This I Believe - He, You-Ning - Taiwan

Click to Listen

I believe to keep close communication with my family and close friends.

I used to believe that since I and my family or friends are so close and familiar, we could understand each other even without language. However, my mother’s depression struck me like a lighting bolt. I came to realize that this thought is completely wrong.

 

I had known my mother before I drew my very first breath. My mother and I lived under the same roof; we said good morning and good night almost every day. There is no doubt that we love each other. I thought I understood her as much as she understood me. But I had not been aware that my mother was suffering mentally until she went to see a psychiatrist. I wanted to help her get through it and tried to understand what happened to her. After several long talks, I was surprised that there were so many things and feelings hidden in my mom’s mind. If I had talked with her earlier, I could have given her much comfort. I blamed myself for that I did not notice it. Then I began to reflect on how I interact with my family and friends.

One time I put newspaper just in front of my eyes, and then I found I cannot read the words clearly. That is just like the relationship between me and my family and close friends. We are so close that I cannot see them and their feelings clearly. I just use what I thought to understand them and take everything for granted. But in fact I am wrong; people change thoughts and feelings with different times. Only through continuous conversation can we keep familiar with each other, even if they are your family or friends. I begin to keep close communication with them and share their different feelings. And I find a lot of things that I did not know before and get closer to them.     

Any two people, no matter how close they are, still cannot fully understand each other, but I believe conversation can compensate this distance. Language cannot depict everything but we still need it to know each other. A lot of people tend to spend much time on meeting and knowing new friends and ignore their family and friends that are intimate with them and their true feelings. Because of that, we unconsciously ignore a lot of important things in our lives.

 Now, though I am in the US now, the distance of roughly 30,000 kilometers cannot block my conversations with my family and friends. We write e-mails or use Skype to share our lives and feelings. Thanks to new technologies, I can keep this belief: to keep close communication with my family and friends.