Tampering with Nature leads to disastrous results. If the damage to Nature continues at the present rate, there is a possibility of humans being wiped out from the face of Earth. The ozone layer is being depleted. This has led to untimely rains, failure of monsoon, crops, unseasonal snowfall, and so on, upsetting all plans and calculations. We are plundering the Earth for raw materials. Science without self-control can only lead to destruction.
When you look into the mirror and do not like what you see, change yourself, not the mirror. The world outside is ruled, governed and determined by you and me. Each one of us is responsible for the condition of the world today. Let us try to change the world by changing ourselves.
Each human being depends on others for their own sustenance – nay, even existence. Revered poet, Rabindranath Tagore has described this unbreakable bond between the individual and society: “Emancipation from bondage of the soil is no freedom for the tree”. If I am the tree, society is the soil that supports and nourishes me. There is no life for the individual outside society. And there is no progress of society without assured security and well-being of every individual.
Faced with mortal peril, there is protection only in mutual help- what the wise have called “each for all, all for each”. The need for this wisdom is now being acutely felt everywhere, with the outbreak of the Coronavirus pandemic. The well-being of all depends on how every individual behaves, just as the safety of each individual depends on how the society behaves. Each person can become a potential carrier of the virus, and also a preventer of its spread and a protector of others.
We have a lesson here in the unity, solidarity and fundamental equality of all human beings. And yet one more of inestimable value – The Power of One. The truth that each one of us can make a difference, not only for one’s own benefit but also for the benefit of the entire planetary population. In normal times, most people, faced with problems that seem too big to be solved by them, are troubled by the question – “What can I do to change the situation for the better? I am just a small, insignificant, powerless person.”
Together we are a power, an undefeatable power. A drop of water cannot be a river; a river is formed by numerous water drops. It is the joining together of countless drops that creates a flow. The real flow of life lies in unity, in the oneness that arises out of love.
Fortunately, however, in the whole abnormal situation created by the Coronavirus, individuals have suddenly become aware of their latent power and also their inescapable responsibility. I am second to none. Rarely, in human affairs, come situations when every human being stands equal in front of danger as well as its antidote. If so, we should see Coronavirus crisis as an opportunity, indeed an imperative, to promote two game-changing goals – first, global solidarity based on the awareness that we are now living in an increasingly interconnected and interdependent world; and second, reordering societies in ways that recognise and guarantee the essential equality and dignity of every member of the human race.
