Help students #ReleaseThePressure

The mere mention of examinations still induces a panic driven sweat in many of us, regardless of the fact that we may not even be students anymore. Such was the pressure on our minds, the pressure to not fail, to not disappoint. Did we ever try to #ReleaseThePressure?

No we did not. Most of us did not anyway. Through Mirinda #ReleaseThePressure, the brand is sharing the plight of students and how the expectations brought along by examinations lead to deteriorating mental health among children.

Constant comparisons with our classmates, our cousins or siblings, the neighbour’s children, where does it end? Are we not taught that we are all different? How is it so easily forgotten?

We have all been in that place. Been through it all. Suffering under varying degrees of pressure to perform. To deliver what our parents, our relatives, our peers and our teachers expect from us. Nothing escapes their sight, except for the fact that we are suffering.

#ReleaseThePressure intends to do exactly the same, by re-enacting the messages received through letters from a number of children, giving a voice to the unspoken pleas of help, screams of frustration and the mental exhaustion that come with expectations of high marks and stellar performances.

The video was posted on Mirinda India’s YouTube channel on 15th February, 2017 and crossed one million views in a matter of 24 hours, resonating with thousands of viewers.

We understand that the pressure to excel academically stems from our parents’ love for us, the wish to see us succeed and to land lucrative jobs when we grow up, but the line gets blurred over a period of time. The line between motivation and force.

Mirinda #ReleaseThePressure strikes a chord with the student in all of us. Some of us may have teared up a little bit. A message that many of us may have attempted to convey to our parents back when we were in school, but never found the courage to speak up.

Putting forth the anguish of children, #ReleaseThePressure makes a powerful case as one of the most stressful periods in the lives of schoolchildren arrives, the SSC and HSC examinations, with a request for parents to understand that children do give it their all, but the constant demand to prove our worth with report cards has the potential to break their children.

Depression is not a laughing matter, and thousands of students bear the brunt of it each year, struggling to deal with anxiety, nervousness and panic. We have all been students, and may soon be parents too.

Let us break this trend.