Community Living

 

In school, we had a subject called Community Living. It taught us life skills of how to live in a society, being civil and polite to others and to elders.

Somehow, in the transition to adulthood, I lost track of when and where this subject has disappeared and with the subject is lost the art of politeness and civility in life as well.

Somehow, in the transition to adulthood, I never realized when and how the society itself got flattened where relationships have become less formal and more casual with fewer social norms and a sad loss of civil human behavior.

Somewhere along the way, we have lost our basic social values and this has had a very bad effect on our own personal lives and the family infrastructure.

Children no longer are respectful to elders, employees are rude to seniors and the public less tolerant of service providers.

Civility though costs nothing and buys everything, is a rare commodity in our lives. We have all experienced rude, passive aggressive or hostile behavior in our work place at some time in our lives, many have faced the same in our family life where we don’t escape such behavior from our own children.

We all live in our own cultures and have our own patterns of civil behavior that we deem normal or acceptable or typical. So any change in such accepted behavior affects our life and causes depression.

Early in life, I had come across a piece of advice from a senior who told me that if I take care of all the little things in my life, the big things take care of themselves.

This advice I have taken to heart and follow in my daily personal life as well as work place and have found very helpful.

Human beings are social organisms and we need to meet and stay with other human beings. We live in social groups or communities.

Irrespective of how independent we fell about ourselves, we need to know that we are part of a chain and need to contribute to the society as much as we take from it.

Trusting relationship form the core of this life and has to be ingrained into us.

If you are frustrated at work or find it difficult to live in your family, it is advisable to take a hard look at how you behave towards others at your work place or in your family and  the impact your behavior has on those around you before looking outward at others to assign the blame.

Civility does not mean the mere outward gentleness of speech cultivated for the occasion, but an inborn gentleness and desire to do good to others.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why do we laugh?

Why do we laugh? Or what makes us laugh? I heard a talk by Gaur Gopal Das of iskcon on YouTube about laughing, albeit not on laughter itself It was something like, we don't laugh on same joke but we cry on same problem The first part is interesting Why can't we laugh on same joke? I mean, we hear a joke the first time and find it hilarious and literally roll on the floor laughing But narrate the same joke again and our laughter goes down a few decibels The third time, we get irritated and outright angry hearing it repeatedly So what made is laugh in the first instance? I Google it and I find scientists struggling to explain exactly what makes people laugh Scientific American says laughter releases endorphins, the feel - good chemicals our bodies produce to make us feel happy and even relieve pain or stress Another post tells me that laughter is the best form of therapy Yet, I realize, if I tell a good joke that would normally evoke laughter, falls flat on its face to someone wh...
Read more

Obsessive Comparison Disorder

  One of the least known or discussed about afflictions in humans is the Constant Comparison Disorder, not to be confused with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. The Constant Comparison Disorder is in fact a disorder generally characterized by an obsession with comparing yourself to others. It is considered a disorder only limited to individuals, but I feel as a society, the whole world suffers from this obsessive comparison disorder. The whole society is obsessed with the disorder and so we are fascinated by the classification of the worlds to 20 rich people, worlds top ten richest nations, the worlds top 20 happiest nations and the worlds top 20 most powerful nations …. The list is endless. I recently came across this world happiness report 2023 in which it is mentioned that Finland is the happiest nation in the world. This report has been vociferously contested because India is ranked 126, ranked below several countries including Pakistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka that have bee...
Read more

The short decade

Sometimes in life we have events that somehow refuse to be covered in the blanket of time Events eventually get obliterated in time but some of them cling on like shreds to the thorns of our memories And these shreds haunt us for days or sometimes flutter like flags in the wind years later Many are just in passing but a few loiter in our mind unable to decide whether to trouble us or just invoke pleasant memories Nearly ten years at this post had made me lose my sense of time and so when I received my transfer orders a few days ago they pumped the wind out of me I did not expect any transfer after my intense try two years ago resulted in failure and had made me believe that no one wants to be posted here And today I had this strange feeling of watching a few tiny strings fluttering at the back of my mind They felt like bitter sweet memories of the good times and the not so good times but somehow couldn't decide whether they were indicative of being worthy of retention The surreal f...
Read more