The difficulties associated with growing pains in life only come when a person encounters a situation in which they are forced to change. Each person adapts to these changes over different rates of time. Sometimes these changes come gradually and people have a lot of time to adapt to them in order to live. In other times life through stone walls in front of you in which you are utterly paralyzed in front of. Change is forced upon a person at such times in life. My life has reached one such moment and it has caused me great pause for consideration.
After a few weeks of discussions I reached a contract extension offer from Southwest University. In it I would commit to another year of teaching with the guarantee that I would be fully reimbursed for my airfare to the United States and back to China next summer. After much deliberation I accepted it hoping that I would feel a sense of accomplishment and drive to continue my interesting experience living and teaching in Rongchang, China. However, after adding the weight of losing possibly both Cory and Ali next year (Ali because she is not enjoying her experience in China) I have come to a realization that life would be difficult without a foreign presence here. Also, Cory is quickly becoming a great friend of mine and the thought of losing him has forced upon me new ruminations. These ruminations leave me with many options that I am currently thinking about. They have also forced me to re examine my inner self.
I have always known that I am a different and unique person who has specific goals, values, and morals in what I place my faith in life. Fortunately, living abroad has opened me up to the reality that things go certain ways in life in which we have no control over. I know now that I can try my best, but will never be able to fit into Chinese society. The one question which I know people are thinking in the back of their mind is: “why China in the first place?” I felt then as I still do now that not one society has all of the right answers, and my Chinese history course professor, Richard Bohr, electrified me in choosing this off-the-beaten-path destination. After eight months living here I can safely say that people in China are no more exempt from this vocational strain than I was while living in the United States.
I tried my very hardest to adapt to Chinese society, but found that even with the greatest attempts a person cannot hide who they are. In my case, it was even more of a strain on my inner self because people judged me wholly on my outer American appearance. People continually tell me how cool, handsome, tall, etc I am without really caring to get to know me as a person. I found this to be another piece of Chinese cultural which is ephemeral in nature. Chinese society puts so much self worth based on appearances that people who can barely afford to put their kids through school will try their best to have an iphone to impress people with. This need for material status is another reason why the marriage between China and the United States will continue to grow in the next century.
My soul was feeling quite empty in coming to China. One thing I really wished and wanted to learn was how to find happiness in my vocational life. Not the kind of short-sided happy feeling you get after a night of partying, but a lifelong realization that what you have done in life matters.
Know I would call the later a sense of fulfillment rather than happiness. I was looking for the kind of fulfillment that Jean Valjean grasps at his dying bedside next to his beloved Cosette and Marius. I was searching haphazardly in the United States to find this in some way, shape, or form. My whole life through my time in college I thought I know where that path would lead me. I thought I would find fulfillment from teaching high school students. I realized pretty early on through my student-teaching experience that this longing would not be meet through teaching high school. I was extremely frightened because I had placed all my life’s vocational value into a profession which left me feeling more frustrated than valued.
After analyzing the different cultures for the past eight months I believe that I have come up with a correlational point to measure both systems with. I discovered that free will versus destiny was one foundational difference between the two cultures. In China, people go to the schools in which they are fortunate enough to get into based upon test scores. Either they get in or they become life-long workers, farmers, etc. In high school, student test score decides if they can get into a college or university. There is no student decision process, campus visiting, nor freedom in choosing a university to study in.
If a student is fortunate enough to get into a college or university they will do their best to succeed in whatever major they are given to study. I have a student in Rongchang who I am currently working on his graduate application for studying in the United States. From talking with him I gathered that he never once wanted to be a biological science major in college. He always wished to study literature and be liberal arts major. Due to cultural expectations in China liberal arts are looked down upon heavily as a field of study. Therefore, he took the advice of his high school teacher and decided to study bio sciences.
After a student finishes the major in which they were chosen for they will enter a job using a very complex system of guanxi relationships. If that person is lucky enough to know people in the industry in which they are applying into they will get that job. It does not really matter how well they earned their marks in school. Guanxi relationships have modeled Chinese society ever since the dawn of Confucius teachings. Filial piety is a central piece of guanxi relationships. A post-graduate is always bound to listen to the advice of their parents in choosing a career. Usually, a relative is the best hope for getting a good job due to their bonded relationship.
The role of filial piety does not end there for a recent graduate looking for a job. In most cases graduates cannot move far away from their hometown in order to find a job. I have a friend in Chongqing who is a very talented T.V. host for a children’s show. She wishes desperately to be able to apply to work full time in Beijing as a T.V. host. Her parents have forbidden this indefinite absence from her hometown of Chongqing. Due to cultural expectations she cannot take the job and must remain in Chongqing. These are but a taste of the role which guanxi and the importance of good relationships plays in Chinese society.
