Does "AWE & WONDER" mean Ignorance 

Last week I was sent an image of flowers of a tree which were of feminine shape and form.  This invoked wonder in me and my natural instinct was to post it in my face book so that my friends could experience this joy.  In my excitement I did not check the authenticity of the image which some of my friends did and pointed out to me.  The image was clearly morphed in a rustic way.

This ignited my mind to wander off to a different subject but not in a random way. It is about the absence of awe and wonder which is one of the most important emotional experiences.

In the words of Rev.Samuel A. Trumbore:

“This is the sadness. I think many of us experience in relation to wonder and awe. As we get older, there is less and less that is new and surprising. We have all seen so much in our lifetimes. It is the curse of good education and a sharp, perceptive mind that by middle age, you know a great deal and by old age, you have seen it all.  There is more for us to know than we can ever take in but the experience of surprise comes less and less”.

Many of us think that the capacity for the experience of wonder and awe is gone forever.  This is not true once we start recalling the magic of our childhood. When we think of our childhood memories many of them, we will realize, were experienced in awe and wonder.  I was born in a metropolitan city and my formative years were spent there.  The name of the city would definitely incite words like “dirty”, “polluted” in outsiders’ minds.  But my most wonderful experiences still act as a unifying agent with my city of birth. The warmth, simplicity, intellect, richness of culture, the acceptance- all these experiences that I enjoyed and was nurtured still gives me a sense of wonder and awe.  A ride by tram-car, playing on the streets, spending some of the evenings at local parks, eating “puchkas”  (widely known as pani-poori)  are no less than awe and wonder for me.

Incidentally, I see less and less children escorted by their parents to the local parks. Imagine this: a mother tenderly taking her child’s hand in hers and leading the tiny hand to the leaf or a flower of a tree and letting the child feel the texture of the leaf, the smell of the flower and see the colour of the leaf. The child by this simple gesture experiences the touch, the smell, the sight – all taught by his/her beloved mother. Remember – the mother is the first teacher of every child. She introduces the father of the child to the baby. Her teaching starts from that day.  I’m sure when the child grows up to an adult he/she will recall not only the wonderful experience but also his/her mother’s tender face and gentle voice and the warmth of her love. He/she may not recall how often their parents took them to Pizza Hut or McDonalds but the experience of them taken to a park and taught lovingly will be etched in their memory for ever.

I feel we insulate ourselves from this powerful emotion.  I am going to cite a few quotes to strengthen my observation. Joshua Heschel (theologian) said, “Mankind will not perish for want of information; but only for want of appreciation. The beginning of our happiness lies in the understanding that life without wonder is not worth living”.  

Sadly, we have created a materialist culture and we believe power will give us control. Instead of increasing our awe and wonder in the magnificence of creation, we use our knowledge to gain power over it by analyzing it.  In our society ignorance means weakness; shame.

Let us keep the element of “surprise” in our lives.

Rumi, a 13^th century Persian poet, a theologian, Sufi mystic  said “sell your cleverness and practice bewilderness”.

No words of mine can be a better ending sentence than this.