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Blissters

Can we achieve eternal bliss? To cut this short, no. We are not hardwired to experience static happiness. What we can have, however, are shares of moments of happiness that, if we earn as many and as early as we can, can almost equate to living a life in bliss. This is what I have learned in our IHD session about the science of happiness, as presented by Dr. Fernando. Interestingly, he has changed his religious perspectives a number of times, and during his presentation with us, he is a now a Buddhist monk. I believe he is a man of wisdom since he has exposed himself in various principles and philosophies, and gets to experience each one of these perspectives and reflect on his endeavours. Likewise, he is a doctor by profession which gives an impression that he has the knowledge about human physiology and psychology which makes him a speaker fit for the topic.

So…if we can’t be happy all the time, how can we be happy for the most of our living days? How can we maximize our time here living a happy life? Still, it all boils down to our own outlook in life. Obviously, each individual is unique, and therefore, has different happiness threshold from others. The chemicals in our body responsible for the feeling of bliss are also dependent on genetics. Moreover, our brains are wired to adapt to changing environment for survival, which therefore repeats emphasis on how we can’t be happy all the time.

It’s funny how this story sharing is about happiness, yet it gradually decreases the instances where one can be happy. Worry not, for Dr. Fernando gave some useful tips in life on how to be happier despite the situation. In essence, what we need to do to achieve happiness is to reduce our worries instead. We might not be feeling a festive mood, but at least we get to avoid getting hurt. One easy and useful tip is to decrease our happiness threshold to a low level. This means that we must lessen our expectations in life, and increase our appreciation in the smaller things. Having this perspective gives instant gratification as we can easily be happy even for the small things we have or experience. Appreciating what you have now, rather than longing for things that are not yet attainable are some concrete examples of this principle. It’s also a good way to learn the circuitries of happiness. The spectrum of happiness ranges from calm and contentment, to excitement, and connection and compassion. Calmness brings tranquillity to an individual, giving him inner peace; excitement gives him drive and sudden spike in emotions; while compassion, probably the best experience of all, is an unwavering feeling of joy as you get to be connected with your loved ones. It is also important to train your mind and be mindful of your actions. Another important lesson in happiness is to be friendly with our thoughts. Know that these emotions and thoughts are our own, and as we get to know them and their patterns, we learn to understand and control them. Further, expressing gratuity and practicing generosity and making them your habits are effective ways on feeling joyfulness. Furthermore, it is good to remember to see everyone (including other living creatures) same as you. We are all living in this planet; therefore, we should treat each life with respect. Finally, the secret to happiness is to know your mind and, again, befriend your thoughts.

As I get to learn these things, I immediately integrated these principles as my values. It’s actually quite simple. Start by identifying what you have now without looking at what you want in the future. Thank our Creator for every blessing that we receive from Him. Thank Him for still breathing, for not being affected by the current pandemic, for having all these material things, financial stability, friends, family, anything that you can think of that deserves His praise. Or if you have different beliefs, just thank anyone who has contributed these things to you, and express your gratitude wholeheartedly. Always expect less, but trust more. Live a life with integrity, and aim to bring about positive influence to your social sphere. Remember, happiness is just one mind-set away.

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Work hard, play hard, but safeguard your body

Occupational safety and health has not been given too much attention for the past few centuries. Some labourers, especially in the construction industry, were physically strained beyond their capacities, and exhausted much of their vigour to keep up with the activity schedule. It was also apparent that safety in the workplace was the least of the problem as this was not a factor of profit, and causing danger or accidents in the workplace by human error is seen as mere irresponsibility of the person being blamed.

Today, much has changed on this perspective. With the society’s development and emerging global standards in labour, care for people are now placed in pedestals. We now see the importance of having a safe working environment as it primarily aims to protect the welfare of the working class. It also decreases the chances of having accidents, as hazard and accident preventive measures are implemented all throughout the facilities of many work environments. This in turn decreases the costs that will be incurred if ever these types of accidents ever happen. In the Philippines, our country has also been active in employing programs relative to occupational safety and health activities. This is evident in the data provided by the Philippine Statistics Authority: https://psa.gov.ph/content/20172018-integrated-survey-labor-and-employmentisle-part-5-occupational-safety-and-health (Mapa, 2019).

