Know your Adversity Quotient

Has a personal setback or sorrow bumped into you so far in your life? A loved one’s death or a heartbreak or a failure or squabbling in the family?

- NAVNIIT GANDHI

It is impossible to rank sorrows in the order of their painful impact. The pain felt due to the loss of a parent cannot be compared with an experience of ruthless bullying in school/college, but for the bearer the scar might well be equally scary. To have an unemployed or abusive father could be as painful for a growing teenager as the first betrayal in love could be for another.

We have all grown up listening to various quotes, fables, songs, and talks by parents and elders guiding us in various ways that ups and downs are, and shall be inevitable in life. But what about the skills needed to scale these ups and downs? In how many homes, or even in schools, are these skills imparted so that we can handle these adversities better?

Most schools, too, go about stuffing down formulae, calculations, theorems, laws, etc., down our systems, while smirking at the very impracticality of the proposition of imparting life-skills in students so that they can handle adversities better.

Yet, challenges, crises situations and adversities cannot be wished away. No matter how much our parents and teachers, and elders love us, and bless us, we will have to go through our share of the sun and the rain. No one is spared. Yes, life is a mixed bag! What shall pop out of the surprise bag and when and how, no one knows!

Adversity Quotient?