7 Everyday Things I'm Grateful For

This may come off as cliché and cheesy to the cynical, but I was in a contemplative state of mind, reflecting on my life and the good and bad that have come with it.  The conclusion I came to is a list of things that might seem trivial, and oftentimes get overlooked, but that have enriched my life.  Each one in turn seems to have enhanced the next, and the further down the list you go, they seem to become less essentially animal necessities and more existentially human gifts.

Seven always seems to be a magic and convenient number when people write lists like this, so here it is: 7 Everyday Things I’m Grateful For:

7. Health – Like anybody, I have my share of ailments.  I don’t have the best eyesight, and my knees give me trouble from time to time.  However, these things have never been the kind of thing to interfere too much with my ability to live day-to-day.  In fact, although my family members and I have all had our share of sicknesses and a surgery here and there, none of my siblings has ever broken a bone or had a major disability.  It is a thing that we all-too-often over look, but it is amazing how much happier we can be just by acknowledging and being grateful for our basic health.

6. Financial Necessities – When my dad was a kid, my grandpa started a real estate business with a partner.  After awhile, he started to notice some irregularities in the accounting, and by the time he realized what had happened, his business partner had taken thousands of dollars of stockholder money and disappeared.  My grandpa could have felt justified in condemning the partner and leaving the shareholders with the bill, but being a man of extreme moral integrity, he vowed to work hard to pay back all the money that had been stolen.  This led to years of less than stellar financial prospects for my dad and the rest of the family growing up, but they were given something much more valuable: a strong work ethic and sense of integrity.  Anyone who knows my dad can attest to this, and this is the situation I was born into.  His academic credentials might not be as impressive as those of others who were able to get more advanced degrees, but his resume shows an understanding of the value of hard work and respect for other people, and as such, we have never had to endure such difficult financial times as many others unfortunately have.  Of course there have been times when money has been tight, and this recent financial crisis has been one of them – my dad even lost his job, as times are particularly tough in the commercial construction sector – but he was able to find a new job relatively quickly.  As a result of this relative financial stability, my siblings and I have never had to go without the necessities of life.  We have had that same work ethic and sense of responsibility instilled in us.  Also, the fact that we have all been fortunate enough to have good health has helped us financially because we haven’t been burdened by medical bills, so we have been able to save money for a rainy day.  Think of that.  When in the history of mankind have so many people actually been able to make enough money to cover their expenses and then some, to the point where they were able to save money for some other time when it might be needed more?

5. Opportunity – From 2003 to 2005, I lived in Uruguay, South America, and I got to know some incredibly humble people.  Many of these people would get up early in the morning, work all day at an unrewarding job, and come home in time to go to bed and try to rest enough to fuel themselves for the next day’s work.  These were some of the most grateful people I had ever talked to.  They were just glad to have a way to pay the bills.  As I mentioned above, my family has been blessed with financial stability, to the point that I was able to graduate high school, go on a religious mission, get a job and go to college, and now go to grad school.  The small opportunities compound on each other to produce larger and larger ones.  Whereas thousands of people in the history of humanity were born into a life of drudgery and died forgotten, I was born in a place and time when I can make something of myself.

4. Leisure – Because of the immense opportunities I have been blessed with, I have a gift that is rather unique from the perspective of history: leisure.  Instead of pushing a plow for the rest of my life, I can read, travel, and learn.  I have a computer in my room that I can use to learn about what is going on in the world, how it impacts me, and how I can impact it.  I have a piano and several guitars at my disposal that I can use to create music.  I can go to school and learn about how the world works, and learn how to improve life for myself and for my family.

3. Art and Natural Beauty – Because of this leisure time I have to think about things not immediately related to my survival, I am able to gain an appreciation for art and natural beauty.  This is the old adage of stopping to “smell the roses.”  Anyone who has ever stepped outside in the late evening to watch the sunset or been in the mountains alone while it’s snowing can understand the beauty that I am talking about.  Goethe wrote that “one ought, every day at least, to hear a little song, read a good poem, see a fine picture and, if possible, speak a few reasonable words.”  There is a lot of ugliness in the world, and there is a lot of beauty.  I believe that you can find beauty anywhere if you look for it.

