INFLUENCERS OF THE WORLD, AND THOSE THEY CAN'T TOUCH
- Madhukar Dama
- May 6
- 3 min read
Why the Most “Important” People Shape Everyone’s Lives—But Not the Lives of the Simply Free
---
INTRODUCTION
The world’s most influential people — those crowned by TIME, Forbes, YouTube, and world governments — are not just public figures.
They’re architects of emotion, culture, behavior, and desire.
Their words shape laws.
Their fashion defines identity.
Their choices ripple into the lives of billions.
They influence what people eat, how they work, what they think, and even what they fear.
But there exists a small, quiet group untouched by this machinery:
those living with voluntary simplicity.
This essay explores how nearly everyone — from slum dwellers to CEOs — is impacted by these global influencers…
except those who have walked away from the influence economy altogether.
---
PART 1: THE UNSEEN POWER OF INFLUENCE
Most people don’t realize it.
But the words, actions, and endorsements of influential people shape:
What food becomes trendy (Millets only after a celebrity endorses it)
What counts as "progress" (Urban migration, tech jobs, English-medium schools)
What is considered beautiful (Fair skin, slim bodies, Botox)
What is moral and what is shameful (Abortion, gender roles, parenting styles)
What is urgent to care about (Climate change one year, AI the next)
The influential decide what should matter.
And billions follow.
Even when the effect is destructive.
---
PART 2: HOW THIS AFFECTS THE MASSES
Whether rich or poor, educated or illiterate, connected or disconnected — almost everyone is caught in the downstream of influential choices.
Examples:
A billionaire CEO promotes workaholism → millions of middle-class Indians glorify burnout.
A tech guru praises “productivity apps” → even school children begin using task managers.
A pop star flaunts fast fashion → rural teenage girls start demanding the same cuts and colors.
A “health” influencer sells protein bars → home-cooked dal-chawal is seen as backward.
No one is immune — unless they consciously choose to be.
---
PART 3: THE EXCEPTION — VOLUNTARILY SIMPLE PEOPLE
Then there’s the other path.
The farmer with no TV.
The homemaker who doesn’t scroll.
The family who walks barefoot to the well.
The young man who refuses promotions to grow his garden.
The woman who reuses her mother’s cotton saree for 40 years.
They are not influenced.
Because they have stepped out of the river.
They are not in competition.
They are not looking for “upgrades.”
They are not waiting for the next expert to tell them how to live.
---
PART 4: WHY INFLUENCE FAILS ON THEM
1. They don’t seek identity from the outside.
So celebrity culture has no effect.
They don’t need a beard oil because a cricketer used it.
2. They don’t chase trends.
So fashion icons, business gurus, and Instagram moms have nothing to sell them.
3. They rely on local systems.
Their food doesn’t come from multinationals.
Their medicine comes from herbs, not pharma ads.
Their income comes from handwork, not stocks.
4. They have no psychological gap to fill.
The influential prey on emptiness.
But the simple have fullness — in routine, nature, human connection.
5. They are already content.
Which makes them unmarketable.
Unshakable.
And therefore, truly free.
---
PART 5: REAL LIFE CONTRAST
---
PART 6: WHY THIS MATTERS
The world keeps calling these figures “important”
because they move markets, shape debates, steer elections, trend on hashtags.
But none of them can move the seed-saver from Odisha.
Or the grandmother who bathes in the river and smiles without teeth.
Or the boy who fixes radios in a tiny hut and refuses to chase degrees.
Those who live with simplicity are the most radical resistance alive today.
They are a silent rebellion against manufactured desire.
They are living proof that importance is an illusion,
and peace is disobedience.
---
CONCLUSION:
So yes — the world’s most “influential” people influence almost everyone.
They infiltrate every dinner plate, every screen, every emotion, every opinion.
But they cannot touch those who have unplugged.
Who do not consume.
Who do not chase.
Who do not need.
Those who live in huts, not headlines.
Who live deeply, not loudly.
Who live on their terms, not under the spell of someone else’s success.
To them, importance is not who changes the world.
Importance is who refuses to be changed by it.
---
