Mahatma Gandhi`s Self-Sufficiency Concept
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seems to be prevalent in this present day. Gandhi pointed out at the
society where there would not be a conflict. The key word in Gandhi’s
philosophy was harmony; harmony like in music. There will be different
notes in music. May be they are different in the sound but all together turn
it into the music. That makes music complete. You don’t distinguish
between one and another, all together will make it into music. So the music
that Gandhi thought of, the harmony that Gandhi thought of was first of all
with one own self.
A self in which there is no quarrel between the hand and the brain
and the heart. We are now thinking of education whether man who learns
more and more, works less and less. That is not the kind of education that
Gandhi thought of. One who uses the brain more also uses the heart more
for fellow human beings, his hand more into the service
of fellow human beings. That is the kind of education for self-sufficiency as
Gandhi said. For him, self-sufficiency also meant self-sufficiency
in education, self-sufficiency in philosophy. So that is man’s relationship
with his own self, then man’s relationship with his society. He began with
small but achievable goals. Goals can be very high up, so high up that man
loses all hope of reaching there. As Gandhi said, “Let us put our feet on the
earth but let’s have our brain on the sky, act locally think globally”. These
two things have to come together. Self-sufficiency to Gandhi of acting
locally, thinking globally which means thinking of your neighbor first,
immediate neighbor first, and then go on widening this circle. He used the
term Oceanic Circles, and the circles of water that you see in a pool. They
go on broadening. Gandhi thought of first thinking of the village then
thinking of the cluster of the village, broadening, broadening it, widening,
widening this circle like the pretty horizons of humanity. Gandhi’s self-
sufficiency was no enemy of interdependence. It was no enemy of your
neighbor countries. Almost all countries have some kind of strained