January 18, 2024
Fortune of the Commons
Today may have been the first day in India where I experienced a whole hour of complete silence (well almost, I may not have been able to help myself from making a stupid comment here and there). For context, we began the day working with The Ugly Indian, an organization that focuses on the beautification of neglected public spaces. Prefacing all the scrubbing, painting, and leveling of the public park that took place, we learned about The Ugly Indian’s philosophy and rules. A main emphasis was the no talking, hence the rare hour of silence. They didn’t want a conversation, or questions, or ideas; they simply wanted the work that needed to be done to take place. I genuinely really appreciated this about the organization. Selfishly because I found solace in focusing solely on the wall in front of me and turning my brain off. But more generally, because I loved how action-oriented their mission is. There was no waiting for approval, no hoping to receive funding; there was simply doing the work that needed to be done.
Another value emphasized by TUI was stewardship. I don’t even want to call it one of their values because truly it’s the root of their entire organization. This idea that we all have this inherent responsibility to take care of the people, community, places, and world around us for no reason other than that is what you do. It’s so simple and obvious, but I think the practice of stewardship tends to be understated and not widely practiced. I mean, I am not going to give the whole tragedy of the commons lecture right now; I will just say it is extremely easy in our day-to-day lives to ignore the fact that we have a responsibility to the greater good. It is easy to look at an issue and think of a million reasons we cannot fix it or even easier to say “not my problem.”
I think we have been extremely lucky these last few weeks to see organizations like The Ugly Indian that are stepping up and saying, “Actually this is our community’s problem, and that is enough for us to step up and find a solution.” And I think at the end of the day that is, in part, why everyone in GCIL decided to sign up for GCIL. In the short time of getting to know everyone in this program, it is clear my peers absolutely value stewardship. I see this attitude of stewardship shine through people’s growing excitement in working for their organization, in the never-ending questions and curiosity shown to our guides and guest speakers, and today specifically through people’s work ethic. Everyone here has made the decision they do not want to contribute to the tragedy of the commons phenomenon; they see each other, communities, and public spaces as something we all need to take part in caring for. And so, while I know over ten weeks constantly in the same quarters we may start to get a little sick of each other, I feel grateful to have found people who not only believe in collective stewardship, but flew across the world to learn from other stewards and take on this shared responsibility.
By Phoebe
