Edited by Oishiki Ganguly
Even though human beings claim to be rational beings, humanity’s history of rationality is rather chequered. On more than one occasion, we have witnessed the agency provided by our complex intelligence working against us. Many of my peers are shocked at the complete ease and lack of action that they see around them; both amongst individuals and larger institutional structures as far as the environment is concerned. Ours is a campus where student activism is alive and kicking. I see many friends who are shocked every year at the apathy the Delhi municipal authorities demonstrate towards the record beating pollution every winter.. Let us consider the example of a person held at gunpoint. In all likelihood, they would immediately make an attempt to scramble for safety. Well functioning instincts are wired that way. The same individual, however, could also be a chain-smoker who knows very well that they are jeopardising their life with every bit of nicotine they consume. In the latter case, their life is dependent upon their reason and prudence and not their instincts. Instincts only kick in when the time available for making a life-saving decision is not even enough for the formation of a thought. When there is time, the intellect takes over and reason gone awry is capable of conjuring delusions of the highest order. This little truth of our individual states reveals much about our collective condition.
In war, in disaster, in emergency, we search for a logic that could explain away the things that befall us. I wonder if the ineffable logic of the terrible occurrences is just this: No individual ever grows from good times. We need to look no further than our own lives to see that. All we want is to be something more than what we currently are, and whatever the road to get there, we take. As I see it, we are attached and dependent on our pain for the growth that we desire. The world that we live in has shaped itself accordingly, and until we find an alternative means of growing, such will be the case.
What has any of this got to do with climate change? Let us take a moment to reflect on what a war or disaster asks of any human being. I begin with a small observation. Without the Second World War or a similar crisis, women’s rights and the rights of coloured people would not have advanced at the pace that they did. Either forcefully or by choice, times of crises ask us to forsake our existence in illusory individualistic bubbles. What in a time of peace is complacent unconsciousness must transform into active participation. In fact, we are always a part of something larger than ourselves but the urgency of impending crisis makes us acutely conscious of our role in a larger structure. And in that heightened awareness, we expand and grow.
In regular life, we do things that fall under the category of daily activities. We buy groceries, cook, drive to places and perform activities that sustain our day-to-day needs. To retain the normalcy of daily life we don’t think of the larger structures that we are a part of,: we don’t actively think of where our food and water comes from. For most of us, these are thoughts that we worry about for a few passing moments or on sleepless nights. The weight of them is too much for us to know the truth and continue a normal way of life. What if we were to grapple with all the small bits of disturbing information that we already know, but have normalised in order to keep our worries at bay? Could we still continue with our normal schedules? If every day we knew exactly the ill quality of the water we drank or the chemical toxins that make their way into our food, felt helpless in the face of the powers that be, could we still delude ourselves into normalcy? We already know of poverty, hunger, sickness, and injustices, and a myriad other things that do not have to be as dismal as they are, and yet continue to be so because they are seen as a part and parcel of our world. If we were to witness the things that we know of closely, know them in all their toxicity, then the feeling of threat and crisis would take over. Our daily interactions and activities will have the shadow of the gunpoint. Our instincts would threaten us into reckless action, instincts that care little for the sanctity of routine existence. And I think there is great potential in this shift, if we can look at the power that it holds.
If we react to crisis with reckless instinct, then we do it as regular animals, without the distinctive quality that makes us human. However, if we choose to grapple with our fear and consciously respond in a creative way, it expands our own spirit and we rise above the fears that limit us. And fear does, always, invariably limit us. I view embracing climate change, political turmoil, and any kind of crisis as a means of raising our own consciousness and breaking the bubble of comfort that protects the normalcy of our life. Not because we have to save the world, but simply because all of us only ever want to live better. And as it so happens, changing oneself is the only way to make an impact in a time of crisis, personal or global. Now more than ever, we as individuals need to realise that each of us has to live in a way that is larger than our lives. This means being conscious at every moment of our lives about the impact that we leave in our wake. And despite the worst of its implications , crisis is an opportunity to raise ourselves to a plane where we live for more than just ourselves. Something within me is convinced that a day will come when we as a collective learn to grow without adversity. Until then, we must open our eyes to the immense potential for consciousness raising held in pain and suffering. The clock is ticking. Soon, it’s not going to be a choice.