NOT ALL WHO WANDER ARE LOST

 

       

        Not all who wander are lost…. A purposeful paradox captured by this beautiful poetic line. One may think of wandering as non-purposeful act. But many wanderers are seekers of something that they might not possess. Many get lost in the process while others survive. Some also re-find their self. This essay intends to gradually explore all those dimensions.

Many define wandering as where the eyes see, the legs go. But it will be a narrow view if the wandering is confined to such a physical dimension.

          It in fact extends beyond what eyes could see! Not speaking about the blind, but about our mind. Mind is so powerful that it can take us beyond our vision to the imagination or a step beyond it to the metaphysical world (spiritual experience or journey).

          In general, the wandering is associated with a purpose to find something or to search for something that is lost. But sometimes, wandering itself is to find a purpose. Such wandering is called as self-actualization, something that we think is a spiritual department and not for commoners. If you think so, you might be wrong!

          Self-actualization is something everyone must strive to attain, that is, to find a purpose in life. This can be done by analysing and self-evaluating one’s past to find our strengths and weaknesses and determine what one can do meaningfully in this life. Thus, to do that, wandering becomes necessary.

Where to wander?

          Most of the seekers in the ancient times do go for a physical journey to distant lands to seek understanding of their purpose. They try to find a spiritual guru for guidance. One such example was our national hero Swami Vivekananda, who found his guru in Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, which later led him to give the spiritual call for India to awake!

          Consider the India visit by Steve Jobs before finding Apple. He said that the simplicity and minimalism preached by the Indian philosophy, gave birth to his Apple company.

          But such spiritual travels need not be done physically anymore in this modern-technocratic era. The social media becomes a repository of spiritual knowledge giving us not one, but many online gurus for guidance.

The learning does not need to be through physical preaching, but could be through online seminars, audio-video means, as well as through e-books. One can go through many, if not vast ocean of resources in this online world.

But still, if the compass is lost, the forest turns into a maze.

Might go lost

          Just like a ship left in the middle of a vast ocean without a map, so can be the people who lose themselves in the puzzle posed by the social media jungle.

          The purpose to use the social media is like a compass for the user who sails through. Once that compass is lost, so is the captain! Once upon a time, we started using social media to share our happiness with others by sharing our achievements. But now it turned into an obsession to post content and seek constant validation, thus losing the self in it. Now people plant trees not intending to conserve it, but to post its picture and get likes. Once the seeker of and with purpose, now reduced into merely self-obsessed showpiece!

This takes a catastrophic turn when the validation is attained no more, leading to mental health issues and deterring the quality of life.

But fortunately, this is not the case for all.

Not all go lost

“Captains with compass, sails through the ocean!”.

Everyone who intends to wander must have a moral compass and their purpose mapped. Even if an artist wander on streets for ideas, the morality is the one that lets him/her resist temptations and seek what s/he came for. Similarly in the social media, the self-control acts as a moral compass and the purpose gives one the tunnel vision to look for what is necessary for the self in this ocean rather than what can possibly be attained in random.

One such example is the online education or research. There are free lectures and research papers available from many top universities in the world like MIT, Harvard University, etc. This can help students access content at virtually zero cost. Even the internet is free in India through BharatNet. The wise will voluntarily search for specific video or material rather than letting the algorithm to recommend/decide on behalf.

Similarly, spiritual wandering can also be through online. But the challenge is posed when the Web algorithm markets one specific ideology repeatedly making it more attractive. This increases the chances of getting carried away by such one which may or may not suit the self. The wisdom alone helps one to understand that spirituality is contextual and situational. There is no one-size-fits-all approach as everyone's experience is vivid and different.

This understanding about the spirituality becomes the core for the captains to not get lost in their journey. Such people won’t be carried away by any one ideology but deeply reflect on if that fits their situation well or not. Mahatma Gandhi was one such person who experimented with different value system while wandering, eventually finding what suits him the best, which was ‘Ahimsa’.

Many seekers in India now mimic the same. They seek for information from many sources taking what is useful for them and discarding the rest, as once said by Bruce Lee.

But how much ever these captains sail through successfully to attain self-realization, India cannot become enlightened unless those who were lost are found again!

