Dear all
Normally we are told to give and take.
It is interesting because our very first breath after we are born is an out breath, not an in breath.
Although this is counter-intuitive, Kabbalistically we are told that the reason for this is because we are givers before we are takers.
Perhaps I should have called this article Take and Take.
This is how my world seems at the moment. My world is the day to day world of life in South Africa.
It seems to me that Colonialism (defined narrowly (locally, micro, in my mind) or broadly (normally, macro, in the world)) involves pushing people down, making them feel insecure, making their self-esteem non-existent, and making people depressed. Good for the drug companies, psychologists and psychiatrists. Bad for society.
So hundreds of years of this Colonialism has pervaded the culture of South Africa.
So much so that I have noticed a pattern with my clients
My clients and my project managers typically push me down. When I have developed something I am proud of, eg I have solved a complex problem, or created something I've never done before, then they say something like "It's a dog's breakfast (i.e. it's untidy and I don't understand it), or "what about doing this", or "what about adding this". IMHO, they do this because they are responsible for negotiating my rate and my annual increase. In order to give me the lowest possible increase, they make me depressed, about myself.
And yet, my consumers are delighted by my work. I get all sorts of incredible messages of support and love from them. As I think this through more and more I realise that my clients, ie the people paying me, have had their brains programmed to push me down, whilst my consumers love what I do, and their brains are wired differently.
I wonder if this is taught in schools and universities in South Africa.
I was lucky enough to study my MBA (Masters in Business Administration) degree at Cranfield University (at that time it was called Cranfield Institute of Technology, a name I prefer as a Technologist), at Cranfield, in the UK. I learnt how to enhance my employees. I learnt how to nurture them. I learnt how to pick them up. I learnt how to lead. I learnt how to develop their (and my) self-esteem.
I did my MBA in 1991/1992. I lived in the UK from 1989 until 1995, and I've been back in South Africa since August 1995. And it has taken me 24 years to realise what's going on.
It's good timing as well, as it's Pesach (Passover) next week, on the 19th April 2019 (14th Nissan 5779 in the Hebrew Calendar). In Pesach, we are told to VHiGaDaTa LeVinCha ( והגדת ×œ×‘×™× ×š והגדת is from הגדה (Haggadah). ie we should Relate it to our Children. The normal translation is "we shall Tell it". But Pesach is about Relating; it's about Relationship; it's about Relativity. And as a Relational Database Expert, I know all about Relationships, and it is yet another "coincidence" in my life as I move from my Information World of IT, to the In-formation World of Kabbalah. And if you don't have children, then you relate the story with your friends and you have discussions.
It's interesting. Even at my clients, where the client pushes me down, the client's boss (or bosses) is (are) incredibly happy with my work. Sometimes asking me for more help.
But I've learnt to overcome this. I know that what I've done is good work. I know that I've solved problems. I know that I've fixed systems. My consumers are saying wonderful things to me. My bosses bosses are happy. The directors of the company are happy. My wffe is happy. I should be happy.
It's time for the depressed people to lift themselves up. To distinguish between clients and consumers, and if their consumers are happy they should be happy. As this happens, one should build one's self-esteem so that one can realise that actually it doesn't matter what other people think. For 20 years, I've been "on about" focussing on the next week of my life. If I can make the next week "free" and especially "stress free", then I can make the rest of my life "free" and therefore "stress-free." Most of us are socialised (a nice way of saying brainwashed) into believing that we must save for retirement, in 40 years, then 30 years, then 20 years, and in my case 10 years away. And "suddenly" most people realise that they aren't ready (financially) for retirement.
So my dream (a dream is a "vision" in business terms - because dreamers have visions) is that I can make my own electricity, and water and food, and that I've paid off my house and my car and everything inside the house. So if I've paid for my electricity and water and food, and everything else is paid off, then I am "retired", ie I am free.
