Identity

            I believe in a world with more peace, more serenity, more understanding, less conflicts. I know the sound the naivety of this belief screams louder than the actual message but I will justify it anyway.  Plato believed that all people desire happiness and they behave otherwise because they do not know which actions produce happiness. This is true, not because I’m assuming but because I know so.

            In school, lecturers call us engineers instead of engineering students. I am not sure if they know this, but the uplifting feeling they leave with me is just awesome. I am aware that they do this because of math, ‘engineers’ is shorter than ‘engineering students’ but hey, they just did. There is a record that only a third of engineering freshmen actually graduate , so when your professor calls you an engineer before you’ve got a certificate you have no choice but to embrace the idea they believe in you. By ‘they’ I mean educators. Well, for me, this feeling keeps me going through the workload and all other stories only engineers can tell.

            I know we live in a world where first impressions can practically determine the kind of house you’ll own. Sad, as it may be, I envision a world where we labeled people based on their ambition or goals in other words. Where we would see a convict, we see a possibly responsible citizen, where we saw a robber we see a man who is simply trying to provide for his family. Imagine that world; I can already see tension released from your face. I have been visualizing this world and it seems like the perfect solution for the turbulent place we call home. 

            People reciprocate how we treat them.  We judge them by their past, they show more of it, we support their future and they will likewise work on it. Most of us instinctively know that.  I’m taking the liberty of assuming Plato was right, for no other reason but the fact that he makes sense.  All people desire happiness, not pleasure, not riches, but happiness. That basically means that all people want the same thing, only that we find it in different things. That being said, all people desire to better themselves in one way or another. Having an identity based on where we are going rather than who we were is a win-win-win situation.

            It takes more than imagination to see the world in a different light. At least, more people would have to be convinced first. But hey a journey is made of small steps. Tap the positive side of people and watch what happens. I guarantee you, it’s good for your health –I mean social health and spiritual health  of course. Good luck!