Thought Overflow

You know how you keep hearing/ reading about the virtues of being yourself or of being genuine, so much so that it’s one of the biggest clichés ever? Well, read on.

So, the other day, someone in my class said something, which on the surface seemed like a perfectly nice thing to say. Unfortunately, being the way I am, I (over)analysed it. The more I thought about it, the more I realised that what he said was basically just a pretty good cover-up of what he actually meant. I even worked out how each word fit so beautifully into that sentence to make it sound even more perfect.

People do this. People perfect the art of sugar-coating their words, of sounding extremely professional, of putting on a beautiful façade to hide their true opinions of you. In B-school, it’s even more apparent, probably even a little required. I think I’ve mentioned before about how it’s important to ensure that you maintain a good impression amongst your batch-mates, because ultimately, most people come to a premier B-school for two reasons—first, for the brand; and second, for the networking.

Anyway, back to the boy in question. It’s but obvious that he said something, but meant something else. And this is where it becomes extremely important to really be genuine when you say something. You can fool some people sometimes, but you can’t fool all the people all the time. And sooner or later, when people realise that you’re a fake, it ruins all the credibility that you might have built up, even for the right reasons.

Oh, and my apologies to those who thought this post was about the play by Oscar Wilde!