Pesach is the Festival of our Freedom. It is a time for remembering that we ourselves must feel that we have been taken out of Egypt. We are Released from Egypt so that we can be Redeemed from Slavery. Redemption is about being bought out of slavery. One way to get this done is to allow God to help us with our Redemption. To ask God to help us move from Mitzrayim (the dark place, the unconscious, known as Egypt in the Bible) to Israel (the light place, known as Israel in the Bible).
As we move from darkness to light, we feel lighter. We left the heaviness behind us. We become en-light-ened. As we become more and more enlightened, as for me enlightenment has been an iterative process, we see more and more patterns. eg the Take and Give pattern that I am speaking about in this article. As we become more and more enlightened, we can go further and further into our dark places, into our shadows, until our unconscious, finding those crisp and hardened pieces of ourselves, and emerging them into the light.
In the past, this swing was "real" for me. I went down, became depressed, spent months or years surfacing, then spent a year or two in the light, being "high", and then the next depression hit, either caused by myself leaping over a chasm and missing, and landing in the chasm, or caused by an Energy Vampire dragging me down into their pit.
Now I'm balanced. I'm centrered. I'm on what Buddhists and Kabbalists refer to as "The Middle Path". I can reach into the depths of my soul, feel the harshness and hardness, and hardening of my heart, and emerge that feeling into the light. Staying balanced, I can heal those wounds, for myself and for others.
Truly, we need to give and take. We need to give more than we take. We can never give everything we have, as we have our life, that God gives us back each morning. To be "lucky" as our Buddhist Teacher Ken tells us. We are lucky to be here today on earth, to help God make the world Good. God creates and He says its "good". Each day we are here, we should help in this creative process to make the world a little bit more perfect, a little bit more good.
And by doing this we build up our self-esteem. If someone pushes us down, we know that we are ok. We cannot "get knotted" and our guts cannot "get knotted". We actually undo the knots that have been imposed on our minds. Our slavery is undone. We are free and we are redeemed.
Regards
David
Dayvid
Normally we are told to give and take.
It is interesting because our very first breath after we are born is an out breath, not an in breath.
Although this is counter-intuitive, Kabbalistically we are told that the reason for this is because we are givers before we are takers.
My ex-wfie was a taker. I am a giver. It was a recipe for disaster. When people ask me for marriage advice, I say you must both be takers, like my parents, or both be givers, like my wife, Mirjana, and I. A giver and taker? Difficult. The giver gives until there is nothing left to give, and then the giver gives their soul, and becomes a slave.
Perhaps I should have called this article Take and Take.
This is how my world seems at the moment. My world is the day to day world of life in South Africa.
It seems to me that Colonialism (defined narrowly (locally, micro, in my mind) or broadly (normally, macro, in the world)) involves pushing people down, making them feel insecure, making their self-esteem non-existent, and making people depressed. Good for the drug companies, psychologists and psychiatrists. Bad for society.
So hundreds of years of this Colonialism has pervaded the culture of South Africa.
So much so that I have noticed a pattern with my clients
First a definition: Clients are the same as Customers. But Consumers are different. A parent might buy a nappy for parent's baby, and the parent is the client and the baby is the consumer.
My clients and my project managers typically push me down. When I have developed something I am proud of, eg I have solved a complex problem, or created something I've never done before, then they say something like "It's a dog's breakfast (i.e. it's untidy and I don't understand it), or "what about doing this", or "what about adding this". IMHO, they do this because they are responsible for negotiating my rate and my annual increase. In order to give me the lowest possible increase, they make me depressed, about myself.
And yet, my consumers are delighted by my work. I get all sorts of incredible messages of support and love from them. As I think this through more and more I realise that my clients, ie the people paying me, have had their brains programmed to push me down, whilst my consumers love what I do, and their brains are wired differently.
I wonder if this is taught in schools and universities in South Africa.
I was lucky enough to study my MBA (Masters in Business Administration) degree at Cranfield University (at that time it was called Cranfield Institute of Technology, a name I prefer as a Technologist), at Cranfield, in the UK. I learnt how to enhance my employees. I learnt how to nurture them. I learnt how to pick them up. I learnt how to lead. I learnt how to develop their (and my) self-esteem.
