Being Average

I have found out in my twilight years of my 20’s, that I am a little bit like a go – getter, have very little patience for nonsense and slightly workaholic (my significant other can attest to that). I am still working towards my advance degree (which making my hair more grey in colour by the seconds), I could not but to wonder, if I have the courage not to pursue this, would I be comfortable being average? Go to work at 9, go back home around 5, submit work on deadline (never early and seldom late) and gives ideas when and only when needed?

Will I look back in 30 years time, my laid back approach to work and life as a result of a decision I’ve made today was the key to my underachieving but steady and enduring mediocrity? I would bet that I would not die out of hunger (unless 2012 happens) nor will I be in a mansion fit for king (if I ever strike Euromillion jackpot). I probably will be able to pay my mortgages and bills and collect a healthy sum of pension just because I am just too lazy to find other high paying work and go along the ‘natural’ career progression map and yearly increment as if it is a birthright.

So what do you think?

Am I just being plan lazy or overtly modest?

Should I have pushed my limited talents so that I can get to the unimaginable heights? Or is there an assuming dignity in my happy pursuit of laying low on the radar?

I still remember the time that we have report cards or report books that we have to carry home and let our parents read and sign the pages acknowledging the teacher that they have read it. Beside the usual your black/blue or red marks and its associated grade, there was a section where the teacher wrote a psychological assessment on how you were behaving and your interaction with the other kids in your class. If i ever had the pleasure to get ‘lazy’ or ‘pemalas’ on my evaluation, I would take it as a compliment (so I believe) because their criticism would implied that I possessed an equivalent of heroically unfulfilled talent. I wish.

So when people of unassuming appearance with similar CV that can only generate as excitement level of M. Night Shyamalan ‘Lady of the water’ movie tell it my face that they are waiting for the right opportunities to swoop in and steal the limelight with minimal effort. Wow. What a sheer arrogance. And such arrogance can only be afforded by the truly talented.

So you see, I have come to the conclusion that this is a silly, youthful conceited, comic book hero scenario that will never fits well with age. And as the years go by, I have become a firm believer and starts appreciate the nobility and virtue of doing your level best and subsequently, your criteria of what constitutes a hero will change too.