March 26, 2017
A World Without Boundaries
I have been blessed to have met so many good people across the racial spectrum, some in person and others through the availability of today’s social media. I have been wondering what would the world be like, when we sleep at night, walk across our beautiful community, travel across the globe, or simply go about doing our daily work, if we only have good people.
Here is a great stranger whom I had met in the line of casual business acquaintance who has become a good friend. Our racial differences don’t matter, but the manner in which we communicate with one another has captured our mutual admiration.
Ge Xiong is an extraordinary man. I met him …
ByJames E.on February 24, 2017
Ge Xiong is an extraordinary man. I met him over 5 years ago. He is a loving, teaching and methodical in kind. This book is a must read. If you knew him personally, the book is even deeper knowing him and how centered he is with life! It should be 10 stars!
Words matter in our communication that gravitates our likeness and binds our common values. Words cross boundaries across the globe and connect our humanity regardless of racial, cultural, and gender differences. Words have the power of solving problems, healing wounds, soothing pain, and even defeating adversaries.
Those who are fascinated by the power of words can learn and borrow them from across human spectrum through listening, reading, and capturing the hidden magic in the muddle of words. Some have found success by using words to enhance their attraction, and can even make them the most powerful figure in any size of domains. It is words that bring me to bind with good people.
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Rethinking of Our Human Well-Being This Summer
June 20, 2016Dear Friends,
I feel honored to be asked to speak at numerous educational celebration events this summer. With the last two of my children graduating from college this summer, I can feel how proud are parents across our nation whose children are doing well and succeeding their educational goals. These reactions clearly indicate that we, regardless of our differences on the skin, are special and distinctively different from all other living beings on the planet.
What does educational achievement mean to us as a person? I believe we all agree on one thing despite we have many differences. That is, education teaches us many things we don’t know and challenges us on many things we inherently perceive as the only truth. I sincerely believe that, first of all, education taught me reading. And through the love of reading, I have broadened my view of the world and commonality of humans.
Today, our world has undergone a spectrum of challenges that affect human kinds in many unimaginable ways. One of the most traumatic problems is the violence against humanity we all have witnessed. The many events of mass killing in schools, shopping malls, and entertainment centers have been beyond a conscientious person can provide explanations for.
After recent mournful and tragic events of violence, I cannot help myself not to think of the following questions: Are we really special in that we are the most intelligent beings on the planet? Are we, with our human intelligence, able to change our thoughts from the modes of retaliation, self-satisfaction, vindictive reaction, protection with weapons, and superiority demonstration to the modes of peaceful solutions and prevention of injuring and killing another human being?
I am sure we can overcome these challenges. But we have to change our selfish and destructive nature. I hope, this summer, we will rethink of our well-being as humans. I also hope we will take the time to read books and literature that promote peace and long-term well-being of our world, and encourage our children to do the same to liberate their minds from our rigid ideology. Please leave me your comment.
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A World Without Boundaries
December 8, 2015As a people who have suffered a long history of oppression, atrocity, and illiteracy, the Hmong have formed narrow mutual-support into multilayers of identity based on geographic and regional clusters, and shared clan names. Linguistic evolution, common cultural practices, and mutual support formation have been the cause of identity development.
Listening to verbal communication about different clans, sub-clans marked by shared ceremonial practices, and regional groups marked by dialects and traditional costumes, we have learned that the diversity within the Hmong community is confusing and complex. We have also learned from life stories that have been passed on from generations to generations about the different circumstantial experiences that served as the root-causes of group identity formation.
While historians and researchers focus on historical events and major characteristic traits pertaining to the Hmong as we continue searching for our root of origin, our interconnections with different people in the world continue to challenge what really represent our identity in today’s modern society. The influence of educational institutions and policies that have far-reaching effects on linguistic and cultural changes within the last 50 years have brought different values and peeled away some layers of group identity in the Hmong community.
Linguistic acquisition, education, and cultural adaptation that serve as powerful change agents have prompted on-going discourses among young Hmong on the issue of what define Hmong and whether or not the different layers of group identity be necessary. Some have questioned and asked to redefine the purpose for which the Hmong need to maintain his/her group identity in modern society in which all the elements of ethnic identity are not distinguishable.
In a broader context of humanity, the increase in racial/ethnic interconnections and educational experiences should have had enough impacts on how we view ourselves as humans in today’s world. Unfortunately, despite destruction, human cruelty and hatred, and wars that have caused human suffering across racial and ethnic boundaries, humans are still divided by racial, ethnic, social, economic, political, and ideological boundaries.
Ironically, in this age of human civilization peak, humans still box themselves in their small world of narrow reasoning. Until humans, who possess languages as the most precious communication tools, realize we cannot escape our own destructions unless we communicate meaningfully, we will continue to cause suffering and death upon ourselves across boundaries and around the globe.