Seeking Footsteps to Hakuna Matata
After many weeks of not having being able to scribble anything, I finally got a full weekend to myself. The leaves on the trees outside the window are gone and the street looks empty, with a little bit of snow here and there. The radio is playing a slow song in the kitchen adding to the calmness of the day and my mind hence I decided to spend some time writing. There have been so many thoughts in my head this past week like everyone else who has been exposed to the media and I couldn’t find a better way to let them out.
It is one of my favorite diversion to introspect what has influenced my thinking and how has it changed over years. There are certain inherent conditions that informs a person’s thinking, beliefs, prejudices, outlook to life and world in general including the upbringing at home, the education given at school, the media and literature around you especially in your adolescent years. However, there are certain tools too that every human being is born with and can be used to change the course of thinking irrespective of these inherent conditions. One of the strongest tools, for example is critical thinking.
In my early adolescent years, I didn’t experience any fundamental prejudices that could have infiltrated my mind. The practice of debate and argument was not discouraged at home which helped in later years of my life to understand human behavior and have an open mind to differences. It also helped develop the reasoning ability to avert the effect of some of the amusing controversy theories that I observed around including conspiracy of external forces against Pakistan in every issue the country was facing; not the least the doctrines advanced by conservative religious scholars in high school.
In the wake of the recent political turbulence between Indian and Pakistan and Trump winning the presidential elections, I tried to keep away from the negativity by attempting to understand the ground realities and not believing everything media puts forth. The practice of questioning before believing worked in the past; however, I feel that that the current affairs made me relatively more cynical and less hopeful for the future. In order to clear my thoughts, I wanted to analyze how can I be mindful and refrain from internalizing the negativity. Here are a few things which I believe could be a way to work around the bitterness.
1: Don’t let your prejudices influence your thinking:
We are all born in an environment which contains misconstrued prejudices about people, places, cultures or belief systems that are different or new to us. In order to cling to our practices and beliefs, we move away from having an open mind to know and enjoy the beauty and differences of others’. This is true for not just conservative societies like Pakistan but also for the western countries.
However, these preconceived differences are voiced louder and with more self-righteousness in the conservative societies. I remember traveling to Islamabad in a bus and meeting a girl on the way, going to the same destiny. We exchanged whereabouts and the conversation started flowing on the topic of hygiene in the public spaces. After a few minutes, I found myself being surprised at the self-righteous attitude towards hygiene in our culture compared to the western countries. This is because she was convinced that westerners do not follow the hygiene protocol in households by letting the dogs inside the houses.
The lack of right sources in the formation of the prejudices plays a huge part in the ignorance and misinformation. This is particularly true for the anti-India prejudices and a wave of blind nationalism in Pakistan and vice versa based on lack of mutual understanding at public level due to an absence of people-to-people exchange.
It’s unfortunate how ignorance and misconstrued reality leads a person away from knowing and respecting the differences and more towards feeding the prejudices further. By attempting to use critical thinking and not letting these prejudices influence our thinking is one answer to overcome them and to get to a more peaceful and happier state of mind.
2: Understand and Introspect:
I believe a lot of human problems can be solved by understanding the problem before jumping to solutions or conclusions. Understanding people, their motives and their fears helps in getting a complete and credible picture which can save one‘s energy spent on useless resentment. Moreover, introspecting about your own reactions by putting yourself in the shoes of the other party also gives a perspective.
Trump’s win in the American elections influenced my thoughts in recent days since it felt that the racism will find legitimacy everywhere and the growing Islamophobia will make it claustrophobic to live on this planet. However, I tried to understand what might be going on, in the minds of those who chose him to be their president. For one thing, the state of fear can motivate actions which cannot be justified logically. Understanding Islamophobia is not very difficult if one sees how radicalism has seeped in the religion be it because of reluctance of religious scholars to see the need to redefine fundamental interpretations or self-interests of different stakeholders who have catalyzed radicalism for their own causes. Whatever the reason is, we have paid a big cost for it inside and outside the country. To deal with the aftermath, we need to understand the impact and the fear caused by it and be vigilant about the work we have to do at home to get rid of intolerance and extremism. As moderate Muslims, we do not like to be grouped as “Terrorists” based on the actions of a few; we must not repeat the same mistake by grouping those who chose to express the fear in a certain way as “racist” or “Islamophobic” no matter how unjustified they are. Instead, the right thing would be to build empathy and understanding like we want others to do with us. That is the only way I see to avoid internalizing the hatred and abhorrence around and be more constructive.
3: Be an engaged individual in whatever capacity:
It’s a natural human condition that we don’t think about the evilness and deplorability of anything to a significant extent until it affects us. We see injustice around us all the time but do not understand the gravity until it’s us who is on the receiving end. We expect things to happen through a divine power fixing our circumstances not recognizing the role we can play on individual level. It is about time that we change that mentality and engage ourselves in whatever capacity to influence the circumstances surrounding us. I come across many people both in Pakistan and abroad who don’t tolerate or respect the choices made by others be it religious, personal or professional. What gives me a little bit hope is that if I engage in my capacity and try to bridge the information gap, I might be able to influence someone’s perspective which might be formed because of misinformation. It gives me hope that if everyone started to play their role on micro-level, we might be able to contain all the ‘isms in the book that are increasingly making the future of this planet a bit bleak every day.
In the end, let peace of mind be our GPS in life and not fear.
