Middlepeace

Did va bazdid = visit and re-visit

Nouroz is the time and visiting and re-visiting our loved ones while opening our doors to those who want to pay respect to us.
The beauty of Nouroz is the promise of a new year intertwined with new relationships.  The New Year and new life however require strengthening our old bonds as well as make new ones.  Nouroz is the natural drive and the health based motivation for keeping friendships alive.   We learn from our ancestors to visit elders or those we have not seen for a while.  In this ceremony we make the actual physical move to go and meet our loved ones.  The dynamic of visiting and revisiting our family, friends, and our acquaintances, has a peace promoting message.  The idea behind these Nouroz family gathering is to resolve any implicit conflict from the previous year and to create new bonds.

We have visits and we go back to revisit the same people, because this is only respectful to do so. Besides we make sure that we have paid our debt of receiving friendship.   We have to offer our alliance to people by making the effort and visit them in their home.  This thousand of year tradition is being kept alive by continuing the message of Nouroz, the notion of peace and real cheerfulness.

Five days left to Nouroz

Poran Poregbal
www.middlepeace.com

We iranian use various ways to greet one another. This is part of our culture and greeting is about paying respect. Nouroz  greeting however is really special, it has many elements of positive psychology.  This is something to  acknowledge and celebrate.

1.    Har roz Nouroz and Nouroz piroz = Everyday be Nouroz and Nouroz be successful
It is not a coincident that we Iranian use phrases such as this one.  Greeting is an important factor in our interpersonal relationships.  Specifically during Nouroz, We Iranian greet one another with kind words, mostly using future oriented well wishes.  When we wish that every day be Nouroz, we basically hope for growth and change in our everyday life.  By hoping for a successful Nouroz, we challenge ourselves to do our best to celebrate this ancient Persian tradition with our best resources.  We basically want to use our healthy oriented mind to celebrate spring and New Year that is filled of new hopes and new achievements.

2.    Emsal beh az in salha = this year may be better than these years.
Again we look forward and let go of the past.  We like to move on in our lives and build better life in future. This way of greeting is positive, healthy, and peaceful.

Five days left to Nouroz

Poran Poregbal
www.middlepeace.com

We Iranian live with a very complicated existential and culturally influenced concept called Aberoo.  Certainly this concept is known in other Persian speaking nations.  The notion of Aberoo impacts our daily life, physical and psychological health as well as our financial situation.   In any case the notion of Aberoo keeps us away of being honest, direct, straight forward, and correct.  For sure we damage our relationship with others because of the behaviours that Aberoo forces us to.   In some aspects this broad concept causes us pain and anxiety because our lives are defined many times by this concept.  We usually say: “If he/she/they know, then my Aberoo is gone.” What do we really refer to?

The word itself involves a vague sense of ambiguity and doubt.  Literally Aberoo can be defined as the water of face.  Keeping our face in all times and with any prise is what Aberoo leads us to.  We do not benefit by living with this fear based and self-destroying concept.  I believe we cannot find one positive element in Aberoo, a self-written script that simply censure us more than any other culturally rooted phenomenon.   In our Iranian families we are many times forbidden to speak up our minds because of Aberoo.   We stay away from seeking help and support because we fear our Aberoo is hurt.  What do we really mean by this way of behaving, thinking, and feeling?  We definitely do not gain anything, but we lose many things.
Our children usually ask us:

“What is Aberoo and why should I care about it?”  We Iranian parents often refer to it when we want our children be silent about family secrets or issues that may influence others perception of us.  We like to keep a facade and defend that picture at all costs.  We refer to Aberoo as a right to be known and viewed in a certain way.  We fear people judging us and knowing about our weaknesses.

It is important to use some tangible, comprehendible, and widespread type examples of Aberoo in order to describe what this concept is about.   Remember our tradition of hosting guests.  Some people will borrow money or use many ways of pretending to be richer than they are, to offer their guests good food that they do not afford.  Some people would buy expensive furniture to proof it to others how wealthy they are.  Some other people lie about their situations to keep up the face that in the first place is self-explanatory.   I believe there are many movies showing how families struggle to keep up the face whether it comes to financial status or social positions.  In any case we do anything to look better, more, larger, stronger, and more powerful.  Aberoo is exactly about letting go of ourselves for the sake of others.

I know one woman who battled breast cancer all by herself because of Aberoo.  This woman did not let anyone in her circle of friends and siblings to find out about her breast cancer, although people around her could see she is undergoing many changes.  There are many families who do not for instance talk about their addicted children or family member because of Aberoo.  We do know many women who suffer in the hands of abusive husbands and do not disclose what is going on due to Aberoo.  We can find numerous examples of how Aberoo limits us and how we let to live with fear because of Aberoo.
Why do we do this? Why do we insist on Aberoo?  This is a lengthy debate and needs time.

Poran Poregbal
March 12, 2009
www.middlepeace.com

1. One reader searched for an answer or a response for this dilemma: “how to make jokes at someone with an accent?”   This is the exact searched words. From this question or searched statement, we can only imagine or assume that the reader most probably wanted to know whether it is okay to make jokes of someone with an accent. Well, my question is why we need to make joke of someone with an accent, if we have done this and we feel bad about it that is another story. If we want to find a polite way of making jokes of someone with an accent, well, do we really want to risk offending someone? There is no polite way to make jokes of someone with an accent. We all have what accent we have, we cannot change it as we learn a certain language based on our caregivers accent.  I just encourage this reader to respect people with any accent and any difference. This is the safest we can be.

2. One question that led to middlepeace website is this: “How to build a healthy relationship between mothers and daughters.”
Well to build any healthy relationship we need healthy attitudes, skills, and plenty of cooperation. This is certainly one huge area that human being in large need to learn about and no books in the world is enough to assist people in this area.  This is an ongoing process and needs sacrifices while willingness to listen to one another.  This rule works for any type of relationship. Particularly between mothers and daughters: remember all research shows that mothers need to be mothers and not friends. I hope that my reader will seek professional help to really build this healthy relationship.

3. Word by word verbatim of searched question: “do mothers of teenagers have rights if they are not listening to the rules?”
What I hear from this question is that a mother tries to understand her role and her rights as being a parent to a teenager.  Do we have any rights to be the parents we are supposed to be? Yes, we are the parents and we are right to be parent, a responsible and nurturing one.  I am not sure what this mother or this reader refers to when using the word “rights.”  It is not even clear whether the intention of knowing about this right is to figure out how to use this right or whether it is okay to punish a teenager who is not following the mother’s rules.  Another way to interpret this question is that the dilemma is about parent’s right to do anything if the teenager is not following the rules.  In any case, this reader or mother may have a difficulty in communicating with this young person.  I hope that this reader will seek professional help to create a healthy atmosphere in talking to this teenager and also listening to this young child.

March 11, 2009

Poran Poregbal