Ok here is the first post by me and hopefully the first of many if I'm not too lazy. This post is here only because a certain someone has been behind me to write something.
It's amazing how much one learns by just talking to people on a train journey. Every Friday I make a journey to Calicut from Angamaly and on Sunday I make the return trip. In the past two months of travelling I've met so many interesting people and all of them in their own way have taught me something.
I've always wondered whether a formal school education is really necessary to ensure success in life especially in the competitive world we live today. I met this incredible person who spoke five different languages and played chess like a grandmaster. This man had studied only till the 5th grade!!! His English was impeccable, Hindi- flawless, Malayalam- had its flaws but hey still good enough to put some of our TV anchors to shame, Kannada- had to be good since it was his mother tongue and French- learnt during his stay in France where he works as a travelling salesman. Pretty good for a guy who studied till the 5th grade. He spoke intellectually on almost any subject. Very well read and passionate about literature and the arts.
So this left me wondering whether our education system is all warped. We have students who reach the 9th grade and still not sure about what they want in life. I see a total lack of drive in kids today. Well there is a lot of drive when it comes to harassing teachers for higher grades but that's not where their heart should be. They need to give direction to their own lives in a different way and I don't think it is wholly the role of the educators and parents to do that. Some of it needs to come from within too.
It amazes me to see how self absorbed kids are today without a thought for the world around them. Words like empathy, compassion, social service etc are usually met with a "duh" like expression. Schools definitely need to rethink their educational strategies lest we end up producing generation after generation of shallow human beings. Parents need to instill the right values without being too preachy. And of course the students need to give meaning- a very deep meaning -to their lives. This meaning should be their raison d'etre.
Ganesh, the guy I met on the train turned out to be such a good citizen of the world because he was willing to open his mind and learn from what life itself had to offer. His lessons were learnt from the great book of life. The world was essentially his classroom. He regrets the fact that he never completed his school education and could never go to college etc. But he never let that regret get better of him and stop him from doing the things he loves doing. His reason for being was his drive to better himself in spite of all the odds stacked against him.
Children who are lucky enough to complete their formal education need to learn from this life lesson It really doesn't matter if you don't come first in everything you do. It doesn't even matter if you don't score straight A's in every subject. A, B, C, etc are just alphabets not heartbeats. They don't determine the person who you truly are nor do they determine your immense potential. If you are willing to free your mind and look- truly look- at where your life is going those alphabets would remain just that - alphabets . You could still climb every mountain you ever wished to climb if you just have a purpose in what you pursue.
“The difference between school and life? In school, you're taught a lesson and then given a test. In life, you're given a test that teaches you a lesson.” Tom Bodett
