From Slogans to Substance: How My Political Views Matured with Time

From Slogans to Substance: How My Political Views Matured with Time

Politics, like life, rarely remains static. What begins as borrowed conviction in youth often ripens—sometimes painfully—into tempered understanding with age. My own political views have not so much swung from one extreme to another as they have settled, shedding noise and acquiring nuance. The journey from idealism to realism, from slogans to substance, has been slow, reflective, and deeply human.

The Early Years: Inherited Beliefs and Loud Certainties

In my younger days, political opinions were largely inherited—absorbed from family discussions, social circles, classrooms, and the dominant narratives of the time. Like many young people, I believed that clarity lay in certainty. Issues were black or white; leaders were heroes or villains. There was a romantic attraction to grand promises, stirring speeches, and ideological purity. Politics felt like a moral contest, and choosing sides felt like choosing righteousness.
Emotion, not evidence, often guided those views. The fire of youth seeks quick answers, not complicated truths.

Middle Years: Encounters with Reality

As professional life unfolded—particularly in education and administration—the simplicity of earlier beliefs began to crack. Policies were no longer abstract ideas but living forces that shaped institutions, budgets, teachers’ morale, students’ futures, and families’ lives. I began to see how good intentions could produce poor outcomes, and how unpopular decisions were sometimes necessary.
Exposure to diversity—of regions, cultures, economic realities, and human behaviour—played a crucial role. Ideology alone could not explain why the same policy succeeded in one context and failed in another. Gradually, I became less interested in who said something and more in what was said, why it was said, and how it would be implemented.
This phase replaced political enthusiasm with political responsibility.

Later Years: From Ideology to Ethics

With age came a quieter, more inward approach to politics. I became sceptical of theatrics and wary of constant outrage. Instead of asking, “Which side is right?”, I found myself asking, “Who benefits, who pays the price, and who is left unheard?”
Philosophy and mythology offered powerful mirrors. In the Mahabharata, even righteous war brings irreversible loss. In Plato’s writings, democracy without wisdom risks becoming mob rule. The Bible repeatedly warns against leaders who serve themselves rather than their flock. These teachings reinforced a central belief: politics divorced from ethics is merely organised self-interest.
Today, my views are less about party loyalty and more about governance, accountability, compassion, and long-term thinking.

What Has Changed—and What Has Not

What has changed is my impatience with absolutism and my distrust of easy answers. I now accept that disagreement is not betrayal and compromise is not weakness. I value institutions over individuals, processes over personalities, and evidence over emotion.
What has not changed is the belief that politics matters deeply because it touches the most vulnerable first. Education, health, dignity of labour, and social harmony remain non-negotiable concerns. If anything, age has intensified my conviction that power must always be questioned, no matter who holds it.

Political maturity, I have learned, is not about becoming cynical but about becoming careful. It is the shift from shouting opinions to weighing consequences, from defending positions to examining principles.
Once I believed politics could change the world overnight. Now I believe it changes lives slowly—sometimes clumsily, sometimes unjustly—but always significantly. And that is precisely why it deserves thought, humility, and conscience.
In the end, my politics did not change direction; they changed depth.