Hyderabad, May 20: Education must attend to all facets of human life. Among the principles of education we need to include the concept that education is an initiation into a life of spirit and a training of the human soul in the pursuit of truth and the practice of virtue.
Every spirit is endowed with values. Only an education that can nourish inbuilt virtues can impart true intelligence.
Awareness of existence, belongingness to the whole creation and commitment to human values in life will help broaden our vision and deepen our roots.
Pluralism and embracing people of all cultures should be part of our education. The multicultural, multi-religious fabric is the glory and beauty of the planet, and that has to be appreciated, acknowledged and celebrated.
If this thought is given to people from a young age, they will love and appreciate the differences. We need to bring about that multicultural and multi-ethnic approach, which in Sanskrit we call ‘Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam’ – the whole world is one family.
The sign of success to me is smile and friendliness; compassion, and willingness to serve each other. I ask children and our youth to take a vow to make one new friend everyday. The second thing is to laugh and let go.
Third is to work together towards a dual goal: to protect our environment, our planet Earth, and to protect human values – compassion, friendliness, cooperation, and a sense of belonging to each other.
This will protect our minds, save our hearts – the soul of the planet.
These human values need to be nurtured so we can have a stress-free, violence-free society.
Right education will cultivate a mind that is free, not obsessed with anything and neither angry about the past nor the future.
Through education that gives our children a broad spectrum of knowledge we can change and unite the hearts and minds of people.
The key is to harness the ancient and be innovative with the modern.
This responsibility we, as global citizens, have to take on ourselves today.
–Agencies