2. Friends and Family – In a lot of ways, life is an experiment, in that sometimes the only way to learn something is by trial and error.  There is a lot of up and down in life, and that is why I am grateful for the helping influence of friends and family.  They turn “I’m in this alone” into “we’re in this together.”  The Incubus song Dig sums up the idea that I’m getting at, when the singer says, presumably to a close friend, “Lift me up from under what is covering the better part of me…Remind me that we’ll always have each other when everything else is gone.”

1. Opposition – In the LDS faith, we seem to say all the time that we are grateful for the “trials and tribulations” that we face, but when they come our way, we tend to complain and wish we didn’t have to go through them.  They are things we love to have gone through, but hate actually going through.  I admit that I, like anybody, suffer from the same short-sightedness when it comes to going through hard times.  However, I am learning to complain less and try to see the bigger picture.  A lot of the bad in the world is the result of other people’s choices, or our own.  And a lot of it is the result of things that could not be avoided.  I believe that this is part of the purpose of life.  As Alfred, Batman’s trusty butler said, we fall “so we can learn to pick ourselves back up.”  In other words, often when we are going through trials, I believe it is so that we can learn something about ourselves and grow as human beings.  Sure, life would be a lot easier if there were only good times, but after awhile, wouldn’t it become boring and tedious?  On the other hand, we become physically stronger by lifting weights, we become stronger in spirit and character by going through resistance.  Sometimes it is to learn something and grow, and other times it might just be so that we can learn to appreciate the good times.  Like I said above, this is where good friends and family are really helpful.

Like I said before, it’s really about perspective.  In the end, we can look at all the ugliness in life and be bitter, or we can look at the beauty and find ways to enhance it for ourselves and for others.  In the words of the French rock band Kyo, “La vie mérite qu’on l’aime.”

The God Delusion's False Conclusion

Since the beginning of sentient man’s existence, people have wondered where they, as well as the universe, came from.  For the majority of people, the answer has been simple: God (or a god, or gods) put it there.  We really had no other way to explain the world.  As time passed, and mankind developed science, the body of collective historical knowledge accessible to us grew.  As more and more of the processes we witness were explained in technical terms, instead of as “miracles,” many began to believe that there was ultimately no reason to believe in a God; all natural phenomena could be dissected and explained.  To these atheists, people who believed in any kind of supernatural or higher power were generally ignorant and easily manipulated.  Religions existed for the purpose of uniting and controlling the masses.  Moreover, religions weren’t just the quaint stupidities of the weak and simpleminded.  They made enemies of peoples who didn’t worship the same God, leading to wars and acts of terrorism.  An appeal to an authority higher and more important than any one person inspired people who were willing to kill and die to please their bloodthirsty God.  Blind faith in an “invisible friend” would especially be dangerous when held by political leaders, who would therefore not govern rationally, but rather impose their beliefs on their subjects.

A fortunate or unfortunate fact, depending on one’s outlook, is that we cannot prove the existence of God.  To do so would require the use of an alternate, “control” universe, in which we know for a fact that there is a God.  By comparing our results, we could either lend credibility to, or disprove our hypothesis.  We must remember, however, that “the burden of proof lies with the plaintiff,” meaning that not proving one hypothesis does not in itself prove its antithesis.  The fact that my colleague cannot prove it is raining outside does not mean that I have proven that it is sunny.  Likewise, the fact that atheism cannot be proven does not prove that there is a God.