I did my MBA in 1991/1992. I lived in the UK from 1989 until 1995, and I've been back in South Africa since August 1995. And it has taken me 24 years to realise what's going on.
It's good timing as well, as it's Pesach (Passover) next week, on the 19th April 2019 (14th Nissan 5779 in the Hebrew Calendar). In Pesach, we are told to VHiGaDaTa LeVinCha ( והגדת ×œ×‘×™× ×š והגדת is from הגדה (Haggadah). ie we should Relate it to our Children. The normal translation is "we shall Tell it". But Pesach is about Relating; it's about Relationship; it's about Relativity. And as a Relational Database Expert, I know all about Relationships, and it is yet another "coincidence" in my life as I move from my Information World of IT, to the In-formation World of Kabbalah. And if you don't have children, then you relate the story with your friends and you have discussions.
It's interesting. Even at my clients, where the client pushes me down, the client's boss (or bosses) is (are) incredibly happy with my work. Sometimes asking me for more help.
But I've learnt to overcome this. I know that what I've done is good work. I know that I've solved problems. I know that I've fixed systems. My consumers are saying wonderful things to me. My bosses bosses are happy. The directors of the company are happy. My wffe is happy. I should be happy.
It's time for the depressed people to lift themselves up. To distinguish between clients and consumers, and if their consumers are happy they should be happy. As this happens, one should build one's self-esteem so that one can realise that actually it doesn't matter what other people think. For 20 years, I've been "on about" focussing on the next week of my life. If I can make the next week "free" and especially "stress free", then I can make the rest of my life "free" and therefore "stress-free." Most of us are socialised (a nice way of saying brainwashed) into believing that we must save for retirement, in 40 years, then 30 years, then 20 years, and in my case 10 years away. And "suddenly" most people realise that they aren't ready (financially) for retirement.
So my dream (a dream is a "vision" in business terms - because dreamers have visions) is that I can make my own electricity, and water and food, and that I've paid off my house and my car and everything inside the house. So if I've paid for my electricity and water and food, and everything else is paid off, then I am "retired", ie I am free.
Pesach is the Festival of our Freedom. It is a time for remembering that we ourselves must feel that we have been taken out of Egypt. We are Released from Egypt so that we can be Redeemed from Slavery. Redemption is about being bought out of slavery. One way to get this done is to allow God to help us with our Redemption. To ask God to help us move from Mitzrayim (the dark place, the unconscious, known as Egypt in the Bible) to Israel (the light place, known as Israel in the Bible).
As we move from darkness to light, we feel lighter. We left the heaviness behind us. We become en-light-ened. As we become more and more enlightened, as for me enlightenment has been an iterative process, we see more and more patterns. eg the Take and Give pattern that I am speaking about in this article. As we become more and more enlightened, we can go further and further into our dark places, into our shadows, until our unconscious, finding those crisp and hardened pieces of ourselves, and emerging them into the light.
In the past, this swing was "real" for me. I went down, became depressed, spent months or years surfacing, then spent a year or two in the light, being "high", and then the next depression hit, either caused by myself leaping over a chasm and missing, and landing in the chasm, or caused by an Energy Vampire dragging me down into their pit.
Now I'm balanced. I'm centrered. I'm on what Buddhists and Kabbalists refer to as "The Middle Path". I can reach into the depths of my soul, feel the harshness and hardness, and hardening of my heart, and emerge that feeling into the light. Staying balanced, I can heal those wounds, for myself and for others.
Truly, we need to give and take. We need to give more than we take. We can never give everything we have, as we have our life, that God gives us back each morning. To be "lucky" as our Buddhist Teacher Ken tells us. We are lucky to be here today on earth, to help God make the world Good. God creates and He says its "good". Each day we are here, we should help in this creative process to make the world a little bit more perfect, a little bit more good.
And by doing this we build up our self-esteem. If someone pushes us down, we know that we are ok. We cannot "get knotted" and our guts cannot "get knotted". We actually undo the knots that have been imposed on our minds. Our slavery is undone. We are free and we are redeemed.
Regards
David
Dayvid
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