Divergence

The world is filled with people who will tell you that sanity lies in following the path well known, doing something which has already been done before, this is what we call median human behavior or crudely, herd mentality. Following a herd gives us a sense of security, a belief that we ll reach a place better than the one we are at and that we ll be relatively safe while getting there. Evolution has taught us to mimic our species, this is good in a way but sometimes this leads to a generation of a species which has the exact same traits of its predecessors which really isnt evolution is it?

We as humans are one of the most social species on the planet, and given this fact its really not surprising that we are groomed as individuals to follow a path that our fellow humans have tried and tested time and time again. From the time we are born to the time we kick the bucket, we try to live a life that our society approves, sometimes doing things just so that we are socially accepted and not cast away as pariahs, this is why most of us do the exact same things in our lives.

We goto school, learn things that our society deems right for us, we goto college and select a major that we hope will lead to a successful career, we do this because this is what everyone else does. We get a job, working hard to keep up with our peers, a rat race that most of us remain in till we retire, then we move to a 55+ community in search of something that has evaded us for most of our adult life, peace of mind!

We are taught to live a life that converges onto the median expectations of our society, any divergence is frowned upon and highly discouraged, but once every few decades comes along a person who says to the world, I dont like this script you wrote for me! am gonna flip it! the society obviously thinks that this guy is a nut and a bad influence for the future generations. You would recall Nicolas Copernicus invited the wrath of the catholic church by saying that earth wasnt the center of the universe but revolved around the sun, it was a radical idea backed by his studies but it needed some courage to take on the church and our modern day astronomers thank him for that display of courage.

No one expected an african american senator from Illinois to run for the democratic ticket much less the Oval Office, some even called it a joke. But the senator did run for the democratic ticket, made people believe that change was possible and that a country grappling with the worst recession in a generation can not only survive but thrive, we know he is the president now but who would have bet that 2 years ago?

Mankind owes a lot to such people who have gone against the tide, taken the proverbial road less travelled and showed everyone what one can achieve irrespective of the odds stacked against him. If you are a young person reading this, I encourage you to think differently, to challenge the equillibrium and to break all the rules, you will be frowned upon by everyone around you but rest assured that you will reach the promised land! and will always be hailed as a trailblazer.

This brings me to the end of my second blog, as a parting statement I would just say that: Greatness does not lie in conformity, it lies in divergence from the average. So go ahead diverge from the mean and induce some volatility in your life, I promise you, you wont regret it!

My First Post

So after being told that blogging is a way to tell your story to like minded people, I decided to give it a shot. I am just an ordinary guy working at an extra ordinary place with some extra ordinary people. My work deals a lot with uncertainity prevalent in the world and a way some people try to control that uncertainity by thinking and acting creatively, this is how I found a name for my blog. Volatility is a measure of uncertainity, a chance that what you get in life might be a little divergent from what you expected to get. People are scared of volatility, be it in their personal life or professional life, we all to an extent wish to live a life with little if any divergence from our expectations, but once every few days life decides to throw a curve ball at us all of sudden and expects us to deal with it. Human achievement lies in not eliminating volatility from our lives but using it to create something bigger and better.

Well thats enough writing for my first blog. Hope you now know why I chose my blog name :)