However, the opposite of this statement is also true, because we do not have a control universe in which we know there is no God.  In this case, atheism become the plaintiff case, the positive assertion of the nonexistence of God, wherein lies the burden of proof.  If neither case can be experimentally proven, then the default state, or rather, the only conclusion at which we can arrive relying solely on fact we absolutely know, is that of agnosticism, the assertion that we cannot know whether or not there is a God.  Aside from that, all we can do is rely on evidences for the existence or nonexistence of God, and arrive at our conclusion, just as a judge must weigh evidence for and against a given case in order arrive at a verdict.   For the deistically inclined, these evidences can include personal, spiritual experiences. However, this verdict relies to some degree on faith - believing in something you can't prove - regardless of how strong the case for or against it may be.  This is a notion that the religious are used to and comfortable with, but that atheists will definitely have difficulty with.  In order to satisfy ourselves with a conclusion of theism, the belief in the existence of God, or atheism, the belief in the nonexistence in God, we must rely on some amount of faith, contingent on the various empirical evidences we might have.  Various arguments postulated over the centuries, from the teleological argument for the existence of an intelligent designer, to the problem of evil and its implications against the idea of an all-powerful and all-benevolent God, are merely evidences to support the feasibility of a conclusion.  That conclusion, however, is ultimately sustained by faith.

The other arguments made against religions are subject to examination as well.  Religion, especially national or otherwise organized, can lead to manipulation of the masses, discrimination against those “heathens” who do not share the faith, and even wars and terrorism.  Leaders will govern by religious opinion, rather than by rational principle.  These may be true, but looking closely, we can see that these implications could be true of an atheist society as well.  The Reign of Terror under Robespierre and the Soviet Union under Stalin are two prime examples of atheist societies where discrimination, persecution, and terrorism occurred in the name of an enlightened, Godless, new order.  Modern atheism, with its militant (or shall we say “evangelical”) approach can be every bit as bigoted and discriminatory as some manifestations of Christianity have been.

Furthermore, these arguments are true of any factor that divides people by party lines.  Perhaps as notoriously divisive as religion throughout human history is the issue of race.  Countless wars have been fought in the name of asserting one race’s dominion over another.  We have no further to look back than the Rwanda crisis of the early 1990’s to see a society divided by race tearing itself apart.  Yet abolishing race is certainly not the answer to solving this type of crisis.  Religion, like race, is not the factor that turns brother against brother.  People of diverse races and religions can coexist peacefully.  A manipulative demagogue, looking for a bogeyman with which to scare the masses into unified submission, will never be at a loss for such divisive factors to separate factions, whether they be religion, race, socioeconomic class, political leaning, etc.

Vilifying religion and campaigning to eliminate it will not end religious strife.  Majorities have always historically persecuted minorities.  They are different and therefore threatening.   And, as demonstrated above, neither conclusion can be unequivocally proven.  Belief is in the eye of the beholder.  Closed-mindedness is the condition wherein a person is unwilling to entertain the idea that contrary views might be right, not just “those who don’t agree with me are wrong because I have SCIENCE!”  The important thing is to be secure enough in one’s own belief as to not feel threatened by the beliefs of others.  That is the true way to peaceful coexistence.  At least, that is what I believe.

Language Learning: Whys and Hows

There is a commonly told joke around the world:

What do you call someone who speaks two languages? Bilingual.

What do you call someone who speaks three languages? Trilingual.

What do you call someone who only speaks one language? American.

While it is true that America is not the only region on Earth where many people are monolingual (the real word for someone who only speaks one language, in case that one got you thinking), we Americans are the ones who really get a lot of bad attention as such.  Much of this may be due to the fact that we as a nation and people are generally more visible to others, due to America being the largest economic, political, military, and cultural influence in the world, and also due to the fact that so many of our citizens have been seen so many places trying to find a bathroom, shouting slowly at “foreigners” in English and gesticulating wildly.

But whether you are American or not, the fact remains that many of the people you know – and maybe even you – only speak one language, and may in fact consider themselves “bad” at learning languages.  This is a sad conclusion, and there is a decent chance that it is incorrect. Practically every person in the world learns at least one language to a high enough proficiency as to be extremely useful on a day-to-day basis.  Why, then, do people so naturally pick up a first language, but find learning a second to be so difficult?

