The Paradox of Society

We live in a society where the irrelevant things become relevant and relevant become irrelevant, small things become big and big, small.

As I get older, the concept of society complicates me even more. It never ceases to amaze me just how much of our lives are dedicated to our surroundings, to society. These are the people we either don’t even know or do not care about. Yet, they constitute such a strong institution and have such a big impact on our lives everyday. In the long run, our decisions are influenced by these people, their opinions, thoughts and image of who they think we are.

It is because we care about our ‘image’ and how we appear to others rather than showing who we really are. We all wear masks to hide behind an identity that is meant to define us.

We live half a life, we experience less and we live a conformed life. We live to fulfill a plan and an idea. We are never really allowed to explore things from our own perspective.

The obsession of appearing to be a certain way, to fit into an ideal image, to gain society’s approval is perhaps the most artificial, discomforting and delusional way of living.

It basically means that sub-consciously most of us are living the life of others, the life that satisfies the criteria that has been set for us by others.

But do we have another choice? Most of us just want to fit in. Humans by nature do not want to feel isolated, henceforth, we want to be accepted by the people around us.

So this means that we give them a fair share of control over lives.

We attach value to such trivial things. For example from a young age all of our life choices are informed by what is considered appropriate by societal standards. We are disciplined to make our behaviour seem "normal", to maintain a certain image. Everything is controlled, how much we laugh or how much we cry, even what we say has to be filtered. As we get older, in school we all want to be liked by classmates, so we keep up with the common and cool trends. We dress and talk in a certain way, we choose to listen to certain music and make friends with certain people. We do all of this because we just want to be accepted, to be part of a common group.

Then, as young adults our interaction with others is regulated. The way you address others, the way you talk matters more than the content of what you say.

We judge people by their looks and their words rather than their intentions or their personality. Genuineness means nothing.

We judge success by money and material gains rather than difference someone makes. Ambition and passion have little or no value.

We judge beauty by how expensive our dresses and glamorous our makeup is.

We judge education by the name of the university and the fluency of our English accent

I’m surrounded by a society that tends to give value to the outward, ignoring the inward.

Parents push their kids to pick universities and degrees that will earn them more money rather than encouraging them to follow their dreams.

We judge a person who is quiet and secluded ignoring the struggle he/she may be going through. We forget that their may be a reason why this person is the way they are. We choose to attach value once again only to the obvious, that which is on the surface.

We judge a wedding but how much is spent and how sparkly it is rather than how much love is put in and how genuine it is.

We judge a marriage by the size of the house and number kids rather than the quality of the relationship.

I’m surrounded by paradoxes. I see that people have learned to make a living but not a life. I see we have learned to make houses but not homes. We have learned to make ourselves happy but not feel happy. We have solutions for all our problems but we don’t know the source of our problems. We claim to know everything and everyone but we don’t even know ourselves.

We wait for days, for moments, for outcomes, we wait so long to just start living. We choose moments we want to live and we forget that the beauty of life lies in mystery, in knowing things one at a time.

The beauty of life lies in small things. The small things that can only be felt but not explained. Small things like a kind smile, a beautiful word, a genuine advice, and laughter with a friend, the warmth of a mother’s hug and a child’s innocent heart. It is the small things that make life big.

But we have quantification, a number a standard for everything. Never do we value the abstract, the immeasurable, the different and the confusion.

This is the great paradox of life; we live so hard that we barely live at all. We blame society for everything but we forget that we are society.

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