They're singing, cheering, applauding, and waiting for the final miner.
What a moment. The foreman was the last man to leave, and was greeted as a hero, complete with a speech from a beaming President, followed by the singing of the Chilean national anthem, in one of the most heartfelt monotone renditions heard in history.
Let's do keep a good thought for these gents and their families. Nothing is ever the same for anyone who goes through a major life event. Ask your friends who are cancer survivors, or widows of those who didn't survive, or soldiers who make it back after hellish experiences. Everyone will have some adjustments to make.
We have a lot to learn from them, when they choose to tell their stories.
In the meantime, they and their families deserve their privacy and dignity.
God bless them all, and their rescuers from around the world.
Showing posts with label Chi-chi-chi-le-le-le. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Chi-chi-chi-le-le-le. Show all posts
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Harvard Business Review And The Chilean Miners: Happiness Is Overrated
OS tripped across this a few days back, and ran it past some friends, who all applauded it. So, here 'tis.
Tony Schwartz, writing for Harvard Business Review, muses that 'happiness', or what we may call happiness--a state of unmolested contentment and well-being--may well be over-rated.
Some years ago, I spent time with a guy who I typically greeted in the most ordinary way: "How are you?" I'd ask.
"I'm WON-DER-FUL," he'd respond, rapturously, and every time I asked. Talk about a conversation stopper. What do you say back to that?
Suffice to say this wasn't a guy with whom I was eager to share a long meal. Here's the paradox: "Happy" people are some of the dullest people I know. And yet happiness is the state to which so many of us doggedly aspire.
Schwartz continues further:
Paradoxically, when we seek happiness as the ultimate state, we're destined to be disappointed. Absent unhappiness, how would we even recognize it? If we're fortunate, happiness is a place we visit from time to time rather than inhabit permanently. As a steady state, it has the limits of any steady state: it's not especially interesting or dynamic.
To seek happiness as a permanent state derives from two primitive evolutionary impulses: avoiding pain (which we associate with danger and the risk of death) and seeking gratification (which helps ensure that our genes get passed on).
But it also turns out that pain and discomfort are critical to growth, and that achieving excellence depends on the capacity to delay gratification.
When we're living fully, what we feel is engaged and immersed, challenged and focused, curious and passionate. Happiness — or more specifically, satisfaction — is something we mostly feel retrospectively, as a payoff on our investment. And then, before very long, we move on to the next challenge.
Engaged and immersed, challenged and focused, curious and passionate. Now that's a definition of happiness, of well-being.
OS hopes his readers don't get bored with him returning to the subject, but he thinks everyone everywhere should view the BBC series 'The Choir'. It isn't about people making great music, although sometimes that occurs. It's about people discovering that they can be engaged and immersed, challenged and focused, curious and passionate about something as wonderful as music, and their lives are thereby transformed. That 'happiness' they may have longed for arrives, because they weren't seeking it per se; they were seeking to tune that chord, memorize that alto line, remember that bit of movement.
The Chilean miners, with much help from their rescuers, kept themselves on a routine, kept their surroundings as neat as they could, kept their minds and hearts engaged, kept about the work of co-operating with their rescuers--they kept themselves engaged with life in horrible circumstances. OS was surprised to see Mr. Sepulveda arrive last night with his bag of souvenirs, and leading the gallery in football cheers.
In retrospect, it should not have been such a surprise. Mr. Sepulveda wasn't a victim per se: he was a miner, a pro, and he stayed engaged with life during his entrapment. He was ready to give out hugs and gifts and lead cheers when he got to the surface. He was one happy guy, not just because he had been rescued, but because he had something to share with everybody on the surface, even if it was just a bag of rocks and a round of hugs and cheers.
Engaged and immersed, challenged and focused, curious and passionate.
Happy.
Tony Schwartz, writing for Harvard Business Review, muses that 'happiness', or what we may call happiness--a state of unmolested contentment and well-being--may well be over-rated.
Some years ago, I spent time with a guy who I typically greeted in the most ordinary way: "How are you?" I'd ask.
"I'm WON-DER-FUL," he'd respond, rapturously, and every time I asked. Talk about a conversation stopper. What do you say back to that?
Suffice to say this wasn't a guy with whom I was eager to share a long meal. Here's the paradox: "Happy" people are some of the dullest people I know. And yet happiness is the state to which so many of us doggedly aspire.
