Hakuna Matata? A few lessons from the ‘Lion King’
So it’s Saturday night and I’ve just coming home from watching the 2019 version of The Lion King with my old lady.
How I spend my Saturday nights might have to be investigated on another post somewhere.
As I watched the Disney classic, I thought of a few takeaways that were probably worth discussing here. In particular I wanted to focus on the concept of hakuna matata, made famous as Timone and Pumba’s catchphrase and life motto. Translated from Swahili, it means…
“there are not troubles”.
Simba embraces a bit of hakuna matata when he runs from his past and his mistakes, to live a care-free, responsibility-free life. Obviously the arc of the film is that he then wrestles with his call to purpose to go back and challenge his Uncle for the throne, who is endangering the balance of Pride Rock and its ‘Circle of Life’.
I found this interesting because we might ask ourselves the same question. What is our ideal way of living?
Do we want to be care-free, responsibility free and light? Or do we want to embrace hard work and fulfil a deeper purpose?
I guess you can translate these questions into the choice between living on a beach and sipping cocktails all day versus working on a meaningful project, fulfilling obligations to others and being very purpose driven.
Going back to the film, I think it gives its own answer to that question. You can’t run away from who you are.
So if we have the ability to do something special, or we’re the only ones who can help a certain people or solve a certain problem, do we have an obligation?
Are we obliged to turn down a ‘problem-free philosophy’ in order to work on these problems?
If I look back over the last three years for example, I try to think about whether I would have rather spent the years travelling, holidaying and partying, than what I have mainly done which is work.
I think the only downside with that hedonistic hakuna matata as a permanent way of life is that it would then become baseline. People can get used to anything and become desensitized towards anything; this applies for not only pain (abuse, violence for example) but pleasure too.
Do we shut ourselves off from the problems of the world and escape, or do we try to play a part in relieving them?
My own thoughts are ultimately this: that it is nice and necessary to switch between the two phases: a relaxed, clean, detached mindset, and the drive to go forward and achieve things that are useful for your community.
It is hard to completely escape and be completely problem free. I do think it’s true that you can’t really ‘run from yourself’. By this I mean, we all develop in a certain way to enjoy certain things, feel things for different people, have certain drives and ambitions. I think these things become innate drives and it is hard to ever really quash them.
I think we feel them with certain symptoms: disappointment, sadness, lacking of fulfilment, lethargy, frustration and many others. Sometimes the worst feeling is taking life too slow and lessening what you can make of the experience.
This might be a very reflective little post or simply my tired brain after coming home from the movies. As it’s late, I might clock off now — hopefully I’m not reading too much into the Lion King and there is some merit in the above.
Good night.
Thanks for Reading! Nothing makes me more excited than people reading my stuff, this has always been one of my dreams… to write! It took me a while but hey, I’m still a young guy!
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