Education

When we say educated people we generally refer people like us who had completed some academics and acquired some university degrees or diplomas. Are we really educated? The so called uneducated are really uneducated with respect to us who are generally considered as educated? What could be the attributes of really educated one?

One of the dictionary meanings of education is “the act or process of imparting or acquiring general knowledge, developing the powers of reasoning and judgment, and generally of preparing oneself or others intellectually for mature life.” This definition may be interpreted according to the idea of the person who is looking for the definition of Education. Here we may try to interpret with respect to the ideology discussed throughout this blog.

When we consider ourselves as educated, we must be living a matured life compared to the so called uneducated. Are we really living a life which is matured than any of so called uneducated person? Probably, we may be living a life of better physical comfort due to the earning power provided by the academic learning we had. If we stripe out the physical comfort from our life, the quality of life which we are living has no difference at all with respect to the quality of life of so called uneducated. We have all the psychological sufferings of so called uneducated person and that person is having all the psychological joy of what we are having. Whatever academic qualifications we acquired are just for earning our livelihood through a profession. Due to the circumstances, the so called uneducated person was unable to learn his profession through a structured way, but such a person also learned some profession and earning the livelihood. Such a person may not be earning as much as we are earning, but that person also learned some profession and earning bread and butter from that profession like us, where we are earning our bread and butter- may be little more, from the profession we learned from schools and universities. Hence classifying a person as educated or uneducated based on academic qualification may not be the right method of classification.

Are we living a matured life due to the education we had? What is a matured life? If we stripe out the physical comfort from the field of education, a matured life may be a life with the understanding of oneself. None of us may be having any understanding of what we are. If we have the slightest understanding of ourselves, the quality of our life must be altogether different from what we are living now – the endless suffering from each and every action of us. We don’t even have the understanding of ourselves to recognize the suffering as we suffer – but much later, suffer on thinking about the suffering! With respect to our ability to understand ourselves, we are much similar to the so called uneducated person. In that case, are we really educated?

Are we any different from so called uneducated person with respect to handling the life situations? – Be it handling our fears, be it handling our desires, be it handling our anger, be it handling our lust. Of course, every one of us handles it differently on outer layer due to the difference in our basic structure. But fundamentally, there is no difference between us and the so called uneducated with respect to handling such life situations. We have fear of life, death, security – exactly same as that of so called uneducated. We get anger when our ego is hurt – we don’t understand our ego, exactly same as the so called uneducated and so on. In that case, are we really educated?

Then, how can we get educated? We can be educated only when we ask questions about each and every aspect of our life and life situations, and find answer for those questions by ourselves. Find answers by ourselves – Not the answer from our parents, teachers, scriptures, Gurus or from anybody else. If the answer is from our parents, it is the answer for the life situation of our parents – not for our life situations. If the answer is from a Guru, it is the life situation of our Guru- not our life situations. If the answer is from a scripture, it is the answer for the life situation of the author of that scripture – not our own life situations. It is we ourselves to educate our selves. The academics are just a means for facilitate this education. Even with out the academics, one can be educated. If we can find answers for our life situations by ourselves, without reference to anybody else or anything else, we will be having at least some understanding about ourselves. This understanding – even the slightest understanding can entirely change our life process. If it happens, we can claim ourselves as educated. But at that stage, we may not be having any need for such claim! – We will be really living a matured life!