Dr Sudhirendar Sharma
New year resolutions are about doing ‘something’ which is different and better compared to the previous years. Isn’t it? But my new year resolution has been to do ‘nothing’ because I have been made to believe that ‘nothing’ (alone) succeeds like ‘success’. Since I have yet to hear anything on the contrary, I’ve no reason to doubt that ‘nothing’ will finally ‘succeed’.Said Oscar Wilde, to do nothing at all is the most difficult thing in the world, the most difficult and the most intellectual.
Ever since the industrial revolution, when the work ethic as we know it was formed, people desirous of doing ‘nothing’ have been ridiculed as freeloaders, good-for-nothings, loafers and loungers. To avoid being ridiculed, every somebody ends up doing ‘something’ as if doing ‘nothing’ is worth ‘nothing’. There is little realization that there is no such thing as ‘nothing’. In every ‘nothing’, there is a ‘something’. In fact, there could be everything in what we consider ‘nothing’.
If you are getting somewhat convinced that ‘doing nothing’ could be a way of life then it must also be understood that ‘doing nothing’ is more than avoidance of a daily routine. It is an intellectual exercise in going beyond the usual and the obvious. No phone, no texting, no likes and no dislikes, just introspection and reflection. Mark my words, it will save you from the contagion of a rotten society. Read the crime reports and you will find that most evils in the society stem from the compulsion of doing ‘something’.
Watch Buddha, he is doing nothing and yet transmits knowledge that inspires millions. The world of labor ought to change, else it will bury humanity under its workload of ‘doing’. Without doubt, to survive as a civilization we need those who stretch and yawn while the rest of society worries and sweats (to reach nowhere, literally)! To borrow idea from Benjamin Franklin, I have volunteered to take more ‘air baths’ this year, with an innate desire to prove that jo kutch nahi karte vo kamaal karte hein meaning ‘those who do nothing, do wonders’!
Join me in my quest to prove that ‘nothing’ not only works but makes sense too!
(Sudhirendar is author (development journalist), academic (offers lectures), advisor (provides consultancy) and activist (providing knowledge backup) rolled into one, based in New Delhi.)
