As we enter this world, we are welcomed as empty shells and mere templates, instead of being guided to unleash what we have brought to the world.
The church wants a tithe payer, the government wants a taxpayer and the school needs someone to indoctrinate.
As a child, you take it for granted that the ones who came before you know what is better and best for you.
However, if by accident, the grace of God, the ancestors or intuition you turn out to be observant, you start noticing society’s fallacies, double standards and hypocrisy.
You realise that if you sometimes felt confused or lost, so could everybody else. You may soon get to realise that the world is just a stage full of different actors, who are selfishly chasing after their interests.
You learn to realise that politicians and people in positions or with roles meant to positively affect the lives of others, may just be like you.
When given such opportunities, they first fend for themselves before anyone else. Why clean outside when your household is dirty?
For some, the opportunity may lead to insatiable greed – so much so that it may become normalised.
Of course, it is good to have realisations.
It is good to start thinking and looking at things critically, but that too has a downside.
This is because the more you get to know, the more you realise there is way more than what you know. In the long run, knowing what you have come to know may slowly become the source of your sadness.
Because you realise that even if you may see through the lies and façade of society, for the most part, there is very little or nothing you can do about it.
This is because at the micro level, it looks as if all is real and what the news tells you is the truth and real, yet at the macro level it is all just a game.
From wars, financial crises and pandemics – they are nothing but fun and games for the 1%.
As if that was not enough, when you look at your experience and sum it all up, you realise that even some things that were meant to be taken as mere parables are actually literally meaningful.
You are told that home is where your heart is – to mean that you are better off at home than anywhere else, or to express longingness.
However, taking it literally has more meaning that your body is actually your home because that is where you live
every half-second of your world life.
Hence, they say that your body is your temple, and should be treated as such.
If it is not treated as such, one may not have peace within, no matter how beautiful the external circumstances may present.
On top of that, contentment and fulfilment are intrinsic, and only the experiencer can experience them, and may not be able to verbalise them.
What is often presented on the outside is just a presentation to meet the insatiable demands and expectations of an even more confused society.
*Karlos The Great
E-mail: karlsimbumusic@gmail.com
Uncommon Sense is published bi-weekly in the New Era newspaper with contributions from Karlos Naimwhaka.