Albeit this information, there are still rooms for improvement on the initiatives of various industries on occupational safety and health in their own companies. As one study shows, there is still a lack of designated Health Officers, conduct of Annual Physical Examinations (APE), implementing healthy lifestyle program, and ergonomics intervention (Revilla, 2019). On a personal level, I believe we, as a country, are quite advanced in adapting principles of occupational safety and health practices in various industries. Although there are still some lapses, especially for the non-compliant establishments, our performance in other occupational safety and health aspects are quite commendable.

I have to admit, I also have a minimal understanding of the concept. As far as I know, as long as my employer compensates me well, I need not to worry about other things. I just let the government regulators do their functions. Maybe one reason is I still consider myself as young and full of vigour; that I can take physical and mental stress at my age. That’s how we were oriented, or at least I, that complaining about sitting for long hours in front of a computer is nothing compared to the jobs of physical labourers. Who am I to complain, right?

But learning that occupational health and safety is still important regardless of the industry you work for, I now realize that we all have the right to a safe and conducive working environment. There are probably numerous studies linking unattended occupational health and safety issues to various work performance, such as productivity, efficiency, and obviously, safety. It was a great IHD session where we discussed Safety and Productivity Enhancement through Ergonomics Development (SPEED). The resource person, Dr. Gutierrez, discussed how they have conducted a study on workplace discomfort experienced by employees in a number of offices. Results of their study revealed that some complain that they experience body pain and cramps that lasts for a day to a week. Surprising as this may seem, even workers who have sedentary nature of tasks still experience body pains. With this, Dr. Gutierrez also shared some ways that could possibly be done to reduce these discomfort. One is the use of ergonomic furniture that would ease tension when using it, such as ergonomic chairs. These are especially helpful for people working in the offices that are seated for several hours a day.

With this new knowledge that I have learned, I now know how I could possibly improve my health even when I am at work. Safety is extremely important for us since we are working in the laboratory. I have established several safety standards, protocols, and administrative controls to manage the risks of the hazards in our laboratory. I also try to take a break from time to time doing several stretches especially when in front of the computer for a long time. In addition, I go out of the office for a few breaks to breathe in fresh air from outside and intentionally look at the trees as, based from what I know, this reduces stress and eases tension in the eyes from focusing too much on the monitor. Likewise, I shared these good habits with my colleagues so that we will not be overworked and experience body pains as well. I try to encourage them to do as I do all the while conversing with them to get to know more, while benefiting from these exercises. I do hope that we could still improve our physical aspects in the workplace, because I believe this will be beneficial not just for us, but for the organization as well.

References

Mapa, C. S. (2019). 2017/2018 Integrated survey on labor and employment(ISLE) – Part 5 occupational safety and health practices: 2017. Philippine Statistics Authority. https://psa.gov.ph/content/20172018-integrated-survey-labor-and-employmentisle-part-5-occupational-safety-and-health

Revilla, R. C. (2019).

Health in the workplace: Examining the contribution of organizational factors on the occurrence of musculoskeletal diseases in the Philippines

[Paper presentation]. National Convention on Statistics (NCS) 2019. https://psa.gov.ph/sites/default/files/5.2.3%20Health%20in%20the%20Workplace%20Examining%20the%20Contribution%20of%20Organizational%20Factors%20on%20the%20Occurrence%20of%20Musculoskeletal.pdf

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Art-sthetics

I used to draw a lot when I was young. As the third child of the four children of my parents, I just mimic what my older siblings do for hobbies: playing basketball, game cards, computer games, and drawing cartoons. I experienced what most of the children in my generation has experienced in their childhood. But among them, I was the one who finish last in making caricatures. Maybe I was too drawn in drawing to make it appear same as the original. Maybe I was a perfectionist. I can’t help but give my best in what I do. It gives me a better sense of accomplishment than doing something in mediocrity. And I liked what I was doing during that time. They can finish their piece in one sitting, while I finish mine in one to two days. It’s what they say, you can’t rush art.

