Way to Life

“The only true wisdom is knowing that you know nothing.” Socrates was a wise, virtuous intellect of Athens, Greece, mostly conducting his teachings through dialogue and charging absolutely nothing. He roamed the streets in fifth century, distributing knowledge like flowers, showering his thoughts of simplicity, fragmented by the attar of eternal effect.

Simplicity is virtue. It’s a way of life, essence of thoughts. It’s a lens to view the world, the same lens through which one shall view themselves in mirror every dawn.

In today’s essay, we shall explore the theme of simplicity, what difference it makes, and what lay before and beyond simplicity. At the very end, we shall know the evolution of simplicity, where it has made us stood.

Truly sophisticated legends are always the simple ones, whether in lifestyle or behaviour. What one wears and how they dress up won’t make them stand out in a crowd, but how they carry themselves definitely will. For instance, let’s take an example of Marcus Aurelius, emperor of the people of Rome.From England to Egypt, his word was the law, yet he decided to be a simple philosophical man and live life guided by Stoic philosophy. “Very little is needed to make a happy life. It is all within yourself, in your way of thinking.” Meditations by Aurelius, which were his notes to himself, reveal how a wise and simple man is made when you have all the heavenly distractions around you.

Distraction is the wine made to corrupt man’s simplicity. World offer various types of wines from which no one can inheritently possess an armour. Distractions are intoxicating; they are that wrong GPS that always makes you reach a wrong end , to a place where you don’t belong. And in those cases again, simplicity is that constellation, guiding your ship in the unknown towards your destination.

Destination for colonial India was freedom—to live a life of dignity, marked by national and international respect. To fulfil this scenery of medulla, every single individual of the nation was united under the shade of freedom struggle. “My life is my message.” Mahatma Gandhi emerged out to be the leader of this broad revolution, in his khadi clothes and a wooden stick and a simple yet strong mentality accompanied by support of the greatest freedom fighters, along with the people of India, fought until they were out of breath and out of will. Some died with this glorious dream and others did just by fighting under the umbrella of unity, until the flag of India was waving in the sky high at midnight, as Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru recorded, “At the stroke of midnight hour, as the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom.”

The will to pursue actions through simplicity is rare, yet bold and grandeur. The will to be simple is a road to making a huge difference, lay down paperwork for a change, and leave a lasting mark on people. Swami Vivekananda was a highly enlightened man who regarded the persuasion of simple form of religion. To him, people had made religion unnecessarily complicated, but it was all about serving humanity and not fuel orthodox dogmas. The teachings of this leader are respected internationally—from Kolkata to Chicago. His teachings had no barrier of language or boundary, for his teachings were spiritual in nature and universal in application.

Like teachings of Vivekananda, simplicity is in humane things. One should know that sitting idle without any purpose isn’t what we are talking about ; rather, that is vague and unpleasant. But simplicity is an art about not manipulating things and admiring them as they are. For instance, reflecting back in the essay: Socrates never left any written account and never stepped back from being executed. Marcus Aurelius didn’t exploit his civilians. Mahatma Gandhi didn’t promote nepotism, and Swami Vivekananda never lived a luxurious life. Note to regard is: none were consumed by their vanity. When youth of today ruminate about them, all they see is a life of simplicity and virtue, and that is what makes it so sophisticated and remarkable.

“All men can withstand adversity, but to test the character of a man, give them power.”

We talked recently of how the great leaders were never consumed by their vanity, but indeed there exist examples of a few who did.

Martin Heidegger was a devoted student of Edmund Husserl and even had a dedication to his teacher in his book Being and Time, but unfortunately, being consumed by his own vanity and propaganda of Nazi Germany, and having joined Nazi party, had ruined his relation with his philosophical companion, Edmund Husserl, who was supposedly a Jew. Heidegger, being a “philosopher,” never publicly supported Husserl and even took his position in professional environment. Previously in this essay, we raised a question of what lay before and beyond our core idea, and here we have the answer to it—undiscovered passion and arrogant narcissism.

21st century is no different, not at all. Indeed, it has become even more complicated, resulting in emergence of various cul de sac in which once set a foot, return journey is never an option. Søren Kierkegaard made it compulsory for humanity to choose between ethical life or aesthetic life, and in today’s clock, it is all about aesthetic life—loss of simplicity and emergence of materialistic pleasure. From counterfeit people to counterfeit faces, if not everyone, but majority is living someone else’s life. And way to life through simplicity has become a noise, and no one wants to be just that much limited anymore. They want themselves to look sophisticated through the idea of social media and other influences.

This needs to be curbed because this way of thought process is macabre. It is not what human civilisation has struggled for. History has seen human history divert during the time of Romans, Greeks, and Ottomans. Yet again, we always get back on the track. This has been realised and is emerging as a new century concern, with leaders and organisations placing limitation on influencing media and directing people’s psyche towards universal human values.

Monarchy of Athens offered a cup of hemlock to Socrates because his simple dialectic was becoming a threat to other philosophical beliefs of those times. Socrates was executed and his burial remains unknown till date, but his simple yet sophisticated teachings lived forever, marking him the father of Western intellect and philosophy.