Are you ready for divorce?

Wait! Wait!

Don’t tell me that you are not married!

Don’t tell me that you love your spouse so much that you’ll never divorce her or him!

I am not talking about dissolving marriage.

I am talking about your readiness to listen, to think, be flexible, to part with your opinions if it makes sense.

courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

Several weeks ago a couple of friends visited us in Pocono Manor. We had a very nice time together and we discussed different topics. They mentioned that their grandson (who is a college graduate) had opinions about everything and became angry and rude if somebody had expressed a different opinion.

It did not surprise us. We hear very often that students and professors are against discussions in universities, that they simply vote against allowing people with different opinions to speak on campuses.

I remember with great love wonderful teachers who gave us good knowledge of their subjects and at the same time taught us to think, to read a lot, to form opinions, to express them, to listen to opinions of others, to like discussions and to divorce (change) our opinions if necessary.

Teachers salaries were low in the Soviet Union but it was an honorable profession. Teachers were “Engineers of Human Souls”.

Think about it! Not engineers of human minds but engineers of human souls. Teachers taught us love, friendship, responsibility, difference between good and bad. They did it in all possible ways but the most effective way was by personal example.

Please, try to find time to read my story OH, THOSE AMERICANS! and pay special attention to what our teachers Boris and Nasir did. It is no wonder that we loved and respected then so much.

I hope that in the nearest future our society will drastically change and students will learn to think, to listen, to discuss, to form opinions on their own instead of taking opinions of their politically motivated teachers or professors.

I want to finish with two quotes:

The opinions that are held with passion are always those for which no good ground exists; indeed the passion is the measure of the holders lack of rational conviction. Opinions in politics and religion are almost always held passionately.

                                       Bertrand Russell (1872 – 1970)

*

The recipe for perpetual ignorance is: be satisfied with your opinions and content with your knowledge.

                                     Elbert Hubbard (1856 – 1915)