Perspective

Tradition

2012-01-27T18:22:00.000-08:00

From Wikipedia

A tradition is a ritual, belief or object passed down within a society, still maintained in the present, with origins in the past

And its been a while that I am thinking about the meaning of tradition and I guess I can make some comments on this definition.
Looking for the meaning of "society" in wikipedia

A society is a group of people related to each other through persistent relations, or a large social grouping sharing the same geographical or virtual territory ...

So it does not say anything about the number of the people but usually when we talk about society a large number comes to our mind.
Second is the term "origin in the past'. How much time should be passed on? Can we think of something like one month ago or necessarily it should come from generations way back in time?
I would also like to replace the phrase "ritual and beliefs" with something less sophisticated like behavior and ideas.

I always praised people who were not traditional and I always did my best to be one of them. Not that it always went according to the plan but I never lost my taste for anything nontraditional, uncustomary and unconventional. I believe fighting traditions and not automatically accepting whatever people say just because they heard it somewhere is a value by itself, although I accept there may be a huge argument against it.

Consider a scenario that a group of (3?) people happens to have something going on every week (something like a party) and they started that a month ago. By definition this can be a tradition and if one of them happens to not continue this he may have experience some isolation from the other two just like what could happen when people didn't comply with the rules of societies.
I can think of something even simpler. What if someone, for whatever ideological or stupid reason, doesn't like to say hi to people s/he sees every morning at work. Won't s/he be an outcast of that small society?

And here is my dilemma: Can we really live a nontraditional life or just being among other people means living traditionally? What happens to freedom of mind? How can someone be an action and not a reaction to what others want? Where is the boundary of living traditionally and modern?

Who wins the race

2012-01-17T18:07:00.000-08:00

The most annoying person ...

does not acknowledge other's presence
comments on everything no matter what the subject is
makes sure others confess they know nothing about a subject if s/he does not know anything about it
believes s/he is better than everyone in (almost) everything even if s/he is only 30
tries to be nice to everyone just to make use of them later
makes fun of others instead of being funny
assumes absolutely no possibilities for something to be false if s/he thinks its true
pretends to be something s/he loves to be
intellect is a subject to talk about but when it comes to action s/he forgets all about it
insult others when s/he wants to be honest ...

Oh, wait! ... I guess I know this person ...

What have I become ... I used to believe in a spacious world ... what have I become ...

Glasses of our fathers

2012-01-02T11:22:00.000-08:00

I assume part of growing up is to throw away our childhood glasses and look at the world around us with our naked eyes. Depending on morals and attitudes of our family and the place and time we grew up in we have different brands and model of glasses on. Religion and politics play an important role for sure but at the end it all goes back to family and how they see the world. When trying to explain the world around us for kids we always have to decide on how much of the truth can be told. How people treat each other in real is considered too much for a little one's world.
Well I have certain doubts about this behavior of human race. For instance think about any of those things we hide from kids and assume it was something that could be seen on streets every day. It was not a secret any more and all kids would know about it from the beginning. Would it still be problematic?
For now every family has to use this protection glasses. The problems raise when we forget to change these glasses in time as the kid grows up. Many times when the kid is not a kid anymore and leave the house to start its own life these glasses are still there. Family is not around anymore and sooner or later these glasses break into pieces and reality comes in but in a shocking way.
I guess some people decide to learn about the real world at this time. They need to spend a lot of their productive years on exploring things that they should have done years before. They would always feel this contradiction between their childish needs and their responsibilities in the society as an adult. When they can overcome the problem depends on many things. Some people never escape from this frustration.
In reaction to the shocking reality some people though glue together all the pieces of the glasses and put them back. The shock is so huge that they cannot bear it. They decide not to look at those things that bother them or even deny their existence. They will be vulnerable people that the shock can attack them every now and then. They are in a constant escape from reality and remain in their childish world. This can have a much more devastating outcome comparing to the first group. Those people at least now there is a problem and are in a constant struggle to tune their childish behaviors to their responsibilities as adults. The second group don't see the problem. They act childish when they need to be an adult and it can happen in their social or personal life. If they are lucky some day they understand it and join the first group but they are way behind in their life.

This boring game

2011-12-16T16:29:00.000-08:00

I wrote this a long time ago in "Training manual for enjoying life":

Chapter 2: define a few goals and enjoy each step toward them. No needto accomplish them.

I revisited this a week ago and suddenly today someone gave me another version of it.

Happiness is not the goal in our modern life and we've been thought that being successful is the most important aspect of life and happiness comes with success automatically.
Probably for most of us when we look back to those thing that we have accomplished we can consider ourselves being successful but we usually don't have enough time for these moments mental nourishment; instead we always change the meaning of success and define new goals and aim for something better.
I agree that it is natural or at least OK because that's how we move ahead and remain hopeful and active but the problem comes in when our happiness is hooked up with our success.
That's when happiness is also something out of reach and life turns to a dissatisfying maneuver between obstacles just not to hit anything and reach the end of the game.

Intellect

2011-11-21T23:16:00.000-08:00

I've been visiting this page every now and then for the last couple of months just to see if I could write again. I imagined myself typing and writing with free spirit and sharp mind. I asked myself if I can really write just not about myself but about the world around me; If I can talk about those tiny things that make my world, our world. I saw myself filled with new thoughts and eager to write about them and then asked myself if I can fit that image.

Well there are always hesitations, or I may say reasoning, and I have a bunch of them. Writing in English is one of them. I still don't feel confident enough to write about something other than stress and strain but I though what harm can that make. Those who don't like it can simply ignore my blog. I had to start somewhere someday.

Another drawback is the vivid memory of what happened before.I am not sure how I can force myself not to think about others' feelings, their criticism or even sarcasm and focus on what I believe really matters. I still don't know how I'm going to avoid that destructive attitude. I just know I feel the the power in me to overcome anything and everything. I feel I can pick out those ruinous words and throw them away.

I am truly happy. I feel the energy to move on. No! that's not it. I feel the need to talk and write. I need ears to hear me loud. I'd rather to talk for those who give themselves some time before commenting on other's thoughts. Those who listen before talking. I appreciate the time people give to every word they write here. I like a spring of wisely chosen words rather than a nonstop flood of letters running just to wash out and take away everything.

I found blogging a place to find people who think after hearing sometning and before commenting on it; those who have a watchman on the way from their ears to their mouth: their intellect.

2010-06-24T09:04:00.000-07:00

That's it. This weblog had become far from my real thoughts and it became harder and harder to write something while thinking about something else. It was not fun anymore. I was fooling myself by pretending that those posts were my real concerns and it was against the only reason of creating this weblog or its ancestors. Clicking the delete button was sccary but I made it at last.

I keep it for the time I feel ready again.