Schwartz continues further:
Paradoxically, when we seek happiness as the ultimate state, we're destined to be disappointed. Absent unhappiness, how would we even recognize it? If we're fortunate, happiness is a place we visit from time to time rather than inhabit permanently. As a steady state, it has the limits of any steady state: it's not especially interesting or dynamic.
To seek happiness as a permanent state derives from two primitive evolutionary impulses: avoiding pain (which we associate with danger and the risk of death) and seeking gratification (which helps ensure that our genes get passed on).
But it also turns out that pain and discomfort are critical to growth, and that achieving excellence depends on the capacity to delay gratification.
When we're living fully, what we feel is engaged and immersed, challenged and focused, curious and passionate. Happiness — or more specifically, satisfaction — is something we mostly feel retrospectively, as a payoff on our investment. And then, before very long, we move on to the next challenge.
Engaged and immersed, challenged and focused, curious and passionate. Now that's a definition of happiness, of well-being.
OS hopes his readers don't get bored with him returning to the subject, but he thinks everyone everywhere should view the BBC series 'The Choir'. It isn't about people making great music, although sometimes that occurs. It's about people discovering that they can be engaged and immersed, challenged and focused, curious and passionate about something as wonderful as music, and their lives are thereby transformed. That 'happiness' they may have longed for arrives, because they weren't seeking it per se; they were seeking to tune that chord, memorize that alto line, remember that bit of movement.
The Chilean miners, with much help from their rescuers, kept themselves on a routine, kept their surroundings as neat as they could, kept their minds and hearts engaged, kept about the work of co-operating with their rescuers--they kept themselves engaged with life in horrible circumstances. OS was surprised to see Mr. Sepulveda arrive last night with his bag of souvenirs, and leading the gallery in football cheers.
In retrospect, it should not have been such a surprise. Mr. Sepulveda wasn't a victim per se: he was a miner, a pro, and he stayed engaged with life during his entrapment. He was ready to give out hugs and gifts and lead cheers when he got to the surface. He was one happy guy, not just because he had been rescued, but because he had something to share with everybody on the surface, even if it was just a bag of rocks and a round of hugs and cheers.
Engaged and immersed, challenged and focused, curious and passionate.
Happy.
Chi-Chi-Chi! Le-Le-Le! Mario Sepulveda Emerges From The San Jose Copoiapo Mine, With Souvenirs And Cheers
Endless streams of words will be written about the events of this evening and morning, so OldSouth will be brief.
If you're looking in from some other part of the world at this late hour in the Western Hemisphere, the live feed is here.
So far, things have gone well. Let's keep a prayer going until everyone is safely out.
This is an inspiring moment for everyone, everywhere. Expertise, resources, cooperation, thought, and no small amount of love were applied to this situation. If everyone emerges, what could have been a terrible tragedy will have a happy ending.
Mr. Sepulveda emerged in high spirits, with a small bag of rocks from the mine floor to hand out as souvenirs, hugged one and all, and then went to the gallery and and began leading cheers: Chi, Chi, Chi-Le,Le,Le. Here's hoping everyone else emerges as healthy and happy.
Conratulations in order to the nation of Chile, who pulled together, and are in the process of pulling off a miracle.
N.B. The third miner just emerged in good spirits. They're going a pace of about one per hour, it appears. Keep a good thought, 'cuz it ain't over til it's over.
If you're looking in from some other part of the world at this late hour in the Western Hemisphere, the live feed is here.
So far, things have gone well. Let's keep a prayer going until everyone is safely out.
This is an inspiring moment for everyone, everywhere. Expertise, resources, cooperation, thought, and no small amount of love were applied to this situation. If everyone emerges, what could have been a terrible tragedy will have a happy ending.
Mr. Sepulveda emerged in high spirits, with a small bag of rocks from the mine floor to hand out as souvenirs, hugged one and all, and then went to the gallery and and began leading cheers: Chi, Chi, Chi-Le,Le,Le. Here's hoping everyone else emerges as healthy and happy.
Conratulations in order to the nation of Chile, who pulled together, and are in the process of pulling off a miracle.
N.B. The third miner just emerged in good spirits. They're going a pace of about one per hour, it appears. Keep a good thought, 'cuz it ain't over til it's over.
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