A trend begins another ends.

The world is governed by trends; clothing style, attitude, type of music, product, movements or even a choice of ‘word’. In one case, experts in International Relations point out the lexical choice of ‘International Community’ and claim it has picked up as a trend in amongst foreign policy. Others,look at the spread of Puma sneakers, the shift to R n B, joining social networking websites as trends.

In order to narrow the lens on ‘trend’, I will pick up a state that I, wholeheartedly, see as a trend driven nation.

Imagine a trend driving a whole nation…

I will begin a mini-series of posts that shed light on how trends pick up in Saudi and try and highlight patterns.

A trend begins another ends…

Credit: Shutterstock

“The ‘positive’ sense of the word ‘liberty’ derives from the wish
on the part of the individual to be hisown master. I wish my
life and decisions to depend on myself, not on external forces of
whatever kind. I wish to be the instrument of my own, not of
other men’s, acts of will. I wish to be a subject, not an object; to be
moved by reasons, by conscious purposes which are my own, not
by causes which affect me, as it were, from outside. I wish to be
somebody, not nobody; a doer — deciding, not being decided for,
self-directed and not acted upon by external nature or by other
men as if I were a thing, or an animal, or a slave incapable of play-
ing a human role, that is, of conceiving goals and policies of my
own and realizing them. This is at least part of what I mean when
I say that I am rational, and that it is my reason that distinguishes
me as a human being from the rest of the world. I wish, above all,
to be conscious of myself as a thinking, willing, active being, bear-
ing responsibility for his choices and able to explain them by
reference to his own ideas and purposes. I feel free to the degree
that I believe this to be true, and enslaved to the degree that I
am made to realize that it is not.”

Source: Two concepts of Liberty by Berlin: Four Essays on Liberty (1969)

I, personally, agree with Friedman’s statement. What Friedman is raising not only applies to the world of economics, but also to everything that governs our lives. I will not go into detail about it, but I would strongly recommend Naomi Klein’s Shock Doctrine that challenges Friedman’s free-market policies and illustrates various examples of how a crisis actually produced real change. Klein highlights the change in Latin America; Chile and Argentina’s market privatization, post 9/11; change in US domestic and foreign policies – the fundamental reason for waging the war on terror.

I hope the picture is clear now, as I only plan to discuss this through a Saudi-Jeddawi lens.

By the end of November 2009, heavy rain hit the people in Jeddah – sadly, a number of them passed away.

What succeeded this unfortunate event was something noteworthy; the emergence of humanitarian aid – not the basic collection of material donations, but instead a personal hand.

Saudi youth, adults and elders stood hand in hand, despite age, gender, background, class… It seemed that everyone was pre-occupied with purpose – a GOAL to help out those who have been affected by the flood.

The Jeddawi Saudis were in a state of shock, and, therefore, something abnormal occurred.  Although there was opposition by the committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice (هيئة الأمر بالمعروف والنهي عن المنكر) to put the humanitarian aid movement to a halt,  it was resisted by determined Saudis who subconsciously protested and used the external circumstances as an alibi for such a significant change; community service, and to be precise gender-mixed.

This dramatic change would not have happened with perhaps 20 Majlis Al-Shura meetings, as a result of some of them being diagnosed with phobia of change – or as would the psychology jargon phrase it:  future shock – ainophobia, the fear of newness.

It seems that Friedman’s theory of change was, to a degree, applied to Jeddawi Saudi society.  Whilst the aim of this post is not to assert that change only occurs when there is a crisis,  but to argue that people with influence should take advantage of a crisis (لا سمح الله) to produce positive change within our society.

Reviving of We are the world.

I hope we replace some of Lady Gaga’s songs with some of these.

Peace.

It is, in no doubt, an extremely significant thing for us to admit that we are mistaken. Our ice-breaker discussion today is just how unsuccessful we are (whether true or not) and begin comparing ourselves with the old Islamic Caliphates, to the United States and recently Japan.

