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What books can’t teach
I have realised that one cannot dedicate their entire life to books in the hope of learning everything about the world from them alone. Frankly, a book never taught me how to console a distraught friend or how to mend a beloved person’s broken heart, which I shattered to pieces in a fit of anger. Books can’t teach you how to accept and adapt to new surroundings or how to observe those around you so that you may know them better
It is a justifiable fact that there is perhaps no one who can comprehend the importance of books like a university student. After all, books are precious windows to a future nine to five work life and they also arm us with all the information we need to call ourselves ‘educated’. There are literary societies and book clubs (besides educational institutions) that regard them as priceless treasures. The books available these days cover every topic under the sun and many cover beyond that as well! Meaning, of course, the solar system and the universe.
Trust me when I say that I am a bookworm by all definitions. I rarely spend a day without reading something new and engrossing myself in the latest bestseller. Surely, I shall never forget that deep rooted racism can inflict great damage on the lives of those involved (To kill a mocking bird) or that societies have set stringent rules about everything, even love (The God of small things) and also that sometimes we have to grope through the dark scary tunnel of life to find the light of compassion and acceptance at the end (David Copperfield) etc. These are but a few of the lessons that I have learnt from books and I will probably carry them to my grave.
However, recently I have been questioning myself on whether reading about empathy and humanity is enough. I have realised that one cannot dedicate their entire life to books in the hope of learning everything about the world from them alone. Frankly, a book never taught me how to console a distraught friend or how to mend a beloved person’s broken heart, which I shattered to pieces in a fit of anger. Books can’t teach you how to accept and adapt to new surroundings (I think I hear an Amen from those students who live abroad) or how to observe those around you so that you may know them better. They can’t make you better people as education of the mind is different from enlightenment of the soul.
To do all these things you have to
a) Stop cramming.
b) Put down your pencils.
c) Get out of your study room.
d) Open your eyes and have a look around.
Of course, that is only if you have already prepared for your exams. If not, turn around and step right back in!
The reason as to why I thought I have to pen down my thoughts regarding this matter is because I know there are many students who define their entire sense of being by their academic accomplishments. While these are important they tend to over shadow the overall development of our personalities where developing moral opinions and enhancing social skills are neglected. I think I hear a strong cry of protest from all the party goers. I simply do not consider partying with friends as development of social skills. How skilful do you have to be to be friendly with people you already know and like? The real social skill kicks in when you have to collaborate with people you have nothing in common with for a project which is vital to your career or because some other situation demands it.
One may argue that there are many self-help books to encounter any issue in our daily lives. But I think those books can only take you to a certain extent. They may help you analyse circumstances but in the end you need your own street-smart, well polished experience and sensibilities to get around these hurdles. For instance there are many well read people who admire Jane Austin’s Elizabeth (Pride and Prejudice) for her wit and sagacity but in real life they’d rather choose the beauty pageant contestant and hope she can spell wit. Then there are those who believe in following religious books to the letter forgetting that kindness and humanity to fellow human beings comes first.
Many students of social sciences and statistics study demographics, birth rates, death rates etc. All those precious human lives compressed into insipid, mundane numbers and digits. There are billions of books on botany but not one can smell as good the flowering plants they inform us about. Just like those seemingly gravity defying, wondrous lava lamps which can study all we like in theory but there is nothing like seeing the actual thing in operation.
I don’t mean to demean books. All I want is for all the bookworms to get a dose of the real world around them (besides the dining and bathroom breaks). I have learned many helpful and magnificent things from books but when I evaluate all the lessons that I have been taught in life, the most significant and fulfilling have nothing to do with books.
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