IF RESTLESS energy is one of the main attributes of youth, then it must be found in every young person. So the question is: Do we really find such a restless energy and enthusiasm in every young person -- a boy or a girl? And unfortunately, the answer may not be in the affirmative in every case we decide to visit. If this is not unfortunate, then what is? -- is the question that needs to be raised for general consumption. There are other attributes of youth as well -- like agency, like ambition, like willingness to go full distance in the fulfillment of personal goals, like associating with something sublime ...! Yet, in the case of a bigger percentage of young people, many attributes are sourly missing, so to say. That is so surprising and shocking! Of course, one does come across many, many young people -- boys and girls -- with some endearing attributes that symbolise youth. But then, there also is the universal experience about young people not knowing how to use their attributes of youth and have a life of glorious possibilities. But then, universally, the experience is that most youths really do not possess most of the core attributes of being young, and most young people tend to grow up in a sluggish manner.

 

This led the iconic litterateur and thinker Oscar Wilde to lament: “Youth is wasted on the young”. What a candid statement! The loud-thinker has often touched upon this Oscar Wilde expression in his writings and speeches for a long time. In fact, duty it must be of young people to prove Oscar Wilde wrong. Yet, nothing of that sort happens and the young people never even try to stand up and get counted against the Oscar Wilde statement -- so full of frustration about the young people’s lack of verve and nerve. In one of his moments of clairvoyance, Swami Vivekananda said, in effect, “Give me a few young people with muscles of steel and hearts of diamond --and I will transform the world.” Going by how today’s youth conducts itself, Swami Vivekananda can be accused of having expressed wild and rather senseless expectation.

 

These thoughts storm the loud-thinker’s mind all the time. For, when he interacts with young people -- say from age 15-16 to age 35-40 years -- he realises that most of them have lost the nerve and verve which is so basic to being young. It will be a matter of separate inquiry as to why this is happening on such a mass scale. But suffice it may be here to say that many young people become victims of wrong habits and spoil their youth and degenerate into morons. Of course, it must be admitted that many young people harbour big dreams -- of high-salaried jobs, of a big bungalow for themselves, and life cloistered in small circles around themselves. Yet, in most cases, they do not seem to be interested in working for the fulfillment of those dreams. By another standard, they do not seem to work for the enhancement of their personalities. In other words, a massive number of young people seem happy with whatever they have achieved. But why? -- one may ask. The answer, in most cases, is simple: The young people do not want a life of true hard work for long stretches of time for years. They want easy achievements -- Easier the better, they say. This is certainly perplexing -- at least for the loud-thinker.