By Charles Leyman Kachitsa
In school you learn about pronouns. One of the most confusing and perhaps abused pronouns are ‘I’ and ‘We’. In fact the two have been used to distinguish cultural traits for groups of people including nations. Some are the ‘I people’ while others believe in the ‘We people.’ So much could be said about this at the family level as to husband and wife often depicted as one person, do they refer to themselves as ‘I’ or ‘We’ to mean the two of them?
Several writers have written about cultural sensitivity to the two pronouns based on what has been termed individualistic for the ‘I’s and Collectivistic for the ‘We’ culture. As to which one is better placed, that’s very debatable, suffice to say that most developed nations are wedged towards the individualistic traits except may be the Asian nations of China, Malaysia which are more collectivistic.
In cultures that use the ‘We’ if someone uses the ‘I’ they are considered to be more selfish and outright arrogant. In such settings it becomes confusing how to express personal triumph as to whether you say we have passed the examination well, for instance to mean your own achievement.
It also becomes difficult to state the action one will take in correcting anomalies which one has contributed to or in exercise of their authority, does one say ‘we will fire you’? When he is the top most authority responsible for all, perhaps figuratively that expression may stand but as to whether it can be taken serious one has to doubt. Conversely, an alternative individualistic statement such as, ‘I will fire you’, imagine how authoritative that is?
The quotes this week extends from the extractions from a book that describes your power in terms of ‘thought possession,’ meaning the thought form you have of a thing is already yours as soon as you think it with the principles of life. I am sure that the selected quotations from the book below will enlighten you to one or two life lessons, read and enjoy:
YOUR INVISIBLE POWER by Genevieve Behrend
“The best method of picturing to yourself that which you may desire is both simple and enjoyable, if you once understand the principle back of it well enough to believe it. First and above everything else, be sure of what it is you really want. Then specialize your desire along these lines.“
“Thought as thought is neither good nor bad, it is creative action and always takes physical form. Therefore, the thoughts you dwell upon become the things you possess or do not possess.“
“…… the understanding of the great principle of the law of Supply will, by repeated experiences, deliver us more and more completely out of the region of anxious thought and toilsome labour and bring us into a new world where the useful employment of all our powers, whether mental or physical, will only be unfolding of our individuality upon the lines of its own nature, and therefore a perpetual source of health and happiness, a sufficient inducement, surely, to the careful study of the laws governing the relation between the individual and the Universal Mind.“
“It should be steadily borne in mind that there is an intelligence and power in all nature and all space that is always creative and infinitely sensitive and responsive. The responsiveness of its nature is two-fold: it is creative and amenable to suggestion. Once the human understanding grasps this all-important fact, it realizes the simplicity of the law of life.“
“Remember that your freedom to choose just what you will think, just what thought possession you will affirm and claim, constitutes God’s gift to you.“