Find the lost

          To find the lost back, it is necessary to search for them in the place where we lost them and to find what made us lose them.

          When lost physically, a search and rescue team can be sent to the exact location to find the wanderers, like a police complaint or military action could help. But this becomes challenging in the social network world due to its vastness compared to the physical space.

Since a person is carried away by the glitters of social media, the first enemy is the emotions that responds to those glitters. One such emotion, as discussed before is the ‘lust of validation’, or called as the ‘fear of insignificance’. It makes one forget the purpose of self-realization and pulls into a ‘circus of visibility’. Constantly seeking visibility gives subtle time for self-evaluation and discovery. It, in fact, dilutes the mental as well as the physical health of oneself.

Another issue is the click-bait. The random scrolling of content and clicking on random videos is a trap. One must be aware of the difference between curiosity and temptations. Curiosity is something that helps in deeper learning but temptation deviates one from actual content one searched for.

So, there is need for awareness on responsible use of social media. Parents must restrict their children’s screen time, set timers, and switch off recommendations. Meditations must be taught to kids from a young age to channelise their thoughts, control their desires and move towards self-realisation of their goal in life.

Although wandering starts from the eyes and legs, it is the mind that determines if one is lost or not. From music to MNC, education to enlightenment, all of them may have started wandering barefooted, but it was their mind that led them channel their thoughts into action. Their self-control and tunnel vision of purpose made their sail easy. Even the lost one can be found when the click-bait temptations are turned into purposeful curiosity. When we start to seek reforms in our mind and not elsewhere, that is when the wanderers become yogis!  

 Lets me know your perspective on the comment section!

Inspiration for creativity springs from the effort to look for the magical in the mundane

 

The story of a young boy and an apple tree is something that the world remembers, not for the apple which fell on his head, but for his scientific temper that led him to enquire into its reasons. This mundane apple event could be considered the beginning of the renaissance of creativity.

The widely known scientist, Isaac Newton was this young boy who discovered Laws of gravitation from that ordinary apple, highlighting that the creativity arises from the effort to look for unusual things from the usual, i.e. the magical from the mundane.

This essay will explore how creativity arises from ordinary things, how it differs from common thinking, why is it necessary, and how the obstacles for its development could be overcome.

Extraordinary from the ordinary

One can observe many ordinary things throughout the day. But these ordinary things have the potential to become extraordinary when a little thought is invoked to transform them. This little thought may be enough to solve many simple problems that we encounter in our daily life. Consider a chair with one leg slightly broken. This can be fixed by a well-folded paper placed beneath that broken leg.

By a little thought, a paper, which is traditionally used for writing is turned into something that can fix a chair. This illustrates how the magic arises from mundane.

This can also be illustrated by another example. A girl can use her bangles as a geometry tool to draw circles in her mathematics exam. This further reaffirms the presented argument.

A natural question arises in one’s mind after these examples – is the above thinking not the general thinking?

The answer lies in understanding the difference between creativity and general thinking. The general thinking is involved in utilizing a product for the purpose it was designed for. The creativity is involved in both the process of designing the product and utilizing it for reasons other than for which it was designed for.

This can be demonstrated with an example of soda can. The general thinking is invoked when the soda can is used to contain beverages, which is its primary purpose. But the creativity is required to select the best shape among the cylindrical, spherical, and cuboidal soda cans for the optimized output, i.e. for maximum volume at minimum cost of production. The used soda can, when reused as a pen stand is also an example of creativity.

Necessity of creativity

While a pen stand may not be a big necessity, the idea to create that is invaluable. Creativity is the basis for the survival and growth of the humans from turning a stone into a wheel to building rockets carrying humans to space. Consider an IT graduate becoming an IAS officer. Despite having different background, the officer can bring his/her IT skills and tech knowledge on AI (Artificial Intelligence), MIS (Management Information System), Data analysis, etc. to better tackle the challenges in the governance. Thus, can aid in realizing the vision of Digital India through the out-of-box thinking, which is the creativity.

The creativity aids a commoner to lead a sustainable life. A farmer can utilize the dung of cattle as a manure in the agricultural field. This will help reduce the out-of-pocket expenditure of the farmer, thus increasing the income on one hand and maintaining the sustainability of the field on the other.

