Monday, May 07, 2012

Big thoughts

I'm in Mysore and very much behind on my correspondence.  Will get back to my regular online activity a little later, but meanwhile, I had to record a couple of big thoughts of a little mind.

Puttachi:  I was just thinking.... if there were no humans, there would be no earth, right?

Me:  What made you think so?

Puttachi:  See, all houses and roads and buildings are built by humans, and trees are planted by humans.... so everything around us is because of humans.  So if there were no humans, then what is the use of the earth?

[Astounding, isn't it, how early we learn to think that human beings are the centre of the universe!]

Me:  Puttachi, remember I told you about animals like dinosaurs which lived much before human beings arrived?

She: Yes.

Me: So where did they live?

She:  (thinking) oh yeah... on the earth....

Me:  Yes.  We are just one of the plants and animals living on earth.  The earth belongs to everybody.

She: Oh, am I just feeling that human beings are important because we live with human beings and we see humans everywhere?

Me: Yes, perhaps.

*****

Puttachi:  Amma, I was just thinking.....

Me: (Aren't you always? :))  Yes?

She:  Amma, the whole world is one family!

Me: What do you mean?

She:  See, now we know somebody in one house, who is related to us, and so that person is a part of our family.  But we might not know that person's mother.  But the mother is that person's family. So thinking that way, that person's mother is our family also.  Like that, if we go on thinking about everybody, then the whole world is our family.

Vasudhaiva kutumbakam, indeed!  Go, kid!

Edited to add on Feb 13, 2013 -


Puttachi seems to be bent upon making the whole world one family.  She came up with another explanation now.

She:  Amma, were you and Papa related before marriage?
Me:  No, we weren't.
She:  But you might have been related.
Me: Why do you say that?
She:  Perhaps your mother's mother's mother's mother's mother's... and so on, mother's son's son's son's son's and so on... son is Papa.  Is it not possible?
Me:  Yes, it could be.
She:  So that way, everybody might be related.
Me: Ha ha, yes.
She:  So everybody is one family.  Our teacher's don't teach us this in school.  I don't think they know all this.  Perhaps I should tell them.
Me: Ohhh-kayyyy.... :)

12 comments:

Brinda said...

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Brinda said...

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Mangala said...

Such a sage little sweetheart :)

PeeVee said...

!!!!!!!!! indeed!

Radhika said...

That's nice! I think all kids have this thought in their mind. I've heard Ananya say this sometime back that all humans are relatives!

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Wanderer said...

Ah such profound thoughts, only a kid could have. When I think back, I too used to have loads of thoughts about the world and people and universe and how we are nothing in the vastness. I wonder where all that disappears when we grow up. I hope Puttachi's thoughts stay with her forever. And I hope that she makes something out of those thoughts, our little philosopher.

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Aparna said...

Nice post Shruthi. Love that she is able to put forth her thoughts. Reminds me of a time when hubby and me were marvelling at the beautiful sunset at the Grand Canyon.. When little A says " Mommy but sunset adamele barey kattaley, why do people like sunsets so much? "

Shruthi said...

Radhika, it always amazes me how we think they are little ones thinking of mundane things, while their thoughts are wandering all over the universe!

Wanderer, exactly - when, why and how do these thoughts get replaced by ordinary day to day things?

Aparna, ha ha, that is so perceptive! Loved it!

praneshachar said...

wow what a thought puttachi its true true and u are my sweet little princess

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