Years went by, and my love for cartoons and drawing started to diminish. As I grew older and the demands from my academics grew bigger, I started losing touch with my artistic side. Society also has greatly influenced my preferences on the things that I should be passionate about. Most of my peers were starting to think maturely, and seeing that my hobbies and interests are that of a child, I tried to reduce those kinds of interests of mine to obscurity. I tried to go along with the same interests my peers are into. Though it doesn’t give me much enjoyment as I did with my former hobbies, I get to learn other things that I haven’t had interest before. Moreover, I get to have many friends, and we all have similar interests. Though this was an apparent change others perceived in me, I still engage those hobbies of mine from time to time in solitude, especially when I am stressed or feeling down.

At this time of my life, it does not matter now if society dictates that I engage in hobbies more appropriate for my age. In this age, people, as the basic unit of society, are starting to break norms. It matters not if your hobbies or your interests are inappropriate for your age, what matters more is it makes you happy and you get to express or influence others, but of course, still confined to what is legal and moral.

I cannot fully grasp what ‘aesthetic’ really means. All I know is it pertains to beauty and the appreciation of it. I wonder if it’s only limited to artworks, artefacts, or something that can only be appreciated by the eyes of the elites and the cultured class. But is there a limit in perceiving beauty? Can it only be perceived by a certain social class? Can beauty be dictated, or standardized? In some way, I guess it can be. We as humans have somehow similar sensitivities when it comes to what is pleasing to the eyes and what could not be. I realized this when our resource speaker for the IHD session, Ms. Ginny Cruz, toured us virtually in the collections of the Banko Sentral ng Pilipinas. As the Deputy Director of the BSP, she is the curator of the artwork and artefact collections of the BSP museum. The tour started in a chronological fashion: starting from the oldest artefact that was kept by the museum, up to the avant-garde artworks of this century. Having this exposure to such intricate, immensely cultural (and extremely expensive) collections will really make you appreciate the richness of our history, as well as understand that appreciation of aesthetics is not limited to any social class. It is perhaps limited to the extent of what our eyes can appreciate. This also depicts that art and beauty are not bounded by time, as it can still spark interests across generations, ethnical and cultural backgrounds, and social classes. As I recall my experience in doing my crafts as a child, I see the beauty in the way I worked hard for it, as I appreciate it beyond what my eyes can perceive.

With this new perspective of appreciating the beauty of things, if time permits, I hope I could still practice, express, and develop my craft. I also wanted to share with others that it matters not if what you are passionate about is inappropriate for your age, as long as it does not harm others, rather, it should influence and inspire others to be who we they really want to be.

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(W)hole in your heart

It was late at night, and I was driving on my way home from work. I was quite stressed because of the demands my work required me to finish before the day ends. I finally arrived at home: tired, hungry, stressed, and somewhat annoyed with all these things going on inside my head. I can’t exactly remember our conversation, but I must have been infuriated at that time, when my brother told me, “You can’t be mad at me because of your work. You should learn to compartmentalize your life.” I’m not pretty sure if that’s what he exactly said, but that was the gist of it. What I do remember was the word “compartmentalize”. When I was back on my feet and already at a calmer state, I asked him what he meant about his principle. He said that each aspect of my life: career, education, family, friends, romantic relationships, and other part of me must not affect each other. In a more basic sense, each part of me must be in compartments: living and breathing its own life and must not influence the others. If I was stressed at work, I must not reflect it to my family or peers, and just leave it at work, same with the other aspects. I held on to his principle for quite a time from that moment on, because he had a point, and he has proven his point. I was not venting my emotions to the people not concerned with my problems, and they seem to be glad that I seem to be fine and better.

But is it really better? Am I really a better person now? In the midst of all the joyous moments I spent with my family, with my workmates, with my friends, my problems and issues never really went away. I just somehow found ways to conceal my dilemmas in my thoughts, but they always reappear with greater magnitude. It’s like I’m depositing my problems in a big piggy bank, and when it’s time to withdraw, I break the whole piggy bank, cash them out in full, and with no cents left.

I am not disregarding the advice of my brother. He is a great person and he seems to have a lot of experience in life. I always look up to him as far back as when we were still both young. He was my best friend and I always admire his way of living, even if he used to be annoyed about it. That’s why I most of the time believe and apply whatever he says because of his wisdom. However, maybe not everything he does well could apply to me in the same manner.