Very good! You would think we are comparing ourselves to know where we stand and where want to be. However,  we are now experts at pinpointing the errors, today everyone utilizes various coefficients in an equation that underscores our situation, whether economically, politically or academically … but at the end we all deduce an exact single result; failure. Some blame it on how we lost our everyday ethics, how dishonesty emerged, that we are too spoiled or living in poverty.

Our main objective, if there is one, is to jump from point A to point C without passing by B. It may be possible, but it is in fact not advisable. The question, therefore, emerges: What is point A, B and C? My humble answer to this modest question will be: Sorry there is not only a single answer but a million! One million! Yes, because to every situation there is an alternative way to tackle it with this so called theory of ABC

We utilize this theory conditionally to an obstacle we face. For instance, let’s employ this analogy in the business world; how would A, B and C be implemented.

Before I start with an example, it will be my honour to introduce the experts that will provide us with their assertions that would balance the reliability or the credibility of the example chosen.

1. Dinner evening specialists (DES); a group of people who meet for dinner and usually end up discussing the welfare of the nation, the negatives, and at sometimes they end up celebrating the achievements of a minority in the country.
2. Afternoon singles (AN); a group of singles who usually hang out at a café’. Unlike DES, the afternoon singles discussions vary, sometimes it is about the country, stuff they must buy, stuff they wish to buy, football and what’s wrong in their lives.

Back to the example:  Point A may be an individual’s qualities in the workforce; leader, hard worker or organized, teamwork…etc. – simple stupid. So far point A is clear? I hope so.

Point B is putting these qualities in immense action, receiving hard tasks, working with foreigners (unfortunately subconscious racism)… Point B is the area where an employee may get demotivated, feel he is fed up.

Why would such a behaviour occur? On the one hand, according to dinner evening’s specialists (DES) in this particular situation assert that this shift in behaviour is due to the fact that they are given an easy ride in school, in other words there is not much challenge in school, therefore, getting used to studying a day or week before the exam.  On the other hand, according to the afternoon singles (AS) it is as a result of being spoiled, getting used to things coming easy- life being easy… until you suddenly encounter difficulties and thus back off. Valid argument, obviously not to all… but to some at least

Point C, Maslow’s hierarchy’s self-actualization, being an executive, a CEO… Aiming high! Another argument by our team of experts, DES claim these high ambitions are, in fact, due to the notion that they are being pressured by society’s expectations, and hence wanting to meet their anticipations. However, AS give a dissimilar theory, their thesis states that these high aims particularly go hand in hand with the love of tangible materialistic things, meaning the idea of owning the best car, a big house and travelling first class.

Therefore, to conclude, we may say that these points, in order to effectively employ them we must follow them chronologically, rather than jump from different points. If an individual jumps from A to C, in the example used above, it may mean the individual did not experience B (the hard one) vividly and is thus not able to perform well as a C – a CEO. This, therefore, draws the line that distinguishes where the real mistake is:

• Blaming the government: 50% effective – The government can provide everything but it is for you to follow up… We cannot all be CEOs.
• Blaming bad teachers: 10% effective –Teachers are put at a halt, perhaps because they are not satisfied with their salary, with the weakness of the syllabus and unmotivated students.
• Blaming the family (Society); 30% effective, blaming the country for not being trained to encounter difficulties, such as getting used to living economically and to cut costs.
• Attend the dinner or chill at the café’: 0% effective all you will do is sit down moan and hope one day things will turn around.
• Blaming yourself; 88% effective, making the change you seek in the world… nevertheless an evident loophole may be falling into depression.

Hence, not only the government, the private sector, the health sector, the education sector, the industrial sector are all responsible, but also you are, by all means, responsible!

May Allah bless all.

Extract from Cosmo Magazine

Dear ambitious city inhabitant,

Today, reflecting on the flow of years, I came a cross something; creativity today and creativity yesterday.

Do both definitions go hand in hand? Maybe, you assume.

You have big hopes of success, thats what I was told.  I do too!

Speaking of success, are you the type of person who wishes to follow-on the foot steps of others and be labelled as a successful, ‘follower’, enhancer or whatever you plan to call it.

What is creativity? It is defined as follows: