply because all of them can not be in first three & not because of the intellectual difference amongst themselves. Thus ,in the first exam, most of these talented students get the first shock. Stress develops .Some find defenses & adopt to the new situation .They say openly, "What’s the use of gaining knowledge? Even if I just pass ,it would be enough." They try to convince themselves the same internally, mostly in vain .They become under achievers & stop studying seriously. This may be because of the attitudes they have developed. They internally feel ( which they may never show out or even they may be unaware of the internal need & perceptions ) that if one studies he must be at the top or it is useless to study .However there is a conflict on somewhere in the back of their minds . They know that this is wrong , but they are helpless & confusion results .Their self expectation is too high & is focused on being at the top position .Some others decide to work harder but they cannot .Some get frustrated & some even become depressed .The number of students in the last category is not negligible. Slowly they adopt to stress & start enjoying (?)the new situation. However as they ,by now clearly understood & accepted that they cannot be the toppers ,the strong desire may get replaced by the one , to be toppers in society in every field. The desire of course is legitimate but sometimes it becomes a need. This is the dangerous point.

If your friend has got his own PC you may feel insecure .You may feel that you are lagging behind him. Someone else goes to a computer class and knowing this you feel tense. Someone has got Internet connection & you feel that you are falling behind .Someone is closer to your teacher & you feel jealous. Someone answers questions asked by your teacher in the class , someone asks his difficulties freely to his teacher & you feel ashamed of yourself. Someone sits & works in the library for a long time & you are frustrated that you cannot. You may hate this person .The list is probably endless. All these negative feelings have a common irrational assumption that you must be better than someone , that if you cannot do all the things that others do , it is a failure on your part & failure is very bad, catastrophic & unbearable. You are watching many people around .How can one achieve that others (ten to fifteen other persons or at times more) have achieved or can achieve ? Is it not improper to be frustrated, depressed due to your idea of failure & success? It is as silly as wanting to lift one thousand Kg weight as other " ten" people can lift hundred Kg each!

Thus if you have developed an irrational idea that to be successful one should be at the top, & to be worthy one should excel in all the fields of life, you should get rid of this and convert it into rational idea. If you read the idea your immediate reaction would be ," How silly ?All of us know it is wrong or impossible to be at the top forever." But when you start analyzing the incidents which trouble you ,you will be able to identify that the irrational idea is operating in your mental under currents. That’s the fun . You think in one way but you may feel other way. Conscious brain (mind)thinks & subconscious feels.

Apart from irrationality about success & failure you might have developed another irrational idea that ,"If things don’t take place the way one wants them to be ,it is a terrible thing for one to be angry, sad or anxious." Sometimes the way your teacher is teaching, you may not like totally. This may lead to the loss of interest .You may start doing mischief in his class & even may love to be punished. The psychological payoff is that you have taught a lesson to your teacher, or have taken revenge.

Teaching or learning are not isolated processes. Just like redox reactions, one does not teach if no one learns .One may lecture but not teach if learning is absent. Thus teaching learning cycle is protected only if both the important components ,i.e. teacher & learner encourage each other. If students ignore what they don’t like or what they may feel improper without the arousal of negative emotions about what they think improper , & try to extract maximum from a teacher , the teaching -learning process will be more fruitful. Similar responsibility lies with teachers too. Again you may think that whatever I have written is correct but may not feel so when things go against your expectations. You may think that you should ignore what you are disliking but at the same time feel bored & off the teaching-learning cycle.

The efforts to reduce the gap between what you think & what you feel is the first step towards a powerful personality. How? We will see this some other time.

--Dr. B.M. Khadilkar