The Cultural Values We Now Deceive Are the Ones We Once Believed

Photo by Cristina Gottardi on Unsplash

We, as humans, blink around 19,200 times in a day, says Erica Hersh. We often see things we don’t like to see and believe.

The moment we get to see what we don’t want to see makes us horrible. Our minds walk in the wrong direction. We find our answers in the wrong direction. Surviving isn’t our piece of cake… so we end up accepting these habits as cultures.

Making us think and question ourselves: do the practices we follow have any contextual background? If “no,” why are we following them?

When we take the matter into our hands

Humans are machines that constantly think — even while asleep and forming doubts.

Once we achieve our goals, we make ourselves look superior. We make our habits. And when people get inspired by us, they follow those habits too and become successful — and there’s no doubt in it.

But here’s an explanation that might help:

We often do things that make us proud of it. For example, I drink a cup of lime & honey every morning when I wake, and instead of rinsing it, I put it there in front of me. This helps me write when all my focus is on the cup. I’d gift myself one shot of lime after I complete my writing. I made this a habit, and I’m proud of it.

When I tell everyone how a lime & honey cup can help me write, it makes me proud of it.

Examples of failed rituals

Let’s take, for example, the Sati. It was a practice of Indian women that forced them to die with their husbands. Either they would burn them alive peacefully inside the grave.

The tradition was okay until Europeans came to the Indian subcontinent and found this horrifying culture. Why did they even do it in the first place?

The answer is simple. They never cared about what the Indians did as the British were only there for the wealth.

Isn’t it said that the more you force someone out of it, the deeper it goes?

• Well, it’s always the fault of people that makes a culture live and die
• Rich/poor and all the people in between
• History makes me believe that culture was only for the poor and not for the rich to follow.
• But cultures are not the same.

You might have tried to find out where the smashing cake tradition in the face “Mordida” came into being. Well, it isn’t hard to find out. The cake in the face is a widely accepted culture in Mexico. When the birthday boy blows the candles, and at that moment, someone pushes a cake into the face.

No, the culture isn’t wrong. It’s the fact that cultural traditions always seem to work for the rich and not the poor.

It’s not money; it’s culture. Some more examples of failed rituals are:

Let’s take another example of royal worship in Vanuatu. Many interesting cultural traditions have risen over the years due to people celebrating the actions/lies of certain individuals. The Prince Philip movement is one of them. The religious sect based on the southern island of Tanna in Vanuatu believes that Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, is a divine being. Every year on his birthday, the old a traditional feast with ceremonial dances.

Royal worships like these are indeed fit for all riches and not poor.

An excuse for a life

Culture as hidden elements. Some are transparent, and some blur.

Culture includes all the things in artifacts, symbols, and practices; art and architecture; language, color, and dress; and social etiquette and traditions.

Hence, it makes it easier to point out un-cultural values in each of them because culture is in all the aspects of life we see.

Most likely, villagers are fond of following cultures, and it makes them look honest with their history, except that history is not for showing your honesty but learning from it.

This makes it a very plausible act to differentiate oneself from others. Some people don’t let go of their culture because it makes them unique and an excuse to stand out.

Visible cultural differences are only ten percent of our cultural identities: hidden cultural differences, including values, assumptions, and beliefs, represent the remaining ninety percent of our cultural identity — writes includeimpower.com.

The custard of blinded wealth

Values are the central feature of culture. They shape intangible cultural differences. For example, the cultures we are thinking in our head are custard of our thoughts.

Our thoughts and visions have become custards of our culture. The good news is, we are improvising cultural values but doing no benefit for ourselves.

Final thoughts

Wrong cultural values make a kink in our life goals. It’s time to think about which cultures to accept and which to let go of.

Now you might tell me Noorain; cultural values don’t affect our lives. The moment you enter the “world improving” zone is when you become inspirational for people to follow. I am using the word “emotional” and “not philosophical,” outlining what your future task needs to be.

Make a hypothesis on what you do every day, take out chunks of research, compile bits of pieces, and show the world what we did when we let go of some cultural values. The audience loves the difference.

Thank you for reading my perspectives.

This is original content from NewsBreak’s Creator Program.