Why do you deliver the speech?

 

In elementary school, there was a period of time for me when I was not able to speak at all. During this abysmal period, even blurting out a simple “hello” seemed impossible to do. At this time, I was insecure about my ability in the english language and felt uncomfortable speaking english in front of the other children. This was one of the hardest things I had to go through, and not being able to speak and voice my opinions for an entire year surely helped open my eyes to the importance of communication through language. When I came out of my insecurity and acquired an ability to voice my opinions and speak openly in fifth grade, I experienced the elation of having an open discussion with others for the first time. My goal through delivering the speech is to get people thinking about a certain subject, in my case a definition of happiness, and provide people with a different point of view. I want to receive contrasting point of views from the audience as well.  Speech provides me a platform to voice my opinion. By delivering my speech, I hope I could inspire people to enjoy the little things in life because as Kart Vonnegut once said, "one day you will look back and realize they were the big things."

 

 

Lessons on Happiness

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　

Japan has the 3rd highest GDP in the world, and is a country that is celebrated as one of the safest places on earth.   Compared to third world countries, we, as Japanese, generally earn higher income as well as having one of the longest life expectancies.   As one could easily notice, statistics wise, Japan is one of the most affluent countries in the world. And I am extremely proud to call this archipelago of four Islands that is so rich in culture my home.

 

Yet, I have always wondered why, if we are so educated, accomplished, and safe, why we are also so stressed.  Watching my peers and my family getting overwhelmed by stress only fueled on my curiosity to ponder more about what it means to be truly happy.

According to livescience 2015, even in a seemingly peaceful society like Japan we are less happy than those in countries such as Guatemala, Romania, and Sudan, which are still under immeasurable amount of poverty.  Today, I want to share my thoughts on how we can reconstruct our stressed out, despondent society into a happier one, and to also share with you the reasons as to why some of the most undeveloped countries could also be one of  the most happiest ones.  To achieve my goal in sharing this, I want to start off by talking about why Japanese society demonstrates high percentages of stress, and low feelings of satisfaction.

 

The first question that comes to mind is, why is Japanese people one of the unhappiest people in the world?

 

One of the most prevalent causes to unhappiness in the Japanese society today is the constant pressure and stress, originated by our society’s ignorance and stigma towards the idea of receiving help from others.  Whether it’s from a counselor, a friend, or family, we usually have a stance that staying strong is imperative when it comes to overcoming hardships in life.  As a consequence, Japanese people often loathe talking about their hardships. Not the “I locked myself out of my apartment” type of dilemma in life, but more serious ones. Because of this,  it is proven that in 2015 there was an increase in the number of patients with mood disorder, including depression and new types of depression, according to Nikkei.

 

So, what does the inability to speak about how we are feeling openly to others affect our mental health and overall happiness?   Let me share with you a product of our over-stressed society. Have you ever heard of the word, “Karoshi”?  Karoshi has been becoming increasingly common in our society.   Karoshi is a sudden death caused by working long hours in a stressful environment.  According to the Japantimes, Japan has one of the longest work hours in the world, and this is the leading cause of stress, unhappiness, and thus the Karoshi.  Thus, I think that the society in a country as developed and prosperous as Japan needs to rethink how we approach our work, and prevent overworking.  To recap, according to my research, the rationale as to why Japan is unhappier than some of the undeveloped countries is because of our stigma towards receiving help, a  notion that we have to stay “strong”, and the long grueling work hours that leaves no time for relaxation and destressing.

 

Now that we know what makes Japanese people one of the unhappiest in the world, I would like to focus on the reason as to why some of the most undeveloped countries in South America contain some of the happiest people in the world today.

 

According to the list of happiest countries by livescience, many of the countries listed on the top  are located in the South America.  Thus, when I found out that many of the poor countries in South America was topping the list, I was amazed.  Additionally I was curious to find out the source of their happiness because often times these countries are in tough economic situations, and the fact that these people, who might not even have the chance to eat three satisfying meals a day, could be so satisfied with their lives were remarkable.  I figured, if I was able to find out what makes these people who,　from our perspective, have so little, than I might be able to use what I have learned to revive our society.

 

In countries such as Guatemala and Panama, tough economic conditions are not considered as  reason for despair because of the strong family bonds.  Many of the families get together on the weekends and spend some time together. Also, in countries like Panama nature is readily available so the beautiful landscape offers relaxation and the positivity.  Nature is a big factor in their overall happiness.  Overall, countries in South America usually have strong relationships within the people and environment around them.

 

 In fact, their positive and open minded attitude helped me to overcome a challenge and find happiness during my elementary school years.  And this experience really helped to revive my family.  When I was 9, my family and I started living in a small town in the state of Kansas. Next to our room there was a older couple from Chile, and they would always invite my mother, sister and I to go fishing or to join them on a barbeque in their apartment. They really cared about us, just like we were their extensive family, and even though we had next to nothing at the time, we felt safer and happier than ever because we knew we could rely on our neighbors like a family.  I later learned that generally people in Chile have different values in life. According to Hofstede, a well-known social psychologist, Chile is considered to be a feminine country, meaning that they value human relationships while Japan is considered a masculine country, and value competitiveness and material gain.  Hofstede claims that the biggest difference between the Japanese society and the South American society such as Chile is that South American countries tend to prefer short term happiness, meaning that they like to live in the moment and not consider their past or future gain.  On the Other Hand, Japanese society tends to strive and prepare for the future, with a high score on the long term orientation, as reported by Hofstede’s center in 2015.

 

During my winter break in the end of 2015, I decided to test out the South American perception of happiness.  I took walks in the forests and the mountains near my grandparents’ house, to go back to my roots and feel the power of nature, which I unfortunately do not have the chance to experience with my busy schedule and hectic urban lifestyle at home.  I spent as much time as I could with family.  I told myself, that “what doesn't kill you, only makes you stronger” and did not let hardships take over my mind, and told myself constantly to stop caring about the little things in life. I went out and played golf, my favorite sport, and started to treasure simple moments in my day to day lives. Before long, I realized that happiness is not what comes to you, but something you can accomplish yourself.  Happiness is a choice.
There are so many lessons about happiness that I have learned from the South American countries.  The most important of them all is the importance of strengthening family bonds.  In a highly developed country like Japan, it is easy to forget about spending time with your family or even simple things as not stressing over the next meeting or the next project.   To the Japanese, work might mean a lot more than other aspects of life, while in South American countries, work is just a small aspect of life to earn a living so that they can fully thrive on their most important aspect of life, their family and friends.

 

In order to revive our society today, we need to focus on how we approach happiness.   While living in a fast paced, highly competitive society may be stressful at times, life is too short not to be happy.   What we, as Japanese, could do to get our society out of stress is not be so harsh with others and ourselves.  Most importantly, because we live in a masculine society, we should remind ourselves to live in the moment,  As Alice Morse Earle once said,  “   Yesterday is history,  tomorrow's a mystery,  today is a gift, that’s why it is called the present.”

 

Together, we can revive our society for the better.