In sixth grade I studied works by Kazakh poet and philosopher Abay Qunanbayuli, and one of his verses impressed me with its meaning. Its approximate translation is “You are but a tile in the world’s puzzle. You shall go and find where you will fit it.” I believe this piece played a great role in shaping my worldview, and it influenced a lot of small and big decisions that I made in my life.
Kazakh people’s nomadic lifestyle isolated them from ideas of Enlightenment that had transformed European thinking and life centuries earlier. Abay Qunanbayuli was among the first educated people who in the late XIX century spread those ideas of humanity among Kazakhs. Abay’s father was an affluent person who dealt with Russian colonizers and managed large mobile population, and he managed to provide Abay with both traditional Islamic-centric and new “European” education. His father had probably hoped to grow him into big position of power, but Abay proved to be a mediocre administrator and poor manager. Instead, this person became famous for using his linguistic and musical talents and resources to educate masses, develop Kazakh language, and spread awareness about Kazakh’s culture in the world. Apart from music, education and poetry, he was well-known for many philosophical works that discussed the world and human’s place using accessible terms and everyday imagery.
I studied Abay at the same age other children in the world study their great classics—at the time my mind and spirit developed, and I started shaping my ideas about how to live in this world. Like many other kids, I found great pleasure in reading stories about ancient princesses and witches, as well as adventures. However, I observed that outside world does not run as I thought it was supposed to. Greed, ambition, indifference of people around me struck my ideals. I was confused about disparity between what people told how everyone should live and their actual deeds. I read classics, and among them Abay, in search of what is now called independent opinion about life and one’s behavior. I liked a lot of his sayings that provided guidance on many topics in people’s life. For example, as I was often disappointed in some of my friends, I came to understand the depth of one of his sayings that compared an infidel friend to a shadow. Abay said that such friends imposed themselves on a person on sunny days, yet were nowhere to be seen on close ones.
I think that his most important saying in my life is “You are but a tile in the world’s puzzle. You shall go and find where you will fit it.” Kazakhs did not have mass manufacturing, and they manually produced bricks and tiles for their construction needs. Although brick-makers tried to make stone in similar shape and size, still, each was unique. A mason had to carefully study each stone before deciding where to attach it on the lower layer. A perfect fit would ensure solid structure and frugal use of resources, while less than perfect fit would jeopardize safety of people inside, and led to overuse of cementing materials. Some stones would be rejected layer after layer before masons would finally find them a perfect fit in the wall. Some otherwise very good stones would be found useless in one construction, and had to be tried for the next one. I as a kid saw many such constructions in the village, and I quickly imagined myself to be a stone that waits for its perfect spot.
As I studied and grew up, I studied carefully my likes and dislikes, and I studied what people I feel myself comfortable around. I knew that I have to find a perfect fit for myself in school, in my job, and in my family. Lack of fit would mean that I both take someone else’s place, and I did not find my perfect place. The knowledge of this perfect fit provided me with inner peace and comfort when I had to forgo on very attractive opportunities that were somewhat of less than a perfect fit. For instance, I knew that I like to communicate with people a lot, and that I cannot live without frequent interaction with people. So I let go an attractive position of an analyst in a firm that was located near my residence. Later, I found a marketing position in a bank that was a bit far from home, but provided me with a lot of satisfaction. I think if I did not have enough confidence in myself, I would take this job near my house, save a bit on commute and feel myself very unhappy for a long period of time.
This idea of fit also helped me to arrange my personal life and make numerous other decisions.
As I think now, if I never read this piece by Abay, I would be in great risk of choosing one of many paths that looked easy at that time and that I would have probably regretted by now.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abay_Qunanbayuli
http://abay.nabrk.kz/index.php?page=content&id=175
"Book of Words", Aikyn, David & McKane, Richard (translator's) Almaty: El Bureau, (1995) (Kara So'zder)
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