“Are we products of our environment or products of our expectations?”

    The question “Are we products of our environment or products of our expectations?” is very deep to understand in the first place. According to me, the explanation of the question is very poetic. People change with time and perceive their point of view toward the world, and the point of view they carry for the rest of their lives is directly affected by what their consciousness chooses. Either it’s the environment that they’ve been around, their peers, their family consequences; or their expectations, expectations with self, and expectations they carry with them. According to me, both of these can be looked at positively and negatively and the way one looks at it decides their fate in life.

    Environment - a setting that heavily impacts the way you lead your life, especially after puberty. I come from India, and I’ve always been taught to be around people who are calm and focused even though I was the exact opposite of it. Now I understand that I was told that because I was a very mischievous kid and I had a lot of complaints from school every week. In class, I was seated far from my friends who were mischievous as well, and with people who didn’t even get off their place until it was recess. It wasn’t so that I couldn’t have a fun school time, it was so that observing the people around me would nurture me to be a little calm and focused on my own business. This also teaches us to keep good people around us when we grow older so that we learn from them and progress in our own lives. If your circle is good and teaches you how to be at the top of your performance in your career/job or whatever your role is, then you keep improving as a person. Your character evolves in a positive direction. Whereas, if you keep neglecting people around you, you will learn to care less for things in your life as well. Eventually, this would lead to a lazy lifestyle. It will all still be fine until there is a need for money, and a neglectful mind with a need for money can only pick the wrong path.

    Expectations - thoughts that are directly proportional to mental stress. I feel like whe
n there is a certain amount of pressure on someone, he/she can perform at their peak. I say that because I’ve seen many people in my life who have come up to where they are today because once in their lives they had nothing but people’s eyes on them. My mother comes from a very humble background. She has two younger brothers and they are both very close to me. When they were grown enough and my mom was in college, my grandmother had open heart surgery. My grandfather had a low-paying government job and all the savings were spent on her surgery. That was a turning point because being a family of five, almost at the poverty line, and having all the savings gone, it was tough for my uncles and mother to study. My mom used to do chores and all the work before going to college. She faced a tough time but all she looked at was that she is the eldest of the family and she is the only one who will graduate in medical, with an above-average paying job. So, she started managing everything accordingly. Same with my elder uncle. He was the man of the family and wanted to become a CA, but the family didn't have enough money to pay for it. Finally, he pursued law. Today, both my uncles and my mom are successful. Not boasting but it’s hard to have a house in The U.S. within 5 years of coming to the country. My mom made it happen. Back home, the family is living a lifestyle they never dreamt of, especially my grandparents. Thus, if a person uses these expectations as a boost, they will perform at the peak in their lives. Whereas if one is buried under the pressure of expectations, they will face tremendous mental trauma.