The Energy in your Blood

Susmita Saha

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Using energy drinks is a popular practice amongst college students. It is quite common to see caffeinated and slightly crazed teenagers in every part of the world as they try to cope with their course work or are just try to stay awake for yet another session of bingeing.

Soft drink companies like Pepsi and Coca-Cola were the pioneers of the first wave of Energy drinks, in the sense that they marketed themselves as such. But that is not the case today, as soft drinks only have sugar and caffeine in them, or so we think.

Back in those days, one of Coca-Cola’s active ingredients was coca leaves, which happens to be the plant that produces cocaine. It’s other important ingredient was kola leaf which is responsible for caffeine production. Thankfully, cocaine in soft drinks was stopped due to concerns regarding addiction. And after a slew of legal battles concerning the aforementioned cocaine, these soft drink companies were content with being just carbonated sugar water.

But history is boring. Today, Red Bull is the leading company when it comes to trafficking energy to red-eyed adults for just as low as 100 Rupees per can. 

So why do we need the “Extra” energy? What has become so difficult and taxing in our lives that we can’t make do with our normal energy levels?

Why do we have to stay up till 2 AM to get decent marks in all the numerous tests and exams that we have in our academic lives?   

Well, I firmly believe that we have a population problem here. There are so many people in the world and everyone happens to be competing for something or the other. It’s so common to see engineers and doctors popping up in every corner of the country. Hence the competition becomes increasingly high, and thus nothing remains normal anymore and everything has to be extra, even our “energy”.

To be fair though, it’s not so much an expectation problem as it is a population issue. By expectation problem, I mean that the typical Indian society still expects the kids of the new generation to take up those old and safe forms of employment. New kinds of jobs like Social Media Influencers, or Youtubers, or even Activists for that matter are looked down upon. Many of our friends and family would discourage us from taking that path. Instead, they content themselves by pushing us down the long acquainted and familiar or the supposedly ‘safe’ career choice. But the problem is that this path is very busy and also extremely competitive.

Let me take you on a little biology expedition here. Our body functions the way it does because of tonnes and tonnes of different chemicals coursing in our blood, just blending in and working together seamlessly. Some of these hormones are responsible for our moods, our motivations, and even our failures.

So, dopamine is a simple hormone that in high concentrations manages to induce focus, motivation, and increased retention capacity. That generally happens when you read or listen to something exciting or funny. When you truly enjoy whatever activity you are doing. In these situations, we tend to be more creative and responsive, and even pretty imaginative. We tend to retain more and generally become more positive.

Frankly, how many of us feel that way in our day-to-day lives or our academic settings? At least I haven’t felt that way in class for a while. It’s not because our teachers don’t put in effort into educating us, I believe that there are so many of us and so few of them that individual attention just can’t be granted to everyone. And so we just get lost as faces or in the case of the Covid Era, as voices.

Instead, we are filled with the hormone adrenaline, which other than the fight or flight response, also induces anxiety, irritability and is responsible for all our bad decisions. We are so stressed that many of us succumb to mental illnesses and other debilitating diseases. Our human bodies are not equipped and evolved enough to fight these high amounts of stress hormones. 

So how should we deal with these unhealthy tension levels? Take a break once in a while. Reward yourself for completing day-to-day tasks, or maybe just for getting out of bed. 

In the long run, we should have the courage to be able to take on something we truly love and enjoy doing instead of trying to fulfill the expectations that society has for us. At the end of it all, all we want is to be healthy and happy. And you could do that just by taking care of yourself!

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Susmita Saha, a vagabond of sorts, with roots in a lot of cities India and the Gulf, is currently a part of the Chronicle and Credit SIGs at ISTE. She is currently pursuing Chemical Engineering in NITK and spends her time reading up about random financial facts and controversies, and drawing when the occasional burst of creativity strikes.