The Illusion of Success: Unraveling Education and Corporate Myths, dare I say Lies!

This week has been a different one. Ramadan has ended and we had a huge Eid celebration for two days with a family and friends. It was wonderful. Everyone got lots of presents and a great sense of achievement. I took four days off work for so I could spend time with the family.

Health wise it is going great but it is difficult. I still haven’t had any sugar, sweets, cakes anything like that even during Eid. It’s very encouraging when our guests who haven’t seen us for a while commented on how much weight I’ve lost and how much better I am looking. This really makes me carry on.

It’s with great sadness. I announce the death of my iMac computer. I’ve had this for 10 years and has been the best computer ever ever had. However, it won’t even turn on now and even though I will take it to the Apple Store to see if they can perform a miracle, I think, it’s the end of the road for this one. I probably won’t get a desktop this time and will go for a MacBook Pro but in reality I won’t really be able to afford this until commissions start coming in from my affiliate marketing business. So I better get on with it! So, this weeks blog comes to you courtesy on my iPad Pro. I’m using a Bluetooth keyboard and track pad with it so it’s like a mini iMac.

For now I would like to mention the education system and the corporate world we live in, where we  have always been promised so much and even though we do benefit from them, ultimately in the end I believe they are in away a trap. By that I mean you are encouraged to go to school, to learn and our parents push us to do well at school to get good grades. With good grades you will get into better schools and do better exams so you can get into a better university so that you can get a better degree that you get you a better job, that will get you a better salary and a better future career. And breathe……..!

You will get a better job with better prospects for promotion so that you can be a manager and be in charge of a big team so you will have a large salary and great benefits with a pension so when you retire (when you’re nearly 70), you can enjoy the little savings you manage to save still paying the huge bills you always did all your life. I think you get my point.

Do I really want to retire at nearly 70 and then enjoy the rest of my life? I might not even be here when I’m 70 and it’s very unlikely. Will my health be so amazing that I’ll be able to do everything that I want to do then?

So I feel a little bit betrayed, deceived and even lied to. But I am grateful that I was able to learn what I have learnt in my life and I am grateful that there is an education system but I think it needs to be reformed drastically. It’s very Victorian, like they used to have for the workhouses. A teacher would stand at the front of the class with rows of desks, with young children. I would even go as far as to say it’s to make us think and behave in a certain way. It’s a way to program them to benefit companies, Banks and the government. Making us dependent on them not able to think freely and frankly, we just become tax collectors for them, they use us to make them rich.

That’s a little bit pessimistic. I hear you ask. It may well be but now I’m 53 and I’ve been through this all I completely believe that. I can’t blame my parents because they came from Pakistan where there was difficulties after the partition of India. Their way out of poverty and to get security was their education. I completely support that and believe that at that time that was the way to progress and become something amazing. I’m not against education, education is the most important thing a human can do learning and developing, what I am against is the man-made controlling systems that they put us into with the false promises of jobs for life, a pension when you retire, healthcare and all this kind of stuff when in reality families are struggling more than ever even with both parents working. Children are missing out on time with their mothers, not seeing their dad while he’s at work and then still not having surplus money at the end of the month for the family to enjoy themselves.

How many people really are able to save a significant amount each month that will make huge differences in their life I would suspect not many. My wife and myself have good paying jobs secure jobs and yet not able to save anything at the moment each month. We used to save quite a lot each month, but the kids were younger and expenses were less, but since Covid the price of everything is so high that we actually don’t save anything each month. In fact sometimes we barely make it through the month, if that’s the state os us what is it like for people that are in a much more difficult position than we are?

So my take on this is education is very important to learn things, concepts to help solve problems and make peoples lives and the world a better place. Corporate and companies are important because they provide salaries for us and also they provide services or products or solutions to people around the world that makes their lives better. It’s underlying sneaky strategies and company politics and favouritism is what I really hate with a passion

I’m just going to talk through some of the educational promises that we are made and also the corporate job security we promised and then talk about the reality of the deception and downsides that we actually experience as we get through the system.

Education and Corporate System Promises

1. A Path to Success: Here is what I feel is the biggest issue, the word success. Success has come to mean promotions, big salaries and being rich. To me true success is having health, wealth, faith, family, and skills that add value to people and fix their problems.

2. Skills for Life: Equipping Students for the Future. At School & University we are often taught things that we are never ever going to use in real life. Why don’t they teach us at school; How to buy a house? how to buy a car? how to save money ? how to build a business ? how to manage your money ? how to fix problems? because they don’t want us to know, they don’t want us to think for ourselves they want conforming robots, not innovative explorers and entrepreneurs!