I like to always balance things in life in order to get a fresh perspective on them. Hindsight is always twenty-twenty. In this case, I shall forge ahead to galvanize the reader towards the power of freedom to make decisions in life. Yes, the average United States citizen has none of those cultural constraints placed upon them in school. Once a post graduate from college a person can do whatever they like. We are even legally emancipated from our parents at the age of eighteen. In order to be fair to myself I already knew most of these things before coming to China. The thing which really interested me was experiencing this culture in order to make real valued inferences regarding choices.
I like to give examples as much as possible to keep myself focused on what is the central topic. For example, I have always enjoyed hot-showers growing up in the United States. In China, there are times when after ten minutes of trying to get the water-heater work that I finally managed to get the water temperature just right. Afterwards I sit for about a minute or two in perfect revery; however, after a while I still find myself not satisfied. I discovered that I wanted to make the temperature warmer. Why could I not find happiness in this perfect temperature?
At this point, you might be wondering as to how in the world does this relate to me coming to China, freedom versus destiny, and all of the other things I mentioned in the passage above. Do not fear. This was no mere digression. I discovered that even though I could get the darn water-heater just right I soon became dissatisfied with this perfection and wanted to change the temperature again. I discussed recently how I believe that humans lack the ability to discover what perfection is in life. I now know this to be true in my own life from the experience of living in China. This discovery has led me to analyze and balance my decisions process differently.
People in the United States have complete freedom to decide upon most things. The real crux is that once they reach that thing in which they believe will make them happiest they rarely discover that the job, person, or thing turned out to be what they thought it would be. People in China have so little freedom in which to choose things that they rarely even worry about such decisions. However, I have found that people in China are in many cases as happy as people in the United States even without this freedom to choose. They are happy for the little things in life that do truly matter in the course of a lifetime. They are happy for their family, food, work, and shelter. They enjoy an easy-going pace of life which allows them the freedom to spend time staring at rivers for hours. I know because I have seen some people do this for hours.
How does this relate to my life? I guess I finally am letting go of trying to reach perfection in life. My sense of perfection is no less real than anyone else’s; therefore, there is no one positive perfect form. Even in a religious sense I still like to think that this world was created perfectly for all creatures on earth. I now feel comfortable in my own skin and relish this liberation from a self-worth built around walls of material things. In my past life I believed that these things would make me happy. I know now that they will only break me down as a person and work to diffuse the things that really do matter in life. In many ways material things become a divisive breach against the people who do really matter in life. When the two different things come into conflict in my lifetime I pray that I will always remember to choose the one that really matters.
In the vocational sense I believe that discovering that I do not need perfection will also help me. I blamed myself after student teaching for not being able to relate to my students. I left student teaching feeling great shame and a sense of failure. Looking into the future I felt very confused and convoluted as to what job would help me find fulfillment. In coming to China, I hoped to discover any of their tricks related to discovering what true happiness in life is.
After some examination I believe that finding that the perfect job, girlfriend, body, mind, soul, etc does not exist in this world. Sometimes people are able to find whatever they seek by dumb luck; however, the majority of people probably feel as frustrated as I did while searching for the perfect career teaching in high school. Others suffer from the same sense of further desire to keep turning the temperature higher on the faucet while taking a shower. The different circumstance are relatable because they both are things which at one time people wanted but soon discovered left them feeling unsatisfied.
I believe now that true happiness does not come from things. Happy people just live enjoyable lives, and true fulfillment can come in many different shapes and forms. Jean Valjean certainly did not lead a happy life but was the most fulfilled individual on earth at the time of his death. Placing value in perfect ideas that do not yet exist is not a wise thing to do. I am a happy person and believe that in order to find fulfillment I should only look to lead a life which allows me to be happy. If this means that I should follow Cory to teach in South Korea, stay another year in China, or look elsewhere for employment I will do so. As long as I am happy I believe I will look back and find fulfillment in my life. Suffering for no reason is masochism and I certainly have already felt like I did that enough to myself in my lifetime. It is always better to value what we are now and do our best to remember it. Regardless of freedom of choice or not people in China find many ways to live very happy and rewarding lives. I discovered that I can live a much happier life by trying things out and seeing what happens. I may not have that “destiny” career, girlfriend, etc, but I know now that this is okay! I can be happy in life just by the way I live it and that will last me a lot longer than any job, rewards, money, things, etc.
On the very real and positive side of things I truly am enjoying teaching this semester. I am finding that my improved Chinese language communication has helped me clarify things for my students. I also believe that I helping them by seeing how difficult it is for me to try and speak Chinese with them. Together, we are working in an environment of positive cultural exchange. I feel that these positive experiences are helping me with my students’ attentiveness this semester. It is most certainly improving their focus in the classroom.