Part of the reason is because of the way we go about learning a new language.  As small children, we learn our first language very gradually.  At first, we begin to mimic the sounds we hear our parents make.  Eventually we learn more and more sounds, and start learning small words, then bigger ones and small sentences.  Before we ever have our first grammar lesson in school we can already communicate quite fluently in our native language.  We don’t start trying to memorize vocabulary lists until we are learning to spell and write.  All of our formative learning comes from listening and speaking.  Also, we have to learn a first language in order to communicate.  Pointing, grunting, and crying only get you so far.

In contrast, most of us take a foreign language in high school because we have to in order to graduate.  We never intend to actually remember or use it. We just need the credits. Therefore the motivation will only take us as far as the end of the semester.  Additionally, while trying to learn our second language in class, we normally learn from textbooks, and try to memorize complex verbal paradigms and long vocabulary lists.  We try to learn a language the way we try to learn biology: by cramming the night before a test, and then not using the material ever again.  Sure, it helps us to pass the class, but how many of us actually remember much from our high school biology classes?  We tend to treat language learning the same way.

Language is best learned the way a musical instrument is learned: by practicing every day.  If I only study chord charts and music theory, I will never become a great guitarist.  On the other hand, many great guitarists don’t have a strong theoretical grasp of music theory as I might.  They are great because they have spent countless hours practicing playing their instrument.  The only way to become good at it is to do it.

As children we were not nearly as averse to making mistakes as we are now.  Children make mistakes all the time in speaking, and when corrected, they confidently continue speaking, unfazed by criticism.  As adults, we somehow have instilled in us the notion that mistakes equal failure and are, therefore, the opposite of progress and success, and this assumption is particularly ingrained in the area of language learning. While living in South America for two years, I taught public English classes in several different cities, and in each city I met people who knew English grammar better than most American college students, but who could barely utter a coherent sentence spontaneously.  Each phrase required painstaking concentration, because they had spent their time in class memorizing charts and lists, but never venturing to actually use the language.  When learning something as organic as a language, we must initially focus more on speaking than on speaking correctly.  Of course grammar is important, and if we don’t speak correctly we won’t be understood well, but we will be better understood than if we don’t speak at all.

The importance of learning a second language cannot be overstated.  As Americans, we have become spoiled by the fact that the language we effortlessly learned as children is the language that billions of people expend a great deal of effort to learn in order to participate in the global marketplace.  However, times they are a-changing.  Countries such as China are becoming the new economic powerhouses in the global arena.  The Chinese upper and middle classes are growing at astounding rates. Indeed, the Chinese middle class alone is as populous as the whole of the United States.  These people are suddenly finding themselves with new money and are looking for things to spend it on, and they, as well as the rest of the world, have developed a taste for things American during the twentieth century.  Also, minority populations are growing at a faster rate in the United States than are “Anglo” populations.  At the beginning of the last decade, a headline appeared in the New York Times, saying in Spanish, “If you cannot read this, you will be left behind in the future.”  Those who have the ability to communicate with these fast-growing groups will be at a huge advantage over those who can’t or refuse to.

Furthermore, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis states that the way a person perceives and interprets the world around him is conditioned to a large degree by his language.  A corollary to this would be that in learning a new language, a person can learn new ways to perceive and interpret the world.  It has been said before that to learn a new language is to gain another soul.

To those who are struggling with learning a language, or who think they aren’t good at it, I say, keep up the good work!  Do what you have to in order to pass your classes, but use the new tool you are developing!  It will open new doors to you that you never knew could be opened!  Even if the language is one that you will seldom use in day-to-day contexts, the insights it will bring you will in themselves prove to be worth the effort you put in.

To those who think learning a language is not worth it, I say, you will be left behind in the future.  The twentieth century paradigm of superpower nation and satellite states is being replaced by the twenty-first century model of a community of nations and unions that compete and cooperate in a global arena.  In order to market to and succeed in such a world, you must be willing to understand the people with whom you mean to do business.

Contact me for more information about learning another language.

