We are different and Unique

I had heard this story from my elders when I was in my primary school about a highly learned man coming from Himalayas after learning all those heavy scriptures from the revered holy men. I always visualized this guy to be a very handsome fair chap in his late twenties with an attractive mustache (we south Indians like to have moosh) coming back in all whites and a bag full of books in his back. He comes down to the banks of Ganges. Now he wants to get into the town and those days they had only the small boat for the purpose of transportation. Unusually that day there were no other passenger but for this highly educated hero of our story. He gets into the boat and seeing his charm, the boat man asked him where he was from and where is heading too. Now our hero is elated to speak of his newly acquired knowledge. So he starts telling the illiterate boat man that he was learning for so many years under many holy men, the knowledge wealth from the scriptures. And after acquiring this incredible knowledge he is coming back to his home town (I never asked my story teller what he intends to do in the town. I was naive then , right?). Now slowly our hero (Ok, enough of hero I will call him Rahul - as all Shahrukh's characters).. So Rahul starts checking out his knowledge with the poor boat man. Rahul recites one sloka and asks the boat man if he knows which Upanishad is the sloka picked from. I am sure most of us can relate to this situation. The big boss comes out with some odd quote from a so-called-management guru and asking us if we have come across this. The boat man also blinked just like us and our Rahul smiles showing off his one dimple and says God you have wasted 5 years of your life. Now Rahul is getting more confident about his Gynan and throws out more slokas for which the boat man did not offer any different expression but the same blink and for every sloka Rahul decremented 5 years from the poor boat man's life. The boat man wanted to jump out of the boat to escape this embarrassment that too inflicted by this young chap who would be hardly half his age. Suddenly as if the boat man's prayers are answered, a hole got developed in the boat and the boat was slowly getting filled with water. Boat man on any other day would have got worried but today he was so happy. He asked our dear Rahul whether he knew to swim for which he got a no for an answer. Boat man started laughing till his stomach started to ache and he told Rahul that he himself has only lost half his life but Rahul is going to loose his entire life - Period - End of the story.
Now my story teller gave me the moral of the story - don't learn all the scriptures of hi-fi things which can come to no help in your future. Learn only those which can give you a saving hand in needy situations. I then thought, maybe, I too need to learn swimming. But while growing up with the ageing story teller, I came to understand the moral in a different perception - learn that skill which could equip you with a better earning capability. And I think many of us (read most of the Indians) are given this gyan intrinsically by the elders even when they are in the womb. We Indians rush to that course which has more "job" prospects in the market. If the early 60s was Arts & Law, 70s to 90s was Mechanical Engineering, late 90s and on its Computers, Electronics, IT and I do not know what next.
But one thing which we forget to learn from this story is that its not the knowledge of these two people which are problems. It is the way they both saw each other. Lets re-script the story and see if we can get a happy ending. If our Rahul instead of criticizing the boat man, took the pains to explain what the inner meaning is and how by knowing this knowledge the boat man can actually see happiness in whatever he does, things would have changed. The boat man would have seen to it that Rahul's life is saved what-so-ever may come. And if even after the criticism, the boat man puts up a brave condition to Rahul if he can teach him the knowledge if he saves Rahul's life, then, too the things would be different.
What we do not see is that we are not ready to accept that we are all different, born to do different things, with different equipments (body, mind and intellect). One which I know need not be known by others and what others might have mastered would be unknown to me. Still we all believe that "I know more than the other". For instance if you talk to individual project members, they all without any forethought would tell you that theirs was the important contribution. It is true in one way, any small contribution is important for a task to be done. But it is ignorant to say that only "mine is the significant". This is a curse to not only in a project team in the industry I work (IT) where each wants to show that he is superior by which the knowledge sharing goes for a toss and the trust they have for each other is hardly the size of this period(.), but also in the entire society.
Business man think they are the most important people in the society since they contribute to the economy of the country, the politicians think they are the important people as they believe they rule the others and only because they rule the country itself is existing, the salaried think they are the important people as they are paying the tax which is utilized for all the work that we see as governmental, laborers feel they are important as without then the place would be a mess. (In fact in the ancient times all were treated with equal importance and in India they were classed based on their work – Kshatriyas, Vaishyas,Shudhras and the teachers community as Brahmana’s – the ones who has attained the knowledge of the Supreme and imparting this highest knowledge) Individually they are all correct, but imagine what would happen if any one of these class stop doing what they do. Imagine one fine day all the scavengers stop picking up the garbages from our roads and the drop boxes, I am sure we will start feeling the importance of these otherwise insignificant people. To ask who/which class is importatnt for the society/organization/project is like asking which organ is important for you in your body? All are equally important. If we are able to recognize this and complement each other, this planet earth would be the best place to live without any hard feelings towards each other and no more asking for reservations, killing people in the name of SC/ST/Hindu, Muslim, Christian ....
For a moment I was even thinking how important the existence of both the sexes... if there were no females / or no males ... God it would be a boring place to live and when we have the other sex amongst us, we just see them as just another inferior species......
My Lord, give us the courage to accept the differences and to learn to live by compliment the existence and differences of others....