Every culture has her unique lingo,
which shapes and carves
the living environment and atmosphere of that place.
It ultimately influences the people who live in it,
and in terms of their happiness level,
what we speak,
what people around us speak,
and what we listen to repititively
is inevitably contagious to our life perspectives
and way of living.
Does our tongue has such power,
to pollute and dampen the state of an entire nation's soul?
Let's investigate.
Moldovans
[click here if you've no idea what this is],
a people who consistently scored the lowest in the World's Happiness Index,
have a few favourite lingoes
that most probably explains their chronic grumpiness.
'ca la Moldova'
definition: This is Moldova.
Eric Weiner said this
'...usually said plaintively, palms open.'
And a rhetorical question always follows,
'ce sa fac'
definition: What can I do?
One of the most common is
'No este problema mea.'
definition: Not my problem.
What can you see from here?
What kind of attitudes do you think the people have
when they say these,
when they grow up listening to
people around them speaking these?
'ca la Moldova. ce sa fac.'
sounds like,
'This is my life.
This is my fate.
I'm born loser and
there's nothing I can do about it.'
I can now hear the
'Nobody loves me, everybody hates me' song.
Brrrrr.
Who can be happy speaking and listening to
these words?
We may speak like this
when we fail.
We fail our parents, friends, loved ones.
It's easier to spit,
'This is me.
What can I do?
Don't tell me to hope,
'cos I'm hopeless.'
When we speak like this,
we end up failing ourselves most.
It's easier to remain defeated on the floor,
than to try pick ourselves up -
just in case, we fail again and
embarrass ourselves.
Thinking about it,
it takes Character
to stand up and try again.
It takes Maturity to
desire growth
and understand that
failures are always included in the process of growth.
It takes Character to
take ownership of our lives -
failures or successes,
unhappiness or happiness,
and do something about it.
Naturally, and reasonably,
until we learn to do that,
we are not able to stop saying things like,
'Not my problem.'
If you can't be bothered with your own life,
you'd most likely
not give a hoot about another human being!
We are taught to,
''Love your neighbours as you love yourself.''
How to love others,
when we haven't learned how to
truly love ourselves?
If we truly love ourselves,
I don't think we'll stand seeing ourselves
drown and die in misery.
I like what Weiner wrote in his conclusion
of his investigation in Moldova.
''Lesson number one:
'Not my problem' is not a philosophy.
It's a mental illness.
Right up there with pessimism.
Other people's problems
are our problems.
If your neighbour is laid off,
you may feel you've dodged the bullet,
but you haven't.
The bullet hit you as well.
You just don't feel the pain yet.'
Lession number two:
Poverty, relative poverty [or failure],
is often an excuse for unhappiness.
Yes, Moldovans are poor compared to Europeans,
but clearly it is their reaction to their economic problems,
and not the problems alone,
that explains their unhappiness.
The seeds of Moldovan unhappiness are planted in their culture.
A culture that
belittles the value of
Trust and Friendship.
A culture that
rewards mean-spiritedness and deceit.
A culture that carves out no space for
unrequited kindness,
no space for what St. Augustine called
''the happiness of hope.''
or as the Indian text the Mahabharata says:
'Hope is the sheet anchor of every man.
When hope is destroyed,
great grief follows,
which is almost equal to death itself.' ''
What lingoes do you speak -
especially after failing in something?
When we're 13,
we can blame our parents for creating such
negative [and condemned] products of ourselves with
the pessimistic words they speak to us everyday.
But when we're old enough to roam the Internet,
I believe we should start
taking ownership of our own state of happiness
instead of blaming our childhood and family culture.
We can change it with the words we speak,
day by day.
*
'The quality of a society is more important
than your place in society.'
Ruut Veenhoven
[the scientist behind the World's Happiness Index]
'In other words,
better to be a small fish in a clean pond
than a big fish in a polluted lake.'
Eric Weiner
*
I should be devoted to my exam revision these days
but
I can't resist reading these three books,
and one of which
[a Chinese book - yes, it's surprisingly fantastic that it kept me up till 5a.m.]
I can't wait to share with you about!
It's quite a load so I've to
schedule them to a series of posts -
after the exams.
People advise me to read in order cure insomnia.
But last night,
I'm convicted reading steals my sleep
[and there goes my preaching about sleeping by 12a.m
for flawless complexion].
You have a very merry public holiday!
