The Shawshank Redemption: The Greatest Movies Providing Some of the Greatest Life Lessons
I watch to learn and learn to write.
Last night I watched the movie Shawshank Redemption. This movie, as the rating suggests, is one of the great movies that portray and depict the harsh prisoners of Shawshank and the apprentice of a clever banker. Being under a false charge of the murder of his wife, he experiences a different world. Adapting to the condition, he, with cleverness and skills, breaks out of the prison and the money laundering and corruption chain.
Writing this piece, it is certain that I noticed something more lucrative and affectionate that I am here to discuss.
Here are the three lessons that I learned……..
1. The house is where you were brought up. And your soul seeks the best comfort in it.
For some, the life that they are accustomed to becomes everything. This was as exampled the old man who spent nearly 50 years earning respect as a prison librarian, and now that world was everything for it.
“The man’s been in here 50 years
This is all he knows.
In here, he’s an important man.
He’s an educated man.
Outside, he’s nothing.”
When he was asked to go out on payroll, he discovered a different world he was neither used to nor knew much about. And with less time and the grey hairs, it would be even more difficult for him to be used to this world. Leading to an unending wish to end up in his house, which is the Shawshank prison.
This was also experienced by Ellis “Red” Redding when he was sent outside on payroll. And here the writer beautifully introduces the concept of institutionalisation. How you get habited (not adapted) to acertain situation if you remain there isa major part of your life.
I’m telling you, these walls are funny.
First, you hate ‘em…
..then you get used to ‘em.
Enough time passes…
you get, so you depend on ‘em.
That’s institutionalised.
This was not true only where you inhabited but also for your environment, company or everything that you put effort into building. Your friends, relatives, and people who respect you and for whom you hold respect.
I belong to gen Z, and this is the youth stage where we can aspire our feet out of the blanket and make new companies outside in the new habitat. However, growing old it becomes more difficult, and we aspire to be with the old inmates.
2. Life is a coin, having both faces. It depends upon your choices whether you are living happily or regretting it.
The movie demonstrates an important lesson which is how even prisoners having a hard life in comparison to the normal free man could also be able to produce that much dopamine and satisfaction that a common man could not. There are two reasons for it.
Reason I: Based on the Theory of Equilibrium.
This was based on the theory of equilibrium. As per the situation, your equilibrium — your point of satisfaction or happiness—is shifted. And your body produces dopamine (pleasure-seeking hormone) according to it.
My Practical Illustration. Last month I traveled back to Agra (Uttar Pradesh, India) from Pune( Maharashtra, India). The temperature in Agra relative to Pune is more volatile. In winter, it drops below 10 degrees, and in summer, it goes above 50 degrees. Making it very cold nowadays (as winter goes on). As a rational person, I wore a body warmer and a sweater, which made me much more comfortable coping with the freezing temperature. However, I accidentally tried for a woolen sock hat, and removing it made me feel uncomfortable. Okay, no issues. I let it go and continue to wear it.
Going on. I was sitting on the couch, and my mother brought me a blanket and put it around my legs. I first resist, but my body feels more comfortable then. And I NEED to opt for it. My mother then turns on the heater. And it was the best feeling. But as soon as I got out of this heater, I started to feel uncomfortable, and now my body has become accustomed to the pleasure that I received and now resists getting lower than that.
Thus, the meetings, cigarettes, and same old movies are their happiness as compared to the harsh work they were much more reliable and pleasure-seeking.
Reason II: Based on the theory of Wants and Aspiration.
“The depth of the valley decides the height of the mountain.” This was another dimension that the stress or the happiness depends upon the aspiration
Andy Dufresne as a prisoner only aspires to the picture of Rita Hayworth or the music of the two Italian ladies, not more than that, which, however, is very small for a rational free man who aspires for much more. And fulfilling this aspiration provides happiness. Thus, it was again we decided on our precinct and the height of the happiness to achieve.
Is it good to have higher aspirations?
Well, I answer that in the affirmation that yes, it is good to have higher aspirations as it excels you to put in more effort, but this would be only when you would be able to understand your position and can look downstairs to be happy knowing your achievements.
Even the movie in itself speaks for it when Andy aspires for freedom and relaxation in Zihuatanejo near the Pacific Ocean. This aspiration led him to fight against fate and achieve it. Thus, aspiration is the tool of human growth, and it motivates you to travel a less traveled road or a difficult road to achieve your destiny.
3. Hope: An instrument of dreams
And lastly, what I learned from the movie is hope. It was Andy’s hope that lay him to carve a long tunnel with the stone hammer. And more than that, it was this hope only that lay him to cross it.
He even hoped against the situation and anticipation that one day his friend would be sent out on payroll. And it was this hope that laid him to bury the tickets under the black marble and lead the unison of two friends.
Hope is a tool that excels us to move, putting all our skills and power into building the way that we wish and dream for, even if fate does not support it. And mark my words, every miracle in the world is the product of persistent hope and perseverance. And you need to keep it to transform destiny and make the world bow in respect.
“Remember. Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.” — Andy Dufresne, Shawshank Redemption.