It can also become a tool for empowerment of women. The Namo Drone Didi program of the government provides the women self-help groups (SHGs) with drones to provide it for rental services to farmers. This not only gives the women financial empowerment, but gives them the skills to operate it thus providing them technological literacy. This affirms that if empowerment is the goal of the government, then the creativity is the path to achieve it.

Further every country’s overall growth is dependent on Research and development (R&D), thus creativity is not an option but a necessity. But despite its significance, it cannot be denied that there exists a demand for creativity in the market.

Reasons for the creativity famine

As mentioned before, creativity is a form of out-of-the-box thinking. But it takes a moment for oneself to think out-of-the-box. That moment is a luxury of time. But unfortunately, the traditional education system seldom gives that moment, i.e. the time to stop and think.

It seems only to make the students race to obtain grades and certificates rather than acting as a transformational tool to shape oneself into skilled thinker. Such race leaves very little room to pause and think, thus letting the transformation, to rarely occur. The certificates may obtain the student a job, but for persisting in that job and excelling in that, transformation becomes necessary. Such transformation requires constant self-reflection through the thought process.

This helps both in the job and in life because the evolving challenges require adaptable methods to tackle them. This shows the significance of the role of creative thinking in achieving such an adaptability.

Thus, the goal of a good education system must be to prepare its citizens to transform themselves into creative thinkers rather than rote learners.

Attaining such an education system needs the rewiring of the traditionally followed colonial education model in most of India. A more flexible curriculum may be suitable for students that might help them control their course choices and the pace at which they finish their courses. This might make the learning more relevant, engaging, and transformational in this new age. The National Education Policy, 2020 is widely considered to have many promising solutions like the above feature including other ones like Academic Bank of Credits, multidisciplinary learning approach, multiple entry and exits, etc. This scheme aims to grow more active thinkers over rote learners, whose role is more relevant in this globalized world than ever before.

Creativity is not a bolt out of blue but a butterfly coming out of a cocoon. From apples to the bangles, paper to the cattle dung, soda cans to stone, every single mundane object could be turned into something magical if it is seen beyond its utility. And such an out-of-box thinking makes creativity different from general thinking. It also becomes necessary for the growth and prosperity of an individual, a society, a country, and the world. But unfortunately, it is lacking in many individuals as the education system has mostly restricted their time to pause and think out-of-box. A strong educational reform can help transform the rote learners into creative thinkers, who can be resilient, adaptive, and can solve the problems posed by this ever complex and interconnected global village. Creativity is not a certificate course, but a thinking skill that tries to reimagine the reality of the mundane into the magic!

Let us keep alive the democracy! Comment your thoughts below.

The Empires of the future will be the empires of the mind

 

            “Mind is mightier than the sword!” The old saying that fits well in the context of what the future empires will be made of. Historically, those powerful nations that dominated had either a powerful army, or navy vessels or nuclear weapons as evident during the world war era. But at present and eventually in the future, it will be the mind that will dominate. But in all the above also, we had a mind that was behind the creation of those tools that led to the pursuit of power, isn’t it? Then, how will the future mind be different from those?

            During those times, a person feels “Eureka moment” while discovering something. And such a discovery intentionally or unintentionally becomes the start of the power conflict. Take in the case of steam engine. Its invention eventually led to the Industrialization which in turn led to colonization. Thus, making a tool for transportation into that of Imperialism.

            But now, the case is different. Most of the inventions are intentional and purposeful. Thus, the process is getting more and more competitive. So, mind requires more processing power and speed. So, recognizing the limitations of the brain capacity of humans, modernized supercomputers named AI comes to aid human.

            Take the case of ChatGPT’s Image creator. Now, it can create an image if you feed in with your specifications in the form of data. But it can also make its own changes. Which means the outcome consists of the inputs of 2 minds – one is of yours and other one is of the AI’s. This is why the future empire will be the empire of mind – let me correct it – empire of “minds”.