It was this moment when I learned about the concept of ‘integrality’. The De La Salle University, or at least in my MBA undertaking, has given great emphasis in moulding individuals to the best extent the institution can influence, reflected especially in their vision and mission, and the teachings of the school. I first encountered the ‘integrality’ principle in my Lasallian Business Leadership class. My professor, Ms. Pia, discussed to us how individuals should be living in a harmonized life. The work and life ‘balance’ is a thing of the past, and where we are now is in the concept of work and life ‘harmony’. You are who you are, regardless of your location or situation. Everything you do or say is a complete reflection of who you are as a person. You are not one person at work and different at home. You bring yourself everywhere you go and with anyone you converse to. You represent yourself. This principle was further emphasized during this term that I am taking my Integral Human Development (IHD) course, and the subject has given us numerous opportunities to develop each one of many aspects a human can flourish.

I saw this principle as a life changer. I strived to make every living moment of my life as an integral person. I now express how I feel for a particular moment, I take action when I need to, I try to integrate my passion in my work, and aim not to dissociate myself from who I am at home and at work. I am striving to be a whole person from the point that I learned about the concept. And now, I am influencing my peers to do the same, especially at work where I try to know more about them and get to share my experiences about it. I also wanted them to be an integral person, to present themselves as they are outside these four corners of our workplace. Now, we can be natural with each other, linking the gaps of profession and as persons.

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(Use of) Money matters

They say money is the root of all evil. Or that’s what I have just heard and known for the longest time, until I actually searched for this phrase. This adage originally emanated from a proverb from the book of 1 Timothy 6:10, which reads: “For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. By craving it, some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows” (Bible Hub, n.d.). I formatted the word “love” in bold text in this bible verse to provide emphasis on the word. The words “love of”, when attached to something, gives extreme emphasis on the desire to have such article, tangible or not. Taking this phrase in context, money is not really the root of all evil, but the love or desire for it, is. Nevertheless, anything that is desired beyond moderation is dangerous for anyone, including money.

I’ve always dreamed of having a lot of material things and properties in life when I get old. By old, I mean the retiring age, because that’s probably the nearest to reality I can aim for right now. I envy the rich living in luxury without worrying about what they would eat tomorrow or where they would sleep tonight, or for the next few decades, including the generations that would follow. Oh, what I would give to have such a life.

I think of these frequently whenever I feel that I am lacking in financial aspects. I always share these thoughts with my brother, about how I wanted to have the good things in life, to give my family the comfortable life, to be able to afford things my loved ones’ wants and needs and  bring joy to their faces, and to financially support those who are in need.

With all these sentiments I’ve expressed so far, I wonder where the word ‘money’ went. I guess it’s not simply about having the money, rather, what I wanted to do with the money I have. What probably is more appropriate to express is how I wanted to help the people I love and care for, and even extend these helping hands to those in need. It certainly never occurred to me to have a lot of money but never used to help others.

During our session in my IHD subject, Mr. Alexander Gilles, a Chartered Financial Analyst, talks about savings and investment instruments and vehicles. I always wanted to learn these things, and I always hear about this method of making your money work for you, but haven’t got the chance, not to mention the time, to attend seminars about this topic due to various priorities. Even my brother always eagerly asks me to join him in the Philippine Stock Exchange seminars to learn about the subject. Now, I took this opportunity to learn intently about how, even for a small value, I could earn money to achieve my goals: to achieve stability and help others.

As I was taking down notes to every details the speaker says, I am gradually learning how to better manage my finances. After the session, my classmates and I have this group chat where we get to share our insights on every subject, session, and discussion we had in our class. This time, it was about this topic. We shared how we will plan to invest our savings to these instruments in a tactical approach to gain leverage, and we conversed with eagerness.

I was grateful that I have learned a lot from this subject matter. Having this knowledge in my thoughts, I decided to use it on the time when I will have lesser financial responsibilities. I also found myself eager and excited to share this new information with my brother and to my family, as I feel that it would help us a lot in the financial aspects of our human development.

