Page 121 - Failure to Triumph - Journey of A Student

educated man is to tolerate and make peace with the fact that God
has created all of us differently. Some people like sweet, some
people like salty; somebody is a capitalist, somebody is a socialist,

somebody is a right-wing activist, someone is aligned to the left wing
while somebody is a moderate. You should not engage in a
conversation with anyone, or clash with anyone when you have half
knowledge on the subject. First do your research and understand
what the entire issue is all about. When was the last time you
analyzed a topic before commenting on it? When was the last time
you studied a book to understand a subject?

You must carry out this important experiment: chose any great
personality and write down all that you know about him in a
notebook. Now read a book about him thoroughly. After reading the
book, compare the knowledge which you had earlier with what you
know now. Perhaps whatever you knew about the person would

have been enough only to fill up a page, but now you can yourself
write a book on him. Do you not have this question in your mind “why
did I not try to find out more about the person before? Why did I
waste so much time on discussions and debates? Now you can in
fact discuss about the person and his life with tremendous amount of
confidence. Now, whenever you listen to other people talk about this
person with half knowledge, you will laugh from within. But you do

not have to engage with anyone, you do not have to silence anyone.
They are where you were yesterday.

True knowledge is that which makes you polite and not egoistic. If
you keep reading books, you will understand their importance.
Reading good books makes you humble and patient. It is important

to know how much you can go ahead while simultaneously
improving yourself. If you invest or put in 100 per cent effort then the
outcome will surprise you as well.

I will give you an example about half knowledge. You must be aware
of GST; the Goods and Services Tax. Once, two students were
having a debate on whether this is good for the country or not. I

witnessed their debate myself; one was in favour of GST and one