I am learning a lot about Chinese culture through the eyes of their language. People keep to themselves things that I and my friends would clearly voice. Holding onto a person’s inner feelings is a critical piece of understanding Chinese culture. It reflects there shame based cultural principles by demonstrating that it would be shameful to admit that there was something to worry about. It is It is interesting to see that they have three different ways to say that something “does not matter” in their language. This helps me in the classroom by helping my students to understand that in this situation my intention is honest. I want them to work on speaking English and that is the only way in which they will be able to improve.
On the running front I am enjoying much more happiness by limiting the amount of time in which I go. My runs are faster now and consume less time spent running which helps me enjoy more activities each day. This one change in my everyday life style has allowed me to feel like a more balanced person. Limiting my exposure to over training has also improved the strength of my body.
When it comes to my improvements in using Chinese it is hard to impress upon the reader the strides in which I have made these past two months. My Chinese has literally improved through perseverance as I have attended in that time period only three classes of Chinese instruction. This along with my reinvigorated enjoyment for doing things which make me feel happy has allowed me to become a much friendlier person. It has also allowed me to really focus on improving the one thing that still separates most from my Chinese culture, communication. I am finding that communication is quite difficult even with a much improved vocabulary and sense of context because the Chinese speak their quite fast. They also speak using their local dialect more often than using mandarin Chinese. This leaves me often chasing my own tail when I am trying to converse with people. It also allows me to appreciate the level of difficulty it takes to live in a world where you would be unable to communicate with people. I am very thankful that I have Cory to chat with on a daily basis using English like I could communicate with an American back home.
I have recently read several great books. I finished “Les Miserable’s” and “Mutant Message Down Under”. Both books were great for different reasons. “Les Miserable’s,” portrays the classics western cannon novel in a way which brought ever character to life for me. I personally related to many of the personality traits which made Jean Val jean, Javert, and Father Gilormarand, such interesting people.
The novel, “Mutant Message Down Under” made me questions my values. I believe that the lessons taught by the aboriginal tribe, “Real People”, relate correlational issues which current human society as a whole has missed. These pieces relate to what I believe is the heart of the problem of finding happiness in life. The Real People emphasis that all people are inextricably linked together by one central thing: Earth.
The Real People live around the jaws of a vicious world each day. This world for the Real People includes sweltering temperatures in the rugged Outback of Australia. The Real People know that their survival is linked to the goodness of the earth. They feel that humans most learn to conserve in order to have a healthy ecosystem. That means that they only eat as much as they can at a time, pack light, and use their feet for transportation. Far from fearing for their survival, the “Real People” frankly feel a great sense of peace in their life. Their happiness comes from knowing that they live life to the fullest each day through non-competitive games, sharing, and enjoying the Earth’s natural beauty.
These people have no need for time as we know it. They do not have important things that must get finished outside of daily life. The Real People neither celebrate holidays or birthdays. They do put an important emphasis on celebrations. Every person in their tribe is known for some unique skill that they have acquired. They will celebrate these skills with their group members at points in their life when they feel they have made an important addition to their skill.
What a remarkable idea. Celebrations when people feel generally happy to celebrate. I also found it extremely interesting to discover that people change their names periodically throughout their life time to represent a new important aspect in their life. For example, a “story teller” might add a title of “great” to their name if they have done some magnificent in their life. A person might even want to add another talent to their repertoire making them a completely new expert in their community.
These people have no need to be competitive within their own tribe and have no need for clothing. Why hide who you truly are? They also find it extremely revolting to think that a doctor could actually heal a person. Only the body, God, or in this case “Eternal Oneness” would be able to heal a person. A doctor can merely do what they can to try and help that person lessen their symptoms and suffering.
They share so many interesting differences with normal human culture and yet they are extremely human at root. They have taught me to remember each day that life is a miracle.
Possession and materialism are also quite strange ideas for these people. I think that the history of the world has reached a unique point in time where these aboriginal people could no longer fit into our human society and co-exist. I believe that neither group is correct in the manner in which life is experienced. Rather, I feel that as a person it would be wise of me not to disregard their civilization’s 50,000 year old tradition as merely archaic. I know that both groups are human and can learn from each other.
I think it would be wise to remember some of their advice regarding living everyday life. Recognizing that each person has many unique gifts, that people are not supposed to dwell on negative things, and that life was not ultimately our choice, for example.
I am currently reading the novel, “Shogun” and am completely fascinated with Japanese society. I will follow-up this blog with more interesting things that are happening right now in my life. I am pondering the future and different possible routes to travel in life. Currently, I am glad to have a strong support system in China as well. Cory and I have truly become great friends during this experience and will continue be as we are both making important decision regarding our future.
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