Cultural Values

This week we talked more about Cultural values and going along with that we watched Tuesdays With Morrie. He talked a lot about values of American's and how they don't always even realize that they're avoiding or so obsessed with specific values. For example people avoid talking about death because they find it sad and seem to think in a materialistic way when they chose to work the extra few hours every day because it will give them more money and therefore they can spend that money on more things. The main character of the movie, the man who Morrie shared his wisdom with every Tuesday was a product of those American values and without even realizing it, he lived in the culturally normal way. He never wanted to admit that Morrie was really ever dying because it was sad but Morrie and our class discussion proved that a death could be a happy thing too. It can be a celebration of life and the fact that Morrie died the way he wanted to was positive. The main character also spent most of his time working or thinking about work until he lost his girlfriend and realized how messed up his values really were.

Another thing we did this week was read an article called Thrive that explained the ways that people should live if they want to neglect a lot of the American values that people get wrapped up in and do things to genuinely make you happy. One that stood out to me the most was the idea of not over working themselves. This applied not only on the movie we watched but also to my life. I have experienced both sides of this because my parents are divorced and my mom is someone who works a lot and travels 2 to 3 times a week and my dad is the complete opposite. He's rather spend his time doing things that interest him more than his job. Growing up in both environments I can completely see both perspectives. Stevenson  and the world we live in is competitive therefore people become more naturally competitive so it's harder to break away from that. I understand both sides and each has plenty of it's own costs and benefits, it's just up to me to decide what other values are most important to me.