The moment you start to grow out of your childhood, you quickly realize that the world isn’t perfect. It is not one of rainbows and unicorns that we were all promised as children but a place that also contains lots of rains and pains. That is, I think, the first time in our lives we truly start paying attention to all the different things wrong with the world, small or large.

Yes, of course, our parents teach us about good and evil right from our childhood when we are so little we don’t even know what it means to be good or bad, but the self realization happens later on in life when you start the process of adolescence. Well, at least in my experience that’s what happened.

That is also the first time we really start thinking about all the different ways the wrongs could be made right and the changes that could make the world and the society a much better place for humans to reside. As time passes, we quickly learn that although everyone wants change, most people are not willing to be the change. My friend recently told me an interesting sentence which goes, “Everyone wants to be first to be the second.”

Be The Change

Even though we would all like to believe that we live in a modern day society that is tech savvy, open minded and educated and most importantly, progressive, owing to the fast paced societal evolution during the recent decades, we couldn’t be further from the truth. The fact of the matter is that, even in today’s world, there are all sorts of people with backwards thinking relating to various matters.

Even if a society consists of mostly progressive people, there is something about change that people automatically resist it. Maybe it is because it forces people to dwell into the unknown for a while or maybe its because people are just too lazy in their bubble of familiarity. Whatever is the case, people fight change vehemently.

So, what do you do when you want change but nobody is ready to do it? Well, start with yourself. Most of the times we are not willing to do something if it doesn’t meet society’s expectations, even though we have to sacrifice our desires for it. I say, do it anyways. If you dare to be the change, you will immediately be followed by all those people who didn’t have the guts to do the same.

Overtime, you will have enough momentum that society will have no choice but to accept the change as the new normal. Isn’t that how big revolutions are won? They start out small with very few people fighting for the cause and over a period of time, the group of people becomes too large for the old systems to work anymore and then we see the dawn of a new age.

Living in a country like India, where people are very conservative, I think the youth of this country need to take more of a stand when it comes to bringing about necessary changes in the society. If you are from a western country and you visit India, you will be shocked to see how connected people still are with ancient traditions, superstitions, cultural bias and societal norms.

I really hope to see the day when everyone takes the stand to be the change they want to see. Only then do we have a chance to abolish old, unjust ways of doing things.