"Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” - Albert Einstein
One time a young man approached a psychologist and told him that he considers himself unintelligent and foolish. The psychologist asked him the reason for him feeling so. He replied "It's because I don't have anything to say when my colleagues in office discuss sports. I feel like a total fool in front of them." The psychologist smiled and asked him, "Do you care about sports? Is it your area of interest?" The man said, "No, not at all." That's exactly what the psychologist wanted to hear. He told him, "You see, it's not that you are not intelligent - it's only that you are not good in the knowledge of sports because it's not your area of interest. And, when you are around your colleagues who have a lot to say on sports, you feel like you are unintelligent. The only thing you need to do is to give yourself permission to have interests separate than those of your colleagues and give them permission to have interests separate from those of yours."
THE MISTAKE OF GENERALISATION
Just like this young man, we all tend to stretch our behavior and action in one situation and make a generalised statement for ourselves. And most often, this generalisation is always negative and overly critical. This damages our sense of self esteem. We all need to be more kind to ourselves. If we are not kind to ourselves, who else will be? A negative self-esteem does serious damage to our functioning in this world and makes us live a very compromised life. We shouldn't be a compromised version of ourself - we have to be our full version. That's why it is said - our success in life is not dependent on "who we are" but on "who we think we are". If we think and start believing, "we are unintelligent and foolish" than we will surely start behaving in unintelligent and foolish ways which will confirm our initial belief.
One time a young man approached a psychologist and told him that he considers himself unintelligent and foolish. The psychologist asked him the reason for him feeling so. He replied "It's because I don't have anything to say when my colleagues in office discuss sports. I feel like a total fool in front of them." The psychologist smiled and asked him, "Do you care about sports? Is it your area of interest?" The man said, "No, not at all." That's exactly what the psychologist wanted to hear. He told him, "You see, it's not that you are not intelligent - it's only that you are not good in the knowledge of sports because it's not your area of interest. And, when you are around your colleagues who have a lot to say on sports, you feel like you are unintelligent. The only thing you need to do is to give yourself permission to have interests separate than those of your colleagues and give them permission to have interests separate from those of yours."
THE MISTAKE OF GENERALISATION
Just like this young man, we all tend to stretch our behavior and action in one situation and make a generalised statement for ourselves. And most often, this generalisation is always negative and overly critical. This damages our sense of self esteem. We all need to be more kind to ourselves. If we are not kind to ourselves, who else will be? A negative self-esteem does serious damage to our functioning in this world and makes us live a very compromised life. We shouldn't be a compromised version of ourself - we have to be our full version. That's why it is said - our success in life is not dependent on "who we are" but on "who we think we are". If we think and start believing, "we are unintelligent and foolish" than we will surely start behaving in unintelligent and foolish ways which will confirm our initial belief.
THE AREAS OF INTELLIGENCE
What we need to understand is that, we are all born intelligent. There is not a single person who is not intelligent - we just are just intelligent in different areas. Some are intelligent in sports, some in speaking, some in writing, some in marketing, some in cooking and some in cleaning. Some are intelligent in managing, some in gardening, some in business, some in their knowledge of vehicles and some in their knowledge of environment. Some are intelligent in analysing people and events, some in travelling, some in music, some in teaching, some in motivating. Some are intelligent in art and poetry, some in dealing with children and some in politics. Some are intelligent in accounting and math, some in science, some in technology, some in health. These are just a few areas in which we could be intelligent in. The list can go on and on. We just need to find our area of intelligence. We shouldn't let anyone, not even us to convince us that we are unintelligent. We may be unintelligent in some area and that's okay - that's how we are all made. What is more important is to connect to the areas in which we are intelligent rather than those in which we are not.
THE ROLE OF EDUCATION
Education is about helping the student find his or her area of intelligence. It should start with the premise that every student is intelligent and not that every student is unintelligent. Education is not about making someone intelligent but connecting the student to his inborn, natural intelligence. As someone rightly said - "mind is not a vessel to fill but a fire to kindle". Education then, is not about creating a standard mould in which we make every student fit in, but it is about creating a unique, customized mould for each child.
In the Vedic system of gurukul, it was the role of the Guru to identify the strengths and inborn intelligence of the child based on the student's psycho-physical nature and help the child develop it and become an expert in that field. In this way, there is no competition - everyone can experience success in their life. But, when you have one standard way to judge everyone then there is cutthroat competition and cases of failures and depression goes skyrocketing.
THE UNHEALTHY LABELS
Whenever a child shows his or her report card to his or her parents, the parents usually notice the subjects in which the child has scored less rather than noticing the subjects in which the child has scored more. This itself is bad, but worse is to label the child with a negative word such as "unintelligent", "not smart", "dull" or "useless". In this way, unconsciously many parents damage the self-esteem of their ward.
When a child's self-esteem is hurt then there is a lot of behavioral changes because the child now feels useless and foolish. He acts in crazy ways as a fool, now that his parents have confirmed it. For the child, his parents and his teachers are his god's - what they believe about him, he believes too - most often blindly. He reasons, "why will my parents say anything wrong about me - their analysis of me has to be the truth." The parents may do it unintentionally but once the self-esteem of the child is damaged, it remains so for a long time, sometimes till adulthood until he begins to realize the truths. It's so very important that parents or teachers are careful of their choice of words.
Words becomes labels that many times remain permanent ones till that child matures to understand that, he has the power to peel the negative, dis empowering labels and in turn stick positive, empowering labels in his life. Let's not make it difficult on anyone's life, be they our children or anyone we are dealing with. Therefore, the single most important duty of every parent or teacher is to make their child or student feel worthy, intelligent and useful. But, for that they should themselves believe in their child's intelligence.
THE SEARCH FOR INTELLIGENCE
Coming to the practical aspect. How do we find our natural intelligence and our area of strength? Simple. By asking ourselves - "What is the area in which I can work, day and night without a holiday and still not be tired? What is the thing that I truly love doing? Which is the area, in which I will get a score of above 7/10?" Answering these questions can help us identify our area of intelligence. But for all this to happen, we need to first believe in our God given intelligence, we need to believe that we are all born intelligent, we all have a genius within us.
In conclusion let us remember that, we are all born intelligent but if we don't realise our inborn intelligence and awaken it then we will die foolish and that is not very intelligent.
- Achyut Gopal Das
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