Swadharma

Welcome to college! Pick two:

1. Social life
2. Good grades
3. Adequate sleep

Many of you have probably seen this list. Especially in college, we are constantly forced to prioritize — should I go to Brain Break or start my Expository Writing paper? Do I have time for a 20-minute (translation: a potentially 4-hour) nap or should I use the time to call home? Should I spend time helping a friend in need or study for my midterm? The decisions are endless…

Many of us will end up putting schoolwork at the top of our list, with friends and family somewhere nearby. And most of us will neglect sleep to accomplish the first two. In my college experience so far, this seems to be the case.

The complications come when we have to prioritize within specific areas of life. When things get busy, we sometimes have to prioritize friends — and while this may not be a conscious process for most people, there is no way to deny that it happens. Within friends at college, it’s impossible to spend equal amounts of time with everyone — how do you choose? Even more heart-wrenching decisions have to be made when we are forced to choose which friends from back home (assuming that our friend circles have not stayed completely constant) to remain in touch with, which ones we can afford to talk to more sporadically, and which ones we can live with letting go almost altogether.

Of course, most people don’t think of this as prioritizing — for most, its just something that happens, “naturally.” But what about prioritizing people, in general? In an earlier post about eye-opening conversations at the Harvard Square Homeless Shelter, I brought up the idea that perhaps PBHA is allowing us to “practice” our social service skills on the guests at the shelter, making them no more than guinea pigs as we hone our skills for future government and social service jobs. This idea of prioritizing human beings in categories really bothered me. Why is it that we take a college student (staff’s) word more than the word of a guest at the shelter? Why is it that a staff member, who may have absolutely no experience, and whom the directors and supervisors in charge of the shelter know nothing about (other than that he/she is in college) is given more responsibility and more dignity than a person who has lived in the shelter — to the extent that a new staff member is allowed to go into the kitchen and make food for the guests, but a guest who has been in the shelter for a long time and really knows the ins and outs of the system will never be allowed into the kitchen? Inherently, we are prioritizing certain “types” of human beings over others, solely based on the groups they are part of.

I suppose this disturbs me because I was brought up with the (somewhat naïve) notion that each soul is potentially divine, and that we should attempt to see God in all beings — and the favoring certain groups over others seems to contradict that idea at the very core. One some level, I suppose that all prioritization comes down to practicality – it isn’t practical (or even possible!) to get to know every guest in HSHS and compare them with every staff member to see who should truly have the benefit of the doubt.

Still, the questions weigh on my mind:

• Is it right to prioritize certain people over others? 
• Where is the line between prejudice/stereotyping and practicality? 
• If all people are inherently divine, who are we to choose which people should be trusted and given the chance to prove themselves? 
• What are your reasons for prioritizing, and what do you base your decisions on?

Related posts:

1. Service
2. The social aspect of religion
3. Question of the Week: Challenges to Faith at Harvard
4. Question of the Week: Hinduism and Relationships
5. Making space for God