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 Chile. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Chile. Show all posts
Thursday, October 14, 2010
A Great Week For South America: The San Jose Mine Rescues And The Nobel Prize
As OS types away, the rescue operation is rounding the far turn and heading for the wire--but no one should rest easy until EVERYBODY is out.
But, what inspiration. These events show us, in the most positive manner, what we are capable of, and how we get these great things accomplished. OS hopes there will be a sober and detailed analysis of the whole story, as there has been a lot of valuable knowledge gained--in engineering, medicine, psychology, medicine, etc.
Also, within the week, the awarding of the Nobel Prize for Literature to Mario Vargas Llosa is most notable.
An English-language Swedish blogger weighs in on the reaction from the Swedish left, which was, shall we say, not amused. After all, if you ain't no socialist, you don't deserve you nooooo prizes, ya heah'?
People who never voiced any concerns about the politics of other Nobel Prize winners – like Wisława Szymborska, who wrote poetic celebrations of Lenin and Stalin; Günter Grass, who praised Cuba’s dictatorship; Harold Pinter, who supported Slobodan Milošević; José Saramago, who purged anti-Stalinists from the revolutionary newspaper he edited – thought that the Swedish Academy had finally crossed a line. Mario Vargas Llosa’s politics apparently should have disqualified him from any prize considerations. He is after all a classical liberal in the tradition of John Locke and Adam Smith.
O.M.G.! Just totally inexcusable!
But before you get carried away and conclude that Vargas Llosa deserves the prize: did I forget to tell you that he is not a socialist? Well, he was. He was a convinced Communist who supported the Cuban revolution. He moved on not because he was no longer able to sympathise with the poor and oppressed, but because he still did when others began to identify more with the revolutionaries than with the people in whose name they made the revolution. He saw that Castro persecuted homosexuals and imprisoned dissenters. While other socialists kept quiet and thought that the dream justified the means, Vargas Llosa began to ask himself the difficult questions about why his ideals looked more like prison camps than socialist utopias when realised.
That is when the author began to think that the centralisation of power and wealth to the government led to authoritarianism, and that trade barriers, regulations and the absence of property rights protected the powerful and made it impossible for the poor to start businesses and build a life of their own. He became a classical liberal, forever fighting against the corrupt and the authoritarian, no matter how they disguised themselves – whether as military juntas, mercantilist right-wingers or socialist dictators – and he took up the fight for the rule of law and property rights for the poor and oppressed.
It's a great article, ya'll. And thanks to the good buddy, who escaped from the clutches of academia in the nick of time, for sharing it with OS.
But, what inspiration. These events show us, in the most positive manner, what we are capable of, and how we get these great things accomplished. OS hopes there will be a sober and detailed analysis of the whole story, as there has been a lot of valuable knowledge gained--in engineering, medicine, psychology, medicine, etc.
Also, within the week, the awarding of the Nobel Prize for Literature to Mario Vargas Llosa is most notable.
An English-language Swedish blogger weighs in on the reaction from the Swedish left, which was, shall we say, not amused. After all, if you ain't no socialist, you don't deserve you nooooo prizes, ya heah'?
People who never voiced any concerns about the politics of other Nobel Prize winners – like Wisława Szymborska, who wrote poetic celebrations of Lenin and Stalin; Günter Grass, who praised Cuba’s dictatorship; Harold Pinter, who supported Slobodan Milošević; José Saramago, who purged anti-Stalinists from the revolutionary newspaper he edited – thought that the Swedish Academy had finally crossed a line. Mario Vargas Llosa’s politics apparently should have disqualified him from any prize considerations. He is after all a classical liberal in the tradition of John Locke and Adam Smith.
O.M.G.! Just totally inexcusable!
But before you get carried away and conclude that Vargas Llosa deserves the prize: did I forget to tell you that he is not a socialist? Well, he was. He was a convinced Communist who supported the Cuban revolution. He moved on not because he was no longer able to sympathise with the poor and oppressed, but because he still did when others began to identify more with the revolutionaries than with the people in whose name they made the revolution. He saw that Castro persecuted homosexuals and imprisoned dissenters. While other socialists kept quiet and thought that the dream justified the means, Vargas Llosa began to ask himself the difficult questions about why his ideals looked more like prison camps than socialist utopias when realised.
That is when the author began to think that the centralisation of power and wealth to the government led to authoritarianism, and that trade barriers, regulations and the absence of property rights protected the powerful and made it impossible for the poor to start businesses and build a life of their own. He became a classical liberal, forever fighting against the corrupt and the authoritarian, no matter how they disguised themselves – whether as military juntas, mercantilist right-wingers or socialist dictators – and he took up the fight for the rule of law and property rights for the poor and oppressed.
It's a great article, ya'll. And thanks to the good buddy, who escaped from the clutches of academia in the nick of time, for sharing it with OS.
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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