A humbling experience

Humbling: causing someone to understand that they are not as important or special as they thought:

It’s a humbling experience to see people being so positive about life when they have so little.
I find his heroism humbling.

It is quite humbling for me to have the chance to work with such incredible people.
Losing is a humbling experience.
Having a second child can be humbling.

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The authenticity of others pain 

1 Harvard Male Orator Jonathan Roberts | Harvard Commencement 2017

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Gepubliceerd op 24 mei 2017

 
Male Orator Jonathan Roberts addresses graduating seniors at Harvard’s Senior Class Day ceremony
on May 24, 2017 at Tercentenary Theatre
(For more information, visit http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story….)
 
At the beginning of Jonathan’s lecture we hear the sentence about

the land of the Wampanoag nation

Please enjoy the awesome lecture of Harvard orator Jonathan Samuel Roberts

Jonathan Roberts is a recent graduate of Harvard University with a strong background in both public speaking and service-based activism.
He focuses on labor and housing justice.

The Wampanoag Indians lived in what is now known as Massachusetts and Rhode Island in the early part of the 17th century. The name means “easterners” and at one point, their population was 12,000. … Right before the Pilgrams landed in 1620, the Wampanoag Indians saw their population greatly reduced due to disease.

The Harvard University – Boston – is situated in the region.

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Transcript
 

Also quick shout-out to my grandmother who is here with us, she is 93 years old, she is still moving and grooving, oh my goodness, I hope I get those genes.

Now before I begin I would like to recognize that we are on the land of the Wampanoag nation, that it is sacred earth and that we have a responsibility to care for it and to treat it as such.

Much to my annoyance growing up, the phrase back in my day was used by my parents, is often as infamous staples such as: because I told you so and I’ll give you something to cry about, but as I stand on this stage, childish irritation is replaced by immeasurable gratitude.

1’30”: You see, back in my father’s day, students who look like him, like me, were pushed out of schools like this. Before my mother even turned 16, white families around this country rioted against integration. So these years at Harvard has been a vindication of their struggle and sacrifice, but I have to say this place has a peculiar way of shifting that familial perspective. Now like many of us I came here wanting to meet my parents expectations and become successful so I internalize what has become a familiar routine, I stressed over problem sets, I worried about internships and jobs, I shook hands, I pass resumes and soon personal failures became unbearable, soon when I would get rejections from student organizations I would feel worthless next to my friends, would I get a bad grade on a test, I would worry about my future when I would be rejected from jobs and internships, I bemoaned how unfair this world was, I forgot the lessons my parents had spent so many years trying to teach me, so when I was at my lowest and called out to my dad for help and guidance and he started to call off by saying back in my day, I hung up. 

3’15”:  

We really do live in an unfair world,


of all the people who could have come here we were the select few who were chosen.

3’40”: But as we worry here about our personal failures here we will earn and achieve more than families whose only failure was living in a broken unequal system and we have been so conditioned by privilege and circumstance that exclusivity is only a crime when we don’t receive, its spoils.

3’55”: Our education here has not prepared us to understand our advantage position in the world or the authenticity of others pain, in economics we learned to quantify and dehumanize suffering, we learn that poverty, inequality, unemployment are unavoidable, that so long as we reach equilibrium people who live on pennies a day are somehow better off, in social studies and sociology we learn to treat others suffering as an academic exercise to ponder their pain from a distance, we critique structural inequality and oppression.

4’45”: But how many of us every day for the past four years have walked past people in the square, experiencing homelessness and acted as though our theories and our conscience did not apply to them.

4’50”: Now I know we will be successful because we are ambitious and talented and personally driven and we will become leaders and innovators and founders of businesses and non-profits but that is exactly why the change this world so desperately needs will not come from us.

That in spite of our jargon our let’s grab a meals, our votes for Hillary, our votes for Jo, we will never sacrifice our position our place in the system. If we could give up this degree to prevent someone from experiencing homelessness or poverty or discrimination or violence we wouldn’t and I know this because after four years here I didn’t even consider it. But last semester dining hall workers gave us the education that we so desperately needed, for three weeks they went without pay, they were on picket lines, they marched, they shared their stories and experiences, they sacrificed everything for affordable health care and still we were sceptical and indifferent to their pain.

6’35”: One student went so far as to tell me that unfortunately in the market we live in, workers without college degrees simply could not be covered.

How quickly we have become the political leaders we claim to despise.


But dining hall workers remembered the lesson that my parents taught me, they remembered that our struggles are intimately connected.
They fought not only for affordable health care they fought for gender and racial equity, they fought for undocumented workers, they fought for their children, for workers in other universities, for workers around the world and they won… This is where you clap. Now as inspired as I am by that, show of conviction, I recognize that, as we are now not yet ready to inherit this world.

7’45: It’s a hard thing to say and it is a hard thing to hear and I am sure it would be easy to leave here feeling guilty.

