Two years after graduating, I went back to my university this past weekend. I went simply because I wanted to see the people I missed, celebrate in the culmination of their work and witness their final thesis presentations. At New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD), final thesis presentations, a.k.a capstones, are a monster and a mammoth task that every senior undertakes to graduate. It’s painstaking, heartbreaking and also weirdly satisfying when the end result comes out.
NYUAD, because of how unbelievably young it is, is also constantly changing and evolving. There’s something new happening every week and members of the community have the first-hand opportunity of actually creating culture as opposed to just assuming and fitting into it. That culture also involves cultivating care, concern and a need to help one another.
I’ve come to realize that with the pressures of needing to succeed and go ahead, we put helping to the wayside. I’m certain everyone reading this is going to go:
"Duh, Krush, this has already been established."
But here’s the catch: we’re all intrinsically aware that we need to help and care more for ourselves, for those around us, for the world. We know that we have to stop making excuses for wasting 10 minutes on a game on our phones when we could be listening to a friend who needs to talk. We’re completely aware that there are others who are doing way worse than we are (though I don’t endorse this kind of thinking that minimizes your own issues because that is comparison and problems are never to be compared). But think about it for a second- Do you take the time out to say, “Hey, let’s talk.” Do we actively put the effort in?
Over the weekend, I met with a member of my university who told me that a little Facebook message I had sent to them a while back, writing about my concern for another member of our community, had turned into a mental health care program. It was insignificant— it took 5 minutes of my time to write, “I’m a little concerned about this person, can you take care of them for me please?” I met with friends who wrote to me saying, “Thank you. Seeing you here was enough— 15 minutes of our conversation was all I needed to get by and through.”
This is not to say I am a messiah of some sort. It’s only to drive the point home that we need to be thinking about the people that are significant to our lives, and not just when we need them. It takes nothing to care, and it gives back to you in infinite amounts. It doesn’t kill to be a little more receptive when the people who make us are struggling or are in need.
I saw theater performances and movies about love, care, culpability and trauma that moved me to tears constantly. These were my babies and my peers putting out into the world, with oodles of vulnerability, their work, their hearts and their beliefs. No matter what the crux of all their work was, it all turned around to one thing: Helping each other and caring for each other is all we have and all we can do. Why not step in, hold each other and walk together?
