Ignorance breeds monsters to fill up all the vacancies of the soul that are unoccupied by the verities of knowledge. He who accepts that he knows nothing is the wisest of all. We possess two evils of knowledge – ignorance and arrogance. Life carries no meaning, if we cannot live according to ideas we subscribe to. It’s not enough to understand life but to lead a good life is the objective as per Socrates.
Our soul is the ultimate guide. What are we running after? Money and power, which are in itself limited in nature and bound to create conflict. Why don’t we run after that which is unlimited and permanent like knowledge, character, duties, love, kindness. Why do we choose remedy worse than the disease itself? Gone are soul’s which were made of gold and silver. Currently we are left with dead woods – souls made of tin and bronze where appetite dominates.
Taking inspiration from our religious scriptures and Greek societies, time has proved that matter belongs to this world only. Real world, if we see, is more beautiful than the world of illusions. Why do we still prefer to live in dens of ignorance and develop a comfort zone? We are becoming too much ignorant and losing the sight and reasoning of what constitutes true happiness in real sense.
To lead an ideal life envisioned by Plato and Socrates, primary mechanism has to be education. It’s the only remedy to liberate us from crude materialism and brutish selfishness. It will not only inculcate values of selfless duty towards all and provide key to new social order. But also can enable an individual to realize himself and adjust harmoniously to be useful to society.
Teaching unfortunately has become a transaction wherein we are overtly getting consumed. Take for example BYJUS. It has 80 million subscribers, 5.5 million paid subscriber’s and exam oriented learning. Here 6 years old are taught coding. Teachers are selling short cuts to success. Children are reduced to login IDs. There is no scope of emotional, Intellectual and spiritual bond.
Teachers are leveraging with obsession of toxic competition and grades and selling unhealthy practice of private tuitions. There seems to be a total negation of the values of education and this has breaded more ignorant masses and lastly resulted in decay of our societies.
We need to declutter our lives before entering into 2022. We can definitely do this by deep cleaning out thoughts, intentions, desires, by rethinking our priorities and reimagining and by adoring every gift that nature has bestowed us with.
There is a need of moral compunction and ponder over how much of what we own do we actually need? How much of what we own do we actually use? We need to try and embrace the minimalist approach, it will save out time as well as energy.
I understand that the average disposable income has Increased and more spending keeps economy growing. But spending does not necessarily bring joy. Even if it brings ,it’s short lived, what stays is hole in pocket.
Wanting things make us more happier than having them. Such is brutish nature of human endless desires that we like to acquire experiences too.
Going on Holiday and clicking 1000 pictures instead of enjoying the moments. We document too much and forget to cherish. There is desire to acquire and hoard things, memories and experiences.
Before entering into 2022, let’s throw away the grudges and junk the toxic relationships, hatred ,unnecessary desires info dustbin of history. Let’s rethink and shun consumer culture and chase for life long joy and stop ourselves from robbing from humanism and happiness.
Happy new year 2022.
Masroora Jan
Author is a student of Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi and can be reached at janmasroora@gmail.com
