What would life be, if
we only live to enjoy it all alone?
People nowadays pretend
to believe that if they secure their own place in this world, everything will
be fine. They then get what they want but they start realizing how less they
actually have and how alone and sad their life is…and this is because they do
not care about sharing.
Life is not always fair
because there are enough people suffering in this world, but if you are a kind
of person who happen to be enough lucky to enjoy life fully, do not ever forget
to share it.. Maybe also with people that are less lucky then you are.
I sometimes feel so
grateful for the life I have, for the life I build for myself, for the simple
fact that I was lucky enough to be born and grow up in a place where the access
to a lot of opportunities and choices is not limited. I never felt as grateful
as I do now. Having the great chance to live in different parts of this world
really opened my vision, my perspective in life and I start seeing things
differently.
I was born in Romania; I
lived there for about 20 years until I decide it is time for me to see and
experience something different. While living in Romania, it always felt like my
life is limited, that life is unfair and that the way people live their life is
by just accepting living it the way the whole community does. I never felt free
enough to be myself and do things the way I thought is worth doing it. And that
is because I never find it possible or even acceptable. I used to live in a
small community where people care a lot about what others think on everyone
else. You do have the choice to be different but you never choose to be
different because you are afraid of criticism, of people thinking you are
wrong; and I do not mean people thinking you are wrong by what you say or do
but by the way you are. I used to care a lot! …
Now, sometimes I am
worried that I don´t care anymore that much!
But what changed? Why do
people change? Why "I" changed?
What really changed me
was the fact that I now see the world as a whole and stop seeing it as a small
box. My community, the place I was living in, was the small box. I never dared
to think out of that box. But not necessary because I was banned by doing so,
but because even people living there their whole life, never want to see
outside the box or never dare, or even think that there is a whole new world
outside that little box. When you do break through, when you start seeing the
whole world as being your community, you realize you have access to more
options, to choices, to experiences that can change you completely.
I start watching people
living outside my little box and I start learning, I start growing, I start not
only improving but understanding myself. I do not criticize my life anymore,
instead I understand it better. People, who feel trapped in a single place, are
people who do not want to break through the little box. This step of taking a
stand and start thinking outside of the box is sometimes scary and really
challenging. But what would life be without challenges?
“Yeah, that´s so great,
you´re so lucky” is what people usually use to excuse their own life or
choices…that being the unforgettable phrase that most of the people is using
it. Not that this is bad, but it is bad when they continue with beliefs like:
“but I can´t do it … I am not so lucky” … I so much don´t like it when people
say that. Most would think that I am and have what I have just because I am
lucky! That´s so wrong people! That is because I made choices that secured
these outcomes. It’s always about choices.
Why I choose then to
change constantly, or what makes me change/grow all the time ... are new
experiences, new life experiences! We all experience something new every day,
if we would be able to learn something out of everything, we would constantly
enrich our life with joy and happiness.
Now I live for a while
in Indonesia … in the great little paradise, in Bali. I came here with work but
it feels sometimes more holiday than work. But I do not want to talk in this
article about work … I want to talk about how a place like Bali can change you
a lot. Maybe it is not only because of Bali, but because of all combined
experiences I have had until this time.
Every time I travel
somewhere, I get that instinct of seeing the world differently. Of really
experiencing changes that questions my way of defining and judging live. I
always learned something new from my experiences and this one is one of the
experiences placed on the top of all I have ever had. When I mean Bali, I mean
People, Culture, Traditions, Life Style, People, Food, Religion and Beliefs,
People … oh I did mention People … but at the end, all of these are created,
respected and given forward by People! It´s all about that in my
perspective!
I suppose you heard
about the “OCEAN” concept on Personality traits? About the Big Five factors and
their constituent traits summarized as “OCEAN”? (Psychology stuff!) … Well, I´m
approaching this concept because I believe that when it comes to Balinese
People, they are the TOP achievers in mastering all these traits. The “OCEAN”
concept derives from Openness, Conscientiousness, Extroversion, Agreeableness
and Neuroticism. I don’t want to go too deep into explaining psychology but in
short I believe that Balinese people know very well how to combine and master
well most of these traits.
When it comes to their
culture, they are very open and efficient, they show a lot of appreciation
toward art, toward emotions and adventures, toward variety and the efficient
part speaks to the way of showing self-discipline toward all the above. When it
comes to their community, they are and act like a big family, they are
energetic and full with positive emotions, and they are compassionate and very
cooperative toward others, especially towards member in their own community but
also foreigners. This culture is one of the single cultures I´ve been living
in, where as a foreigner I feel very protected, respected and welcomed. And I lived
in many different cultures, foreign countries in Europe. I never felt like
this, not even in my own country!
Here people are simple,
most of them are poor but what I love about them is that they never feel poor.
Because being poor here means something different then back in Europe. In
Europe, being poor means not having enough financial resources based on which
to make life enjoyable; in Indonesia, at least here in Bali, people don´t care
that much about their financial situation but about life in general: they make
sure they have good relationships with each other, with their community, with
their Gods, they make sure they inspire and offer love to people around them,
they believe that BEING HUMAN is being RICH, rather than being rich by having
money. Once a very good local friend told me that she knows people here that
own lots of properties and make lot of money but working as taxi drivers. And
that is because they care about what they do as a profession and if that kind
of work makes then happy, they choose it. Here people don´t spend money on
THINGS as much as they spend on making sure they are healthy and happy,
spending on making sure they enrich their life with love and joy.
In Europe, we care so
much about what other people think about us, we care so much on having as much
money as possible, but we forget to care being humans, being careful with each
others, we forget SHARING, and so it is how we lose our soul. We spend our
whole life fighting and reaching to be rich and famous … but what for?
Actually, I believe that
no matter how rich or famous we may become, we will always fight for more and
more and more. There is never going to be a limit because there is no limit we
set for ourselves or because there is no limit people expect us to reach. We
and people around us will always expect more…always!
So, for me, what can be
greater than this lesson I learned from people of Bali, from Indonesians? Maybe
more lessons to come, for sure … but this is a lesson I want to adopt for
myself! This can be a lesson of sharing, maybe inspiring others as well J
Feel inspired, Learn to
Share and Love ... and so you secure a place in people’s heart.
Gabriela
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