No One Right Way - My Ishmael
From our creative partner in Gurugram, Haryana just outside of Delhi in India
We just finished the third book in the Ishmael series - My Ishmael at the Daniel Quinn Book Club. And I am dizzy with thoughts. Thoughts that challenge my beliefs.
Daniel Quinn is someone, I urge everyone to read. I stumbled upon Quinn’s Ishmael three years ago. The moment I finished the book, I opened my laptop and desperately started searching for people who had read Ishmael. I couldn’t rest, because I needed a community and a safe space to spill my thoughts. This is something that is sure to happen to anyone who reads Ishmael. You search for your tribe, to survive together as “Quinnions”, because the world might not embrace you anymore.
Well, I discovered the Daniel Quinn Book Club. It has been my sacred space. I love our small community of fellow readers. Every well, come Wednesday, even a lazy bum like me is up and about at 4:30 am to discuss the book under scanner from a Quinnonian perspective. #BTW, it is compulsory that we wear our Martian Anthropologist hat.
To those of you who haven’t read any of Daniel Quinn books - well, he talks about the cultural indoctrination that is engulfing us all, including life on planet Earth. He calls our culture (where the food is locked) as the taker culture and the rest as leaver culture. Can you guess the messenger Quinn chose? It's a Gorilla named Ishmael.
Every time I read Quinn, he simplified the workings of the world around me. He gave me a new lens to look through. As an expert, he highlighted the fallacies of mother culture. But that’s it! I always had this contention, that he never offered any solutions.
It’s as if you have been thrown into an ocean. While the rough sea is thrashing you, Quinn is screaming in your head that the world is on fire……RUN. But where? Immediately, he becomes silent. And here you are, barely keeping afloat, trying to breathe in as much air as you can.
I have had this feeling every time I had read him…..the feeling of being cheated. The feeling of being left in lurch with water rushing down my lungs and my desperate attempt to find the elixir of life - air.
I wanted him to hold my hand, and show me a new world or help me dream a utopian dream. I looked up at the sky for a comic-book Superman or Superwoman to save the planet. But that’s not Quinn. He is way more realistic than that. He doesn’t believe in fake promises and fancy dreams.
Reading My Ishmael, the same feeling creeped in. This time, wrapped in a new thought……Am I more like Alan than Julie? I wasn’t too pleased with the revelation. Yes, I was being Alan, a clingy student who wouldn’t let go Ishmael.
As I accepted myself, Quinn’s message became evident. In the book, Ishmael doesn't want Alan to remain a pupil all his life. Ishmael wants him to come out of his shadow. So that Alan discovers, analyses, researches, thinks, and observes…..all by himself. To use Ishmael’s learning as the base so as to create anew with a new mind set. To find solutions. Solutions based on his own sensibilities, not proposed by someone else.
With My Ishmael, the message hit me. Quinn understood that, there will be numerous situations that needs to be worked on depending on the personal experiences, region, and culture thus, leading to infinite permutations and combinations. What might suit someone in Hawaii might not be applicable to someone like me in India and vice-versa.
Thus, every individual has to find the truth in accordance to his/her reality.
Ah! And I was dumb enough to miss the point for a good three years. Why? Partly, because of my inherent nature to seek stability always and secondly, the cultural training that has trained me, as a follower - To happily let someone else decide for me. Whoever I consider as the epitome of authority or wisdom. Isn’t that the case with most of us? We are fond of readymade solutions. We want stability, love attachments, and our comfort zones, thus, we are always looking for quick fixes. I was no exception. I expected Quinn, to not only bring forth the problem but to solve it too.
I was blown away when Quinn mentioned in My Ishmael - that each student perceived his teachings differently and that’s the way it should be. That led to the inference that every student will also find a different solution. Because the main message is: There’s no one right way.
About the Author: Dr. Shruti Shankar Gaur describes herself as a nonplussed mother, a Luna to her Alpha, a passionate entrepreneur, a novice thinker, a hard-core dreamer, a scruffy poet, a true seeker, and an unusual sinner. She bares her soul in her blog: Pain & Bliss - Contact the author: https://linktr.ee/dr.shrutishankargaur
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Shruti, it’s so exciting when a book has this kind of impact! How thrilling and wonderful when a book leaves us “dizzy with thoughts.” I thoroughly enjoyed reading about your experience with My Ishmael; I love the passion and intensity you expressed. And I admire your willingness to wrestle with the book’s message, as well as your openness and honesty in sharing about your process of self-reflection and the conclusions you arrived at.
Thank you Dr. Shruti Shankar Guar for sharing your thoughts on Daniel Quinn's Ishmael book series. It's interesting to think that the great majority of what we experience and express in our lives unfolds within our own minds. Our perceptions, cultural influences, internal dialogue, and ideologies all blend together to paint a uniquely personal reality. So it makes sense that everything we take in is deconstructed and processed based on that reality and the needs we have within it. The external stimuli we receive provides different solutions for all of us because during our time on this planet, none of us are walking the exact same path.