I remember the time when your ticket to being powerful was by being exclusive. You could either be born with a silver spoon or you could become an industrialist, an early term for an entrepreneur. You could also acquire power by being a technocrat or a bureaucrat with more access to education.

Those who couldn’t be any of these would serve either the rich or the masses like doctors, lawyers, teachers, CAs, engineers, architects, designers, and the like.

And then there were the least powerful mortals who simply served the more powerful. Meanwhile, education was never a pre-requisite to become a politician, which is another tangent altogether.

Education, or the lack thereof, has always been a factor in determining power dynamics. Your sense of power could be your own individual definition It could range from living at peace with yourself in isolation to lording over the Universe. We define xclusivity in our own unique ways.

Exclusive Education is a pursuit of specialised knowledge and skills that lead to an exclusive level of expertise. There is never anything wrong with seeking education, whether one’s intent is conscious or unconscious.

An unconscious person seeks to become exclusive. A conscious one seeks to become inclusive. That’s where true power lies.

Exclusive people try to extract and hoard power, inclusive one’s work towards empowering themselves and others. They distribute power and surround themselves with powerful people by making them more powerful than themselves. They connect with people for a selfless purpose and help them fin meaning and cause in their lives.

But unfortunately, most people pursue education for the sake of exclusivity.

Entrepreneurs are a powerful force in the present and future world. If you wish to be one or want your children to become one, then teach them to be inclusive and connect with humanity at large.

The team of the immediate future will consist of millennials and Gen Z. They will not be swayed by power or wealth, nor will they be impressed by lineage, position, degrees, travels, language proficien y, or even knowledge.

They all have these and more. If I talk about India, then the millenials and Gen Z will always come from the new urban centres (since all villages will soon be modern urban places). Your child’s ability to connect with them is what will matter. Education, whether obtained in an expensive or exclusive school, or even the number of books read (online or offline), is not the sole de erminant of success. We need to remember that Lord Rama went to a gurukul where the four princes studied with common folks and learnt to connect and engage with them. That was what they were learning.

Krishna went to Maharishi Sandipani’s Ashram, where he developed the ability to connect and engage with fellow learners, such as Sudama.

Abdul Kalam and Lal Bahadur Shastri did not attend exclusive schools and neither did Nelson Mandela or Mahatma Gandhi. Even Albert Einstein went to a common school called Gymnasium in those days and taught himself most of the things. In fact, he was rebelling against the rote system of education even in those days.

If you wish your children to be truly powerful, teach them about inclusiveness NOW. Exclusivity will not lead them anywhere but into deep suffering. They need to learn the ways to connect with humans. They need to see how people live, feel, think and behave. They need to learn to accept and embrace them. They need to learn how to realise their own potential and help others do that.

Your education must now be geared more than ever towards engaging with people who hold different values, lifestyles, convictions, and beliefs than your own. This is an essential part of life. Without this learning, you may be literate, but your knowledge and understanding will remain limited