Strength of Mind

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I was reading an interview one of these days and the person being interviewed (a tennis player) was talking about how the game can be so frustrating sometimes; if in the best of chances, one wins 5 tournaments in one year and one plays 25 tournaments, then one looses all the other matches. In no other game is the rate of losses/victories so unbalanced and also, because the majority of the other sports are team sports, there is always someone we can share the defeat with. In tennis we are alone, naked on court, with no one to blame or share responsibilities with. One must have a very strong frame of mind to survive in this game. And that is where my point comes in: what is strength of mind and how do we get it?

A friend of mine once told me (in a somewhat despizing tone) that we have to be strong to survive in this world and those who aren't will just be cast aside. I found this remark very ungenerous, for it sounded like it's an easy choice to be strong and those who aren't should be punished for not being so.

First of all strength is not a matter of choice. We are all born with certain characteristics. We didn't choose to have them, they were just given to us. Then, while we are young and our personalities are being formed, we do not have control over the events that shape us (we don't choose our families, we don't choose our environment, nor the situations that we face). Then suddenly we are grown up and now we have responsibilities over our lives. It is true that we can all choose right from wrong, but that power of choice comes only at a later stage in our lives when all that we are was already shaped by many hands and events. In these circumstances the fact that some of us come out strong is no more a merit than that some of us come out weak is a blame. Many times it's just a question of luck.

This fact is already a strong point against the affirmation above, but there is another. What is the definition of strength? Who set it and by what standards?

A person that is called solid in Europe or America, is not considered so in Asia, and a strong man in the XXI century might not have been so 500 years ago. Definitions and situations change over time and over space and what is strong by the current patterns could very well be weak in another world or in another time.

My belief is that we are all necessary in this world and none of us is better nor worse than the next. The weak are as necessary to the strong as darkness is necessary to brightness. We are all multilayered and what we are and what we achieve depends on many circumstances and on many people, so in my opinion it's much more strong the one that is clear sighted enough to recognize his frailties and brave enough to face them, than the one that arrogantly believes to be better just because he has more.

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A.C. Lisbon, 19th December 2005

Why I just hate rumours!

What’s a rumour? It’s a piece of news of origin unknown, often negative or derogative about someone, and of no practical use for anyone in general. So why do rumours begin so easily and spread so fast? If they are irrelevant, mean and often false why do we spend so much time listening to and talking about them?

In my view, rumours are the mirror of everything that’s petty, mean and low in human nature. Rumours, specially when they are about the rich, the famous or the talented, are something that makes us feel good, because it makes those we consider lucky appear bad. Rumours flatter our vanity and raise our self esteem because they put others down. Rumours make us feel special because they give us a sense of power: we know something about someone that shows how human and flawed that person is, and we like to exercise that power by spreading the rumour around.

Rumours are a social tool, because they facilitate contact. In some situations rumours compensate for the lack of subject between people, or their lack of talent to stand out in a group. If one begins to speak about something he/she has heard, they are sure to get everybody’s attention in a flash.

But what do rumours do? Nothing good and a lot of bad. They stain people’s lives, they nettle and disturb, and they confuse and offend. In the best of chances they simply hurt, and in the worst they can destroy lives. Rumours are insidious, they are poisonous and they are coward. If someone tells us something offensive or untrue we can react, we can confront the offender and straighten out the truth. But with a rumour we cannot do that. Rumours have no face and no name, but they do have thousands of voices. Being victim of a rumour is like being slapped repeatedly in the dark. You are hit again and again and there’s nothing you can do to stop it because you don’t know who’s hitting you or why. You just stand there helpless and take the blows.

And the worst thing about a rumour is that it is spread by people who have no intention of creating any harm. They just can’t loose the opportunity of passing around that juicy little piece of gossip they just heard, with no idea of the damage they might be creating. The majority of us don’t steal and don’t kill, but almost all of us have passed a rumour around. You might think that comparing rumours to robberies or killings is going too far, but that is only because most of us don’t have an idea of the harm a rumour can create until we experience it in the flesh or see it affecting the life of someone we love. And then we understand why someone once felt it was just as important to say “Thou shall not bear false witness”, as to say “though shall not kill” and “though shall not steal”!

A.C., December the 5th, 2005