Congruity: The Celebrated Robber

Congruity is a smooth and friendly robber who enters your house as an entrepreneur selling a service (a tutorial on how to be cool and fit in the clique). As an unsuspecting host you gladly welcome the guest and sit through the tutorial patiently. You pay for the service by giving up your personal convictions and off he (congruity) goes to hunt for the next unsuspecting culprit. He robs your house (willpower) clean and leaves you with a herd-mentality that sticks with you as long as you want to remain cool.

The good thing (am not sure whether it’s really good) with our society (us) is that we’re really smart. We pride in our ability to remain on top of things. We aren’t intimidated by problems, (though we aren’t proactive in solving them either). So whenever we’re faced with a stubborn problem that’s likely to give us headaches, we tag it with a justification and quickly sweep it under the carpet (that’s smart, right?). For instance, in the case mentioned above, when our kids receive a visit from his highness sir congruity and they’re robbed off their personal convictions in exchange for herd mentality, we lament about the issue and on realizing how deep the mess is, we quickly give the problem a tag ‘peer pressure’ and religiously sweep it under the carpet.

What we fail to realize (refuse to see) is that by sweeping problems under the carpet, we’re actually incubating them and when the time is due and they burst forth, results are usually disastrous.

However, I must commend the efforts of a few change agents who have joined the fight against peer pressure. Thanks to their efforts, a few gems have been salvaged. But my heart goes out to the many who never get a chance to sit under the guidance of peer counselors and those who’re so into herd mentality that lessons of peer counselors don’t make sense.

Herd mentality maims dreams; it saps purpose out of those it controls. Herd mentality pulls schools and organizations down; it derails productivity. It’s the greatest enemy to personal excellence. One thing people need to realize is that the size of a paycheck can be largely determined by their abilities, decisions/resolutions and efforts but no one will ever pay you for being cool. I agree, being cool will give you a feeling of acceptance and belonging and maybe a little *prestige*, but it all ends there. At the end of the day you bare solely the guilt and baggage of your actions and inactions.

Congruity is so enterprising you’ll find him even in the circles of the successful (successful as defined by the naive eye of the society). But if these successful hosts of congruity were to open up, you would only hear stories of how unfulfilled they feel. They ignored the voice of the guide inside of them and instead chose to pursue success along the paths defined by the mob (society). Now their inactions (the persistent personal convictions which they ignored) and their actions (as dictated by the mob) haunt them day and night; fulfillment has become an elusive dream. The bottom line is, congruity will find you wherever you are, and as long as you’re craving to impress your peers and feel cool, your willpower is doomed and so is your life’s purpose.

To overcome herd mentality, understand that you’re an individual and so you should live for yourself and not for someone else. Define yourself; know your strengths and weaknesses. Polish up your strengths and improve on your weaknesses. Visualize your ideal character and work towards achieving it. Know what you live for; what are your goals in life? What is your purpose in life? Are you working towards achieving your goals? Are your goals ethical? It’s important that all your deliberations and resolutions pass the integrity check because your actions whether good or bad will somehow find their way back to you. Last but not least, always listen to your inner voice; and make sure external persuasions are authorized by your inner man before you follow them.