3. Opportunities Galore: The Promised Land of Higher Education, university; I was very lucky because in those days the UK government would pay the fees. Now it’s £9,000 per year just for the fees. During Covid so many classes were cancelled yet nobody was given any of that money back. It used to be about learning and research and inventing and doing amazing things. These days it feels like a cult environment with strange, social thinking about our existence and changing what we are and who we are rather than building amazing futures for future generations

4. Personal Growth: Nurturing Potential in Learning Environments. There’s no individuality anymore we just fit into groups in a very tribal way like thousands of years ago. You are identified not by your intellect and your abilities but your position in society, who your circle of friends are, colour, religion etc. the human race is most definitely going backwards.

5. Bright Futures: Selling the Dream of Career Prosperity. When you come out of university and become a graduate in a company, you are so excited to learn and change the world and change the future. Unfortunately you realise that it’s all a game and you have to play the system if you want to get anywhere. I’ve seen so many people sucking up to management for selfish personal gain. Yet the company values they talk about; collaboration, teamwork and trust fade, favouritism flourishes throughout corporate land. So you have two choices really about the future; you play the game, suck up to the right people. It’s who you know not what you know and see where you end up. You have to break away from matrix and rat race and take control of your own life and build the future you want for you and your family.

6. Stability and Security: The Allure of a 9-to-5 Career. In the 70s and 80s our parents had what they would call a job for life. Loyalty to the company and from the company. There’s no loyalty either way anymore as employees are looking for more money and better benefits and employers are looking to use less people to do more work for less money.

7. Financial Comfort: Promises of a Steady Income and Benefits. Money in reality is one huge amount removed from your salary each month in various forms of tax. Nothing left to save, expenses are going up but salaries haven’t moved. You get told at your appraisal; that your a fantastic employee, your work is excellent but we’re not going to give you a pay rise, how does that work, do you feel inspired?

8. Career Progression: Climbing the Corporate Ladder to Success. Clamouring to clime the corporate ladder because they think at the top is money, success, respect and a wonderful life. I know friends and family who got there and they’re not happy and they either leave or they change career completely. It’s not career progression we should be chasing its value in life progression.

9. Work-Life Balance: Finding Harmony in Professional and Personal Life. This is something I would say is much better than it used to be and I welcome these changes. Companies are very good now at looking at the well-being of the employees. Whether it’s self development, taking time off to look after family and working from home, all of these things are positive changes I feel, in fact many jobs are going to become permanently working from home. What are your thoughts on that? Let me know in the comments.

10. Pension and Retirement: Assurances for a Comfortable Future. This is where you spend your whole life working like a dog and at the end when you’re old and tired you’re now given that chance to enjoy it. People are retiring younger because they want to get away from the rat race. This is also my plan; to retire my wife and myself in the next few years but how can you do that? Where is the money going to come from? this is one of my biggest reasons for doing affiliate marketing as I believe it is the way my wife can retire,  save money,  charity we wish to do,  get the kids through their education, help Family and achieve the lifestyle that we want.

Deceptions and Downsides

 The following are what millions of people are feeling in the reality of going through the education system and the corporate job system. We are at the mercy of Banks, companies and governments and this is what we end up with.  Read the following 10 points and let me know in the comments which ones of these are you feeling?

1. The Reality Gap: Education’s Disconnect from Industry Needs
2. Student Debt Crisis: The Burden of Loans Amidst Diminished Return
3. Job Market Realities: Unemployment and Underemployment Among Graduates
4. Skills Gap: Degrees Versus Practical Competencies in the Workplace
5. Corporate Burnout: Mental Health Challenges in High-Pressure Environments
6. Lack of Fulfilment: Trading Passion for a Pay-check in Mundane Roles
7. Automation Anxiety: Threats to Job Security in an Evolving Technological Landscape
8. Empty Promises: Broken Career Trajectories and Unfulfilled Expectations
9. Workplace Exploitation: The Reality of Overwork and Under-appreciation
10. Retirement Insecurity: Pension Shortfalls and Financial Uncertainty in Later Life

The 10 reasons above are why you should and everyone should take control of their lives and build a business that they control and they can grow. One where they can choose when they work, where they work, for how long they work and what brings value to many people.

I just want to say that a lot of what I said may sound negative. It’s not intended to. It’s just the reality that I’ve felt in my life, what was promised to me in the education and corporate system in the end is not true. It’s stressful. It gives you an anxiety it gives you sleepless nights, with no savings and some struggle.

So conclusion is that learning and education are very very important and you should always educate yourself and learn new things every single day. There’s nothing wrong with working for other companies but learn from them and then go and do something yourself. I would encourage all young people to start your own businesses do something amazing but still go to college, still go to university, to learn (if you want to but it’s not the only way).

Education, the word that sums up our whole life and existence as human beings. Because all we’ve done from the beginning and all we will do till the end is use that to help people.

Thanks for listening.

Please let me know in the comments any thoughts on what you’ve read here and what you think you’ve learnt and what you think you’ll start to do different. What will you stop doing now and what will you start doing? I’d love to hear from you, so please do leave comments below.

Thank you for reading, I hope it helped you in some way. You are only a few steps behind me!

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Until next time, take care.

Atif

#Atif’s Academy