StrengthsFinder

I mentioned the StrengthsFinder in a previous post, and several people have asked me about it, so I will write a little more about it today.

The StrengthsFinder profile is the result of a 30-year research project conducted by Gallup (although they are known for their polling, most of their operations in fact deal with management consulting).  It is a tool to assess one’s inherent attributes, similar to the famous Myers Briggs Type Indicator.  During the orientation for the MBA program at Chapman, we each took the test and received our results so that we could discuss them in the context of team-building and management, essential to the degree we were pursuing, but also very useful to understanding oneself in a variety of situations in life.

The premise behind the StrengthsFinder profile is the idea that people can achieve more by focusing their energies on improving in areas where they are already strong, or have more of a potential to be strong.  The book Now, Discover Your Strengths, by Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton, which originally presented the idea, points out that “StrengthsFinder’s purpose is not to anoint you with strengths but to find where you have the greatest potential for a strength.”  Thus, the results that one gets from taking the test may not necessarily line up with things that the person has focused on already or even known they had the potential to develop.

That said, when I took the StrengthsFinder test, my top five results were Intellection, Empathy, Adaptability, Connectedness, and Ideation.  As described in the book, people who have Intellection are those who spend a lot of time thinking, questioning, and processing ideas.  They are the kind who you never want to ask what is on their mind unless you want to hear the whole train of thought that led there.  Those with Empathy are those who are able to “sense” and relate to the emotions of those around them, and can understand things from the point of view of others.  Adaptability is the uncanny ability to “go with the flow,” and not be adversely affected by sudden change.  Connectedness is the ability to see abstract connections between seemingly unrelated concepts, things, or ideas.  Finally, those with Ideation are those who seem to always be coming up with new ideas.  (I mentioned Activator in an earlier post. Those with Activator are those who seem to take every idea and turn it into action.  I definitely don’t have Activator, and as a consequence I seem to take action on only a small percentage of the ideas that I have!)

It is noteworthy that although a strength may not be listed among my top five that I received when I took the test, I may still have it as a strength.  Furthermore, it might even appear in my top five if I were to take the test again, as the results depends on the way I answer the questions.  This simply means that I have more than five strengths, and some manifest themselves more than others in different situations or at different times.

A useful and interesting application of these results is team-building.  A good two-person team might consist of someone with Ideation to come up with creative new ideas and someone with Activator to implement the idea.  Other combinations of people can be made based on the desired result.

For more information, see the StrengthsFinder website or read the book Now, Discover Your Strengths.

All Systems Go

Ok. After messing with this thing most of the weekend and the first part of the week, I think I've got it mostly set up how I want it for the time being. I'll still be doing some editing on some of the pages, especially the Home and Projects pages, but I will now be able to focus more on writing than on formatting and coding. So stay tuned for some entertaining and enlightening reads. Also, feel free to comment about the site in general on the Comments page. Thanks!

Another One Bites the Dust...

I was always kind of opposed to starting a blog. Not on any kind of moral or philosophical grounds or anything.  I just didn't think it was worth it.  Most of the blogs that I had seen out there were people ranting about how they got cut off on the way to work in the morning, or on their theories that the government was using chemtrails to control our minds, or stuff like that that I really didn't care about.  Most of my ranting and theorizing was done out loud to my friends, who (hopefully!) cared more about what I thought than the interwebs did.  I've always been reluctant to write, too.  Don't get me wrong, I've had plenty of ideas to write about, but Ideation is one of my strengths (anyone ever taken the Gallup StrengthsFinder test?), whereas Activator, sadly isn't (as my mom will be the first to tell you).

However, it seems to be the way of the future. All the cool kids are doing it. Also, I got this nifty website set up, so I kind of have to do it now, right?  So anyway, here goes nothing.  I'll be posting every now and then, as bloggers are wont to do.  If you see something you like, say something.  If you see something you don't like, be civil.

So there it is. My first blog post! Stay tuned for more...

N.b. I have spoken with a few people about that StrengthsFinder concept.  It's a really interesting one, and I will write more about it later.