*
which shapes and carves
the living environment and atmosphere of that place.
It ultimately influences the people who live in it,
and in terms of their happiness level,
what we speak,
what people around us speak,
and what we listen to repititively
is inevitably contagious to our life perspectives
and way of living.
Does our tongue has such power,
to pollute and dampen the state of an entire nation's soul?
Let's investigate.
Moldovans
[click here if you've no idea what this is],
a people who consistently scored the lowest in the World's Happiness Index,
have a few favourite lingoes
that most probably explains their chronic grumpiness.
'ca la Moldova'
definition: This is Moldova.
Eric Weiner said this
'...usually said plaintively, palms open.'
And a rhetorical question always follows,
'ce sa fac'
definition: What can I do?
One of the most common is
'No este problema mea.'
definition: Not my problem.
What can you see from here?
What kind of attitudes do you think the people have
when they say these,
when they grow up listening to
people around them speaking these?
'ca la Moldova. ce sa fac.'
sounds like,
'This is my life.
This is my fate.
I'm born loser and
there's nothing I can do about it.'
I can now hear the
'Nobody loves me, everybody hates me' song.
Brrrrr.
Who can be happy speaking and listening to
these words?
We may speak like this
when we fail.
We fail our parents, friends, loved ones.
It's easier to spit,
'This is me.
What can I do?
Don't tell me to hope,
'cos I'm hopeless.'
When we speak like this,
we end up failing ourselves most.
It's easier to remain defeated on the floor,
than to try pick ourselves up -
just in case, we fail again and
embarrass ourselves.
Thinking about it,
it takes Character
to stand up and try again.
It takes Maturity to
desire growth
and understand that
failures are always included in the process of growth.
It takes Character to
take ownership of our lives -
failures or successes,
unhappiness or happiness,
and do something about it.
Naturally, and reasonably,
until we learn to do that,
we are not able to stop saying things like,
'Not my problem.'
If you can't be bothered with your own life,
you'd most likely
not give a hoot about another human being!
We are taught to,
''Love your neighbours as you love yourself.''
How to love others,
when we haven't learned how to
truly love ourselves?
If we truly love ourselves,
I don't think we'll stand seeing ourselves
drown and die in misery.
I like what Weiner wrote in his conclusion
of his investigation in Moldova.
''Lesson number one:
'Not my problem' is not a philosophy.
It's a mental illness.
Right up there with pessimism.
Other people's problems
are our problems.
If your neighbour is laid off,
you may feel you've dodged the bullet,
but you haven't.
The bullet hit you as well.
You just don't feel the pain yet.'
Lession number two:
Poverty, relative poverty [or failure],
is often an excuse for unhappiness.
Yes, Moldovans are poor compared to Europeans,
but clearly it is their reaction to their economic problems,
and not the problems alone,
that explains their unhappiness.
The seeds of Moldovan unhappiness are planted in their culture.
A culture that
belittles the value of
Trust and Friendship.
A culture that
rewards mean-spiritedness and deceit.
A culture that carves out no space for
unrequited kindness,
no space for what St. Augustine called
''the happiness of hope.''
or as the Indian text the Mahabharata says:
'Hope is the sheet anchor of every man.
When hope is destroyed,
great grief follows,
which is almost equal to death itself.' ''
What lingoes do you speak -
especially after failing in something?
When we're 13,
we can blame our parents for creating such
negative [and condemned] products of ourselves with
the pessimistic words they speak to us everyday.
But when we're old enough to roam the Internet,
I believe we should start
taking ownership of our own state of happiness
instead of blaming our childhood and family culture.
We can change it with the words we speak,
day by day.
*
'The quality of a society is more important
than your place in society.'
Ruut Veenhoven
[the scientist behind the World's Happiness Index]
'In other words,
better to be a small fish in a clean pond
than a big fish in a polluted lake.'
Eric Weiner
*
I should be devoted to my exam revision these days
but
I can't resist reading these three books,
and one of which
[a Chinese book - yes, it's surprisingly fantastic that it kept me up till 5a.m.]
I can't wait to share with you about!
It's quite a load so I've to
schedule them to a series of posts -
after the exams.
People advise me to read in order cure insomnia.
But last night,
I'm convicted reading steals my sleep
[and there goes my preaching about sleeping by 12a.m
for flawless complexion].
You have a very merry public holiday!
*
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