8’: But without any lasting commitment,

I’m sure it would be easy to convince ourselves that this is just the way the world works.


I am sure as my parents know all too well, it would be easy for us to justify our privileges and unequal advantages by saying that it is better to take care for our own, than to empower individuals who society has disowned

but we have stepped on the blood and bones of people for far too long to forgive ourselves for doing what is easy.

Now we need to act beyond ourselves and think what is possible for others.

8’50”: And I know if I do that, in the future when I hear my children complaining about the inconveniences in their world, I will muster the strength to smile and I would know they are living in a world that is one, I could only dream of, because back in my day.

Michelangelo Abstract Boy Child Adult

Michelangelo Abstract Boy Child Adult

Summary
  1. As I stand on this stage, childish irritation is replaced by immeasurable gratitude.
  2. Back in my father’s day, students who look like him, like me, were pushed out of schools like this.
  3. I forgot the lessons my parents had spent so many years trying to teach me.
 
  1. We really do live in an unfair world.
 
  1. But as we worry here about our personal failures, here we will earn and achieve more than families whose only failure was living in a broken unequal system.
  2. Our education here has not prepared us to understand our advantage position in the world or
 
  1. the authenticity of others pain,
    1. in economics we learned to quantify and dehumanize suffering,
    2. we learn that poverty, inequality, unemployment are unavoidable,
    3. that so long as we reach equilibrium people who live on pennies a day are somehow better off,
    4. in social studies and sociology we learn to treat others suffering as an academic exercise to ponder their pain from a distance,
    5. we critique structural inequality and oppression.

 

  1. But how many of us every day for the past four years have walked past people in the square, experiencing homelessness and acted as though our theories and our conscience did not apply to them.
  2. They sacrificed everything for affordable health care and still we were sceptical and indifferent to their pain.
  3. One student went so far as to tell me that unfortunately in the market we live in, workers without college degrees simply could not be covered.
  4. How quickly we have become the political leaders we claim to despise.
  5. They remembered that our struggles are intimately connected.
  6. It’s a hard thing to say and it is a hard thing to hear and I am sure it would be easy to leave here feeling guilty.
  7. But without any lasting commitment,
  8. I’m sure it would be easy to convince ourselves that this is just the way the world works.
  9. BUT WE HAVE STEPPED ON THE BLOOD AND BONES OF PEOPLE FOR FAR TOO LONG TO FORGIVE OURSELVES FOR DOING WHAT IS EASY.
 
  1. Now we need to act beyond ourselves and think what is possible for others.
 
  1. I know if I do that, in the future when I hear my children complaining about the inconveniences in their world, I will muster the strength to smile and I would know they are living in a world that is one, I could only dream of, because back in my day.
The land of the Wampanoag nation before the invasion

The land of the Wampanoag nation before the invasion

The land of the Wampanoag nation

Please remember

  1. … but as I stand on this stage, childish irritation is replaced by immeasurable gratitude.
  2. You see, back in my father’s day, students who look like him, like me, were pushed out of schools like this.
  3. But as we worry here about our personal failures here we will earn and achieve more than families whose only failure was living in a broken unequal system and we have been so conditioned by privilege and circumstance that exclusivity is only a crime when we don’t receive, its spoils.
  4. We really do live in an unfair world,
  5. of all the people who could have come here we were the select few who were chosen.
  6. How quickly we have become the political leaders we claim to despise.
  7. But dining hall workers remembered the lesson that my parents taught me, they remembered that our struggles are intimately connected.
  8. It’s a hard thing to say and it is a hard thing to hear and I am sure it would be easy to leave here feeling guilty.
  9. But without any lasting commitment,
  10. I’m sure it would be easy to convince ourselves that this is just the way the world works.
  11. I am sure as my parents know all too well, it would be easy for us to justify our privileges and unequal advantages by saying that it is better to take care for our own, than to empower individuals who society has disowned

  12. BUT WE HAVE STEPPED ON THE BLOOD AND BONES OF PEOPLE FOR FAR TOO LONG TO FORGIVE OURSELVES FOR DOING WHAT IS EASY.

     

  13. Now we need to act beyond ourselves and think what is possible for others.

     

  14. And I know if I do that, in the future when I hear my children complaining about the inconveniences in their world, I will muster the strength to smile and I would know they are living in a world that is one, I could only dream of, because back in my day.

2 Blind man eating ice cream prank! Always Nevermind

5 mrt. 2021

Blind man eating ice cream prank! Always Nevermind
I’ve made a video cover for your continuous support guys, this is for you all. I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart. After watching this blind man ice cream prank, check this out.
 
If you are in their situation being pranked, is your reaction will be the same?

True Learning

Current page

“You cared about me”

Words of wisdom

Confucius

Reflections on Life

Bryan Stevenson