Unlearning & Ignorance

“Don’t let schooling interfere with your education”

Mark Twain

 Many entrepreneurs today who have accomplished phenomenal feats have risen from humble families, with less or no formal education and with innumerable struggles due to the lack of proper financial aid. But, it didn’t stop them from achieving their dreams. Life taught them valuable lessons. When they were left to bite the dust, they kissed the ground where they stood. They started afresh, ready to learn every lesson. They turned darkness into their blackboard and wrote their own destiny. On the other hand, there are people who have fallen from glory because success had infected their minds. They shut themselves down from every possible aspect of life. They had become scholars on the matters of life and there was nothing on this earth that would possibly teach them anything more. Well, they are the ones back to square one learning rhymes of bad times. Getting a Doctorate in Sales & Marketing would never justify being a dick. Being the most decorated officer in your battalion is not enough when you are not even able to respect women. People have come to a realisation that education today would take us nowhere if we do not learn to unlearn.

“Education is what remains after one has forgotten what one has learned in school”

Albert Einstein

When you figure out that the algebraic equations and geometrical theorems wouldn’t really help you achieve your dreams, you will truly discover the true meaning and purpose of education. Unlearning is the hardest part because we have been injected with so much of educational jargons and narcissism that we begin to love who we are, and that’s the most dangerous place to be. Living under an impression that we are “perfect” is the worst kind of an illusion. Not everyone would love to accept their flaws because we are designed to expect more. We would never want an average body; so we hit the gym. We would never want an average motorcycle; so we own a Royal Enfield (on EMI). We would never want to marry an ugly, fat, skinny, hairy, short, tall person. We never wish to settle for the average. We have been programmed to expect perfection and nobody has ever been able to offer a universal definition and work towards it. Perfection forever has been a subjective term and has been coloured differently by those wearing different lenses. Perfection has always been a matter of perspective and it is the most turbulent element of life. While one part of the capitalist world is inclined towards inflicting self-hatred and making you buy things you don’t need, some people have accepted their flaws and have learned from their mistakes – the mistake that they knew the world enough to live a perfect life. They felt that unlearning and ignorance is one and the same. If you ignore what you cannot unlearn, you will eventually unlearn automatically.

“Where ignorance is our master, there is no possibility of real peace”

Dalai Lama

 The corporate world should know that every person working in companies is a human being and they all come with emotional baggage. It is important to “Know” about their likes and dislikes, pet peeves and OCDs. But it is really necessary to know the source of their inspiration. Why is it they wake up every day and feel like coming to work a mundane nine-to-five job? Money is not always the sole motivator. People quit jobs because of people and not because of jobs. People always love to work where they are understood. When the top management becomes ignorant of their team’s capabilities, it is the top management that would topple, and not the team. The team will always find a way to meet each other, either at work premises or outside. To them, working peacefully together is of primary importance than achieving their daily targets. The team can blindly cross every target if they are confident about their knowledge and expertise. If the team doesn’t feel appreciated enough; if the team feel ignored, it is all because the company is just looking at them as slot machines and not human beings.

In short, if you wish to make it big and never fail, you have already failed. If you want to learn and be more knowledgeable, you should possess a strong will to unlearn first. And to conclude, ignoring the emotions would be a cardinal blunder.