What an amazing week I just had! Not only am I learning more about community development (I can’t tell you how much this is something I love), but I am also living an intense experience like I never did before and I am meeting wonderful people that are inspiring me everyday.
Already one week passed by. It went so fast! Tuesday to Friday, we learned more about sustainable development and the asset-based community drive approach (Bala Vikasa style). Saturday, we visited what they call a model village, which is a village that perfectly shows the success of this approach. It was such an amazing day. It warmed my heart an incredible amount. People welcomed us like family. They had a big ceremony for us as they were so proud to know we were coming to learn more from them (and everyone in the village was participating). We danced, we sang, we tasted new food, we planted trees on behalf of our country and so much more. Then we had the chance to meet the mayor and all the committees of the village. They were proud to tell us their story and how their community changed for the best in the last months.
Their success comes mostly from their unity. It has nothing to do with money. Honestly, I have never visited a village, a city or a neighbourhood in Canada where the social capital (the relations) between people is so strong. We may have a lot of things, but that connection between everyone is something that I’ve never seen before. A community can grow so much just by building their social capital. This is also something we’ve learned during the week (and how to make it grow.)
I am meeting so many people from different cultures, different countries, different beliefs. Many of them have so much less than what we have. So much less than what I have. Somehow though, they have so much more. They find happiness in things we don't anymore. They don't need much to be happy. They don't need much to feel blessed.
There are things I am seeing with my eyes that makes me so sad. In fact, there are thing I am seeing with my soul that makes me cry. Do you know why?
Yes, it makes me sad for them to see the conditions they are living in; but it also makes me sad for us.
It makes me sad for us because we believe we need more than what they have. In fact, we always need more than what we already have. We are rarely satisfied. It’s never enough.
It makes me sad for us because we get upset over things that aren't worth it. Our society tells us we need this or we need that in order to find happiness. A car, a new cellphone or a big house maybe. Not only does it tell us we need it, but it tells us we need it before a certain age. A wedding, a career and children before you're 30 maybe. When we don't succeed to have it all, we get depressed.
It makes me sad for us because we are always more concerned about the way we look than the way we feel. We are more concerned about taking care of our appearance than taking care of our inner self.
It makes me sad for us because whenever we loose something, we feellike we lost everything. We are struggling to find something to hold on. We don't try to think further than what our eyes can see. We don't try to connect with the simple things life has to offer.
It makes me sad for us because we accept what people say and what medias show us without questioning it. We don't try to think beyond what we see or what we hear. We accept what they tell us about other religions. We accept what they tell us about other cultures. We don't try to understand it. We judge.
There are a lot of things that makes me sad, but don’t get me wrong; there are a lot of things that makes me smile when I think about us:
I smile because we are free. We are free of walking in the streets as women and dress as we want to. We are free of choosing what we want to study. We are free of having the job we want. We are free of choosing who are our friends. We are free of choosing who we are going to marry. We are free of not wanting to get married. We are free of having our own beliefs. We are free of doing what we are passionate of.
I smile because we have easy access to everything around us. We have access to a toilet. We have access to a warm shower. We have access to a comfortable bed. We have access to potable water right from our tap. We have access to electricity. We have access to food. We have access to a car that we can use to go wherever we want. We have access to education. We have access to a salary.
Are these things you daily forget to smile about?
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