Happy New Year! I’m writing this in India, where I’ve been on a wonderful and hugely inspiring trip. I’ve visited workplaces, meditated on empty country roads and nudged a few sacred cows. What I take home above all is the value of close relationships.
The strong family ties of Indians owe a great deal to the fact that the country is in many ways decentralised, with a state far less powerful than those of the West and China. Even though the British made a determined effort to break up the country’s many kingdoms, culturally it is still the family that serves as Indians’ safety net, accident insurance and pension savings.
I saw those close, strong bonds brought to life in the story of a family member who stormed out of the house in anger — at which the mother shouted out of the window: “You know you’ll come back, so why not come back now?!” Because when the day is done, everyone gathers again, eats dinner and drinks chai in bed. Perhaps we could learn something from that?
In our part of the world, we can quickly hop on Facebook and get a new friend. We can get divorced by text message and set up a new dating profile, and we can even be replaced ourselves by the HR department within a few months. I’m exaggerating, of course, but the point is that it has become unsettlingly easy to pull the plug on a relationship whenever it suits us. Perhaps part of our stress lies in precisely this uncertainty. Relationships have become easy to replace, and the fuse on the ones we already have has grown shorter. The downside is that we risk the same thing happening to us.
On the other hand, there is a solid weight of calm in the stomach when you know that work, friends and family can hold you when you fall in the ditch and are a poor colleague, friend, father or mother. The security of being able to bring almost anything and still keep the relationship makes us dare to explore and less afraid to fail. It gives us experiences we don’t have to travel for.
May 2013 be a year of even stronger relationships with your family, friends and colleagues.
/Martin
Thank goodness it’s almost Monday
