Elusive dreams and feedback loop

Being a career counsellor for the last 25 years, and more recently, a preventive mental health counsellor at IIT Bombay, has given me an opportunity to interact with students very closely. I now realize that even though a large amount of information and advice is available in the public domain students still struggle with heeding the available advice and incorporating it in their daily lives. Seeing students struggle and not fulfil their potential has been a source of great angst for me, as anybody will tell you that we counsellors love to see students around us blossom and flourish (especially after our advice).

I think people (young and old) see the larger goal of fame and success very passionately but somehow the step-by-step ladder that takes a person from dream to an achievement stage remains elusive. Despite all advice about setting SMART goals (Small, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Timely) students get stuck and somehow can’t move forward. This inability to see success very often results in giving up and being overwhelmed by a sense of failure. So year after year I see students in my office who are not thriving and feeling frustrated because of it. They want to achieve “so badly” but have difficulty in working towards it and making their dreams come true.

Feedback Loop

If I had to second guess the reason why people struggle I think one of the reasons would have to do with the feedback loop they have in place for themselves. Most of us have a binary (either or) approach to success. To put it in simple terms, it would mean “pass or fail”.

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