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Flourishing the Integral Human Development (IHD) flower

Personal reflection is a rare opportunity for me to practice nowadays. I have to admit, I rarely reflect on what is my current state as a human. Am I at an optimum condition for my age? Am I doing the best for my body, mind, and spirit? Am I treating the people around me justly? Am I being a good person and a citizen to my country? These questions don’t come often to me since I simply do not make any effort whatsoever in doing so. I just feel like there are a lot of things going on in my life to even ponder on these thoughts. Fortunately, this elective I am taking for my MBA course called Integral Human Development is kind of a breather from all the responsibilities and burdens I am confronting every day. Although I am still at the initializing phase of the subject, I feel like most of the period, we will be reflecting on various facets of a person, how these facets can be wholly integrated into one’s persona, and how each facet can be further developed and eventually the developing the person holistically. That being said, our first meeting involves the Integral Human Development flower. This flower depicts a person’s evaluation of himself/herself or how others affect them based on different human facets: material, bodily, cognitive, emotional, social, aesthetic, moral, and spiritual. The person then rates himself/herself by illustrating a “petal”: the longer the petal (or the further it is from the center of the flower), the more the person feels like he is developed in that aspect. For our activity, we used the flower to evaluate how each facet is being nurtured at our own workplace. In this case, below is my depiction of my Integral Human Development flower relative to our company’s nurturing:

The illustration above is my evaluation of my company’s rating on how well they nurture each facet for their employees. Based on my illustration, I believe there is a good balance of advantages and disadvantages on how well our company takes care of their employees’ human development facets. To compare and contrast, the highest rated facets are Material, Cognitive, and Social, follow by mid ranked facets like Moral and Spiritual, and least as Bodily, Emotional, and Aesthetic. I gave a high rating for the material aspect for my company since I work in the public sector, and during this pandemic, unlike some private companies, our organization has not downsized its number of staff, rather, the department even provided hazard pays for employees reporting for work, and took care of the expenses for testing of employees. Remuneration was not also hampered and was even given in advance. For the cognitive aspect, our organization gives us great number of opportunities for cognitive development since we are frequently sent to to various capability building activities relative to our nature of work that develop our knowledge and skills in being more efficient and productive in our tasks. For the social aspect, our organization, prior this pandemic, has always been active and supportive in conducting social gatherings for us to get to know all the personnel in the organization. In addition, although it is required, our organization is also active in sharing bible verses and readings as a reflective activity for our spiritual and moral obligations. Every week, bible verses are being cited and shared to employees for them to relate and review among themselves their acts and decisions in the workplace in regard to upholding moral standards that should be demonstrated by government entities. However, the reason why spiritual and moral facets are just fairly rated is because these shared bible verses are not really applied and moral standards are rarely observed in the organization. I gave the lowest scores to the Bodily, Emotional, and Aesthetic human development aspects of our organization. To start, no programs are currently being implemented in our organization, nor facilities and equipment to help their employees take care of their physical health. Unlike other neighbouring government facilities, our office does not have any gym or fitness area and equipment where employees can work up a sweat. Nevertheless, there are several instances where our organization conducts annual “sportsfest” events where employees can demonstrate their physical abilities in competing with other groups of employees. On an emotional state, our organization rarely shows interest in the emotional well-being of the employees; rather, commotions and gossiping are completely normal phenomena in the office. Similarly, the aesthetic side of the organization is also on the lower rated aspect. The premises of the building, its maintenance and appearance, the bathrooms (which is personally the most important part of the building as it directly reflects how the organization maintains its facilities and surroundings) all look a bit shoddy; as if the organization did not bother maintaining the building since the day they moved in. However, I am still grateful and thankful for my organization for giving and taking care of me by providing and nurturing some of the most important human aspects that I value: material and cognitive. I believe there is still hope for my organization to improve on the other human development aspects albeit the huge gap our organization has compared with other contemporary organizations. We could also take a closer look at how toxic our culture is to other employees. We could probably listen less to gossips and more to the bible verses sharing. Our organization still has a long way to go and a lot of work to do, but with the proper resources and continuous support, our organization will someday blossom into a vibrant flower.