           This gives rise to the Data(s) model of livelihood where the people’s data becomes crucial for service delivery. Say for example, you order a pizza online. Your address, phone number and payment details are becoming necessary for the home delivery of the pizza. But is it guaranteed that these data will not be used beyond pizza delivery? Are you sure the right to be erased as part of Article 21 is followed in spirit beyond in letter?

            If you think so, let me remind you about the 2018 Google’s Data leak that exposed the personal data of millions of users. Why would a corporate company have to store all these personal data beyond its primary purpose for which it was collected?

            The answer lies in the customer calls and the personalized Ads you get. Immediately in your browser, a Ad pops up showing “25% Discount for Domino’s Pizza if bought New movie ticket”. This is how the corporates commercialize our private data. This is a form of “Data Imperialism” with which the superpowers like US and emerging superpowers like China tries to dominate the world.

            Those old times, a war was necessary for imposing dominance. Now, a “Blue Whale Challenge” is more than sufficient to manipulate people by controlling their private data as evident in COVID times. If there is another world war, it may more likely be fought with personal data more than bullets and bombs!

            But a coin always has 2 sides and so is the scope of the future minds.

Human-AI Interface

            Despite all the warnings, Ghost stories and fiction thriller narratives about the AI against humans like Terminator series, we cannot deny the opportunities it presents.

            Take in the case of healthcare. The Robotics has aided the Doctors in disease detection, patient-health monitoring and in complex surgeries like cardiac surgery.  The Compassionate nature of humans combined with the Surgical Precision of the robots in treating the patients made the hospitals truly a temple.

            One other such successful Human-AI interface was seen in Education field. In a school in Kerala, classes are taken by regular staffs. But the staffs cannot be with students all the time. Thus comes “Iris” the AI teacher to fill the vacuum by helping students get their doubts cleared anytime.

            This does not end here. The opportunities presented by the Human-AI Interface goes beyond imagination. Who would have thought a Bandicoot Robot would come to rescue the Safai karamcharis from Manual scavenging!

            Further these Interfaces will increase manifolds by the IndiaAI Mission which intends to build an AI empire in India. Thus, the opportunities are nothing short of imagination but it is mandatory to have a handle to wield the sword effectively in a way it does not harm the user.

String the puppet

            In this new era of dual minds, the stringing of the AI is crucial for maximum benefits with minimized harm. But since this age of AI has already begun, a swift action becomes necessary.

            Already Corporates like Google, Meta, X (formerly called twitter) are having Monopoly in the Digital Market and thus dictating the pace of Digital Economy. For example, You-tube algorithms can make you see what makes it profitable. It is important for India to bring key regulations to ensure free and fair market together with ensuring competition. Consumer protection Act, Digital data protection Act, and Competition Act etc. aid in doing so.

            In long-term, these market regulations need to be accompanied by domestic search engine developments like “Quamu”. Further data localization measures to protect the privacy of the users can instill confidence in digitalization.

            To build an empire, the regulations must be accompanied by innovation. This needs critical thinking which can be sparked during school education. In that way, the National Education Policy (2020), Atal tinkering labs and Atal Incubators fosters creativity among students to think beyond rigid curriculum. The one nation one subscription scheme also provides nationwide access research articles and journals thus facilitating high quality research opportunities.

            Inventions may be crucial for building the empire, but such assets need to be protected from misuse to sustain the empire. Securing the Intellectual property rights of the owners is important to foster further scientific temper among the researchers. This is done by GI tags, copyrights, trademarks, etc. and further by curbing Bio-piracy to safeguard the rights of Indigenous people.

            Final thing is to have a robust defense mechanism. Not the army, but the cyber-defense to shield against the cyber-attacks. One potential measure can be to introduce Indian cyber police service (ICPS) as a part of UPSC CSE. This will attract talented cyber-crime specialist into the service with added advantage of reduced cost of training as already they have required specialization in that field.

            This empire of the future will be the one with the mind that will be different from the past consisting of Human-AI Interface. Potential for challenges and threats may not be short of our expectations but it is also equally true that such threats can be effectively domesticated to bring us opportunities. Thus, recognizing that the foundation stone for the future empire has been laid already by the IndiaAI program, we need to build upon that swiftly to attain our goal by 2047 – the Viksit Bharat era.

                Let's discuss. Share your views below!