9/4/24 942am

There has come the hint of a great realisation. I have often wondered why, when I was 17, I wrote so much on improving schools. The answer is I wanted to improve schools. Then I wonder how it was possible, so many ideas flowed. Where did they come from and why is that drive no more there?

Perhaps it is no more because I have gotten dead I thought. That the wish to create my own school was gone. Now I see differently.

I did not want to improve ‘schools’, I wanted to improve whatever I was seeing. I was seeing schools because I was in school. Holding on to this idea, as I left school, I can no longer think of ideas because I am not seeing it.

It is thus:
An artist had a particular set of crayons. He would paint often with them. He equated his art with his crayons. One day he no more had these crayons and he stopped creating. His mistake was thinking the crayons defined his art, and as he understood this, he looked around and saw many materials. He began painting again.

Similarly, the things that I was good at, such as generating ideas to improve schools, are dynamic. I must let my crayon go. As I thought this, my mind turned to my current life.

College

And so many ideas flood in. There is a bit rust, but here:
In my college system, let there be an interview which asks people ‘Do you wish to change the world?’. I want people who are driven and willing to be driven. Fine, if you do not feel inspired. In fact, if you are feeling inspired already, if you have a path already, you shouldn’t be here. I only want those who are seeking, who are wishing. They are wishing because they believe it is not in their hands. I am here to turn wishes into wants and wants into intentions.

Let the interview seek these qualities. Questions about willingness to learn. Let it identify potential.

Then I imagine my first meeting with each class, here I explain the difference between wish, want and intent. I explain how it is ‘our’ college. “It may sound corny to you. I don’t mean you own it. No. I mean you have the ability to own it, it make this yours. We have begun this journey on opposite ends. Normally, you would have to go from where you are now to where the college wants you to be at the end. What I mean is I am wiling to meet you at the halfway point of wherever you wish to be, and you can come. I hope you come.”

I imagine the first 6 months spent on mindset, on deconditioning. There is much trash.

I imagine counsellors, psychological counsellors, coming to classes and talking to the students about recent trends. I feel currently, they are not involved at all. They are in another side of the campus in a room waiting to be approached.

I imagine a system where effort is praised. Because here is another thing:

What I do, anyone can do. I have forgotten this truth in my arrogance. In my belief I need crayons.

I digress.

My point is, upon recognising that what I wish to give to the world, my purpose, is dynamic and not restrained to schools, for example, I can adapt to problem solving the situation I am in- college. My experience is common, only my witnessing is different. This witnessing can provide insights. The best solutions are insights- people do not recognise where they are going wrong. Once they realise, they self correct. I only need to say okay, what you have experienced I have experienced, in my experience I noticed this. The best solutions to another person self-correct.

In this sense, I can predict this- I wanted to create my own schools, as I now want my own colleges, these are circumstantial. What I want ultimately is my own world. It is not a burning want that can be corrupted by the ego- Hitler wanted his own world. Rather, he wanted to own his world. I want my own world, a place I belong to. If I must create it- it must be created- then so be it. It is possible. Just witness and write about college.