Embracing Discomfort: A Recipe for Fulfilment

New Acropolis Culture Circle recently interviewed Professor Thakur S Powdyel, Bhutan’s first democratically elected Minister of Education (2008-2013). An educator by choice, conviction and passion, he is respected for moving Bhutan towards fulfilling the country’s constitutional mandate for education. As a recipient of numerous international awards such as the Gusi Peace Prize and the Global Education Award,

We speak of difficult jobs, difficult subjects, difficult psychological situations, difficult actions or circumstances, difficult people, difficult times… The list would be endless and we won’t even attempt in such a limited space to complete it or offer a solution for each of these cases. Instead, we would like to focus on the inner attitude of a person who has to face difficulty.

The year was 65 AD, a little less than a hundred years after the assassination of Julius Caesar and the foundation of the Roman Empire. Musonius Rufus, the foremost Stoic philosopher of his times, known by some as the “Roman Socrates”, was accused by emperor Nero to have participated in a conspiracy against him, and was exiled to a tiny and desolate Greek island called Gyaros.

Gyaros was considered a terrible place to be. Fifty years earlier the then emperor Tiberius, who wasn’t known for his charitable nature, refused to send a traitor to exile there, saying it was too harsh and devoid of human culture.

In my younger years, I would often wonder about the idea of enlightenment. There has been a fascination about how I could ever reach a point where my mind would merge into, or become united with, the Cosmic Mind; to acquire, to realise, or to experience, what some might call, the ultimate Truth.

But I was advised: Spiritually elevating yourself is about dropping ideas about the self… it is not about adding or acquiring. On the contrary, it is about knowing what you are NOT. Hence the only way ahead is to Know Thyself. If you seek sincerely, look deeply at your personality’s filters,

Life is a mystery and in mysterious ways, invites us to unravel it. The Truth it guards so protectively is expressed in myriad symbolic forms, some of which have survived over centuries, civilizations, and cultures. For one who is on a philosophical adventure of seeking wisdom, these symbolic forms are a bridge to the hidden Truth, or at least to some aspect of it. One such intriguing form that literally and figuratively conceals the mystery that is man, is a mask.

Last week I tried to catch up with a few friends for dinner, three to be precise. Can you believe we could not find a date when we were all free to meet until almost a month later! My friends work and I’m the only one who doesn’t work. Guess who was the busiest? Yes, you guessed right – me!

So I began to ponder about what it was that kept me so busy, and about the whole concept of busyness in general. We fill our days with tasks, writing them down in digital reminders. We tick them off triumphantly as we complete them, only to periodically add to the list again! So we seem to be on a never ending wheel of chores and busyness.

Does my mind exist outside of me? Who am I really, if not my mind? Many of us have experienced the predicament of almost having a face-off within ourselves, as if there were two people debating within us; one of whom we eventually align with. Sometimes, we’re even surprised to find that our mind seems to have a mind of its own! “I don’t know what came over me,” we say puzzled, “how could I have behaved so out of character?”

Often we find ourselves at the crossroads of various opportunities in life. We celebrate the privilege of having options, and experience a sense of freedom in the ability to choose from among so many possibilities. We feel we are in control of our lives, and decide to retain this freedom as far as possible, without having to commit to any one of the options. Before long, however, we are torn between the many options, each one more alluring than the next. And an inner battle looms, to retain as many options as possible, until the last possible minute.

The Movie The Matrix, released in 1999, and its two sequels (Reloaded and Revolutions), released in 2003, have together been an international phenomena. The first movie in particular, was known as a modern version of Plato’s Myth of the Cave, and the two subsequent parts are of the same universe – the real world and the cave – although further away from Plato’s text. When The Matrix Revolutions was released, it seemed that the dice were rolled. A cycle was complete, and the sun was rising on a world where the cards had been dealt and the rules had apparently changed.

Let us ask ourselves about one of the aspects that is most important for the human beings of our times: what are the different ways of achieving success, of standing out? There is one thing that is indisputable: all human beings, in one way or another, try to stand out, to succeed; it is like a vital necessity. It is the need to do something, but above all, something important; it is the need to act, but to act in a way that does not pass by unnoticed. It is about “being someone”, not disappearing into anonymity, ensuring that our name will be on the lips of the greatest possible number of people.

It is not easy to define youth. Even if we do a lot of research, we will find that different authors throughout time have not been able to agree on an exact definition. Moreover, the concept of youth is so rich and varied in its meanings, so flexible and extraordinary, that it is impossible to find an objective, concrete and synthetic way of defining it.

As philosophers, we have enormous faith in youth and great hope in that future world that we speak about so often and of which we say so many things. We think that, deep down, none of us have ever stopped being young and, for one reason or another, have never stopped having certain anxieties either and, even though those anxieties may be more or less youthful, their roots are to be found in the same problems and in similar circumstances.

Since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, many aspects of the reality that we have been accustomed to, have changed. All at once, reality has become an unstable and inconvenient place to live in. Many of our basic needs for social gathering and human interaction became very limited. This situation had a psychological impact, and emotions such as uncertainty, confusion, anxiety and fear of the future, have been growing dramatically in our society.

When 2020 began, we did not yet know the extent of the difficult times we would have to face. A short time later came the spread of a pandemic, which affected most – if not all – countries in the world, showing that in such cases what we regard as differences do not exist. We are all human beings, we are all vulnerable to sickness and we are all affected by pain.

Human beings are often said to be rational creatures, but in reality we are very much emotional creatures as well. More often than not, history is a showcase of tragic actions taken by human beings overcome by their passions. And apart from these grand-scale dramas, our everyday life is full of instances where the right thing is sacrificed for the sake of the urge, the ego, the instinct.

In great theatrical tragedies, such as the Shakespearean King Lear or Romeo and Juliet, the passionate actions taken by the protagonists lead to an unfortunate chain of events of betrayal and death.

Throughout the ages nature has time and again instilled a sense of awe and wonder within human beings; at her unparalleled beauty, at her mysterious methodology and her enigmatic laws that govern the universe.

The ancient Greek philosophers, specifically the Pre-Socratic philosophers are said to have lived their lives with a deep sense of this mystery. Their deeply rooted understanding of the laws of the universe contributed to their aligning their lives with the path of nature. Plato, as well as the Stoics who followed later, believed all of nature to be an expression of the One – the Divine.