Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Appreciation.... An Essential Ingredient


No matter who we are, No matter what our actions may say, all of us long for recognition in one form or another. I am not just talking about appreciation at work but in personal life/relationships with brothers, sisters, parents, friends, life partners ...all with whom we are associated.

Let me first start with a quote by William Arthur which says
"Flatter me, and I may not believe you. Criticize me, and I may not like you. Ignore me, and I may not forgive you. Encourage me, and I may not forget you"

Ever wondered why one said "I dont care what others say, I am not bothered and it matters the least to me, I am what I want to be, I say what I want to say", this is the person is the most attention-wanting species, and they care a lot about what others think. He would be the one who would rarely apologize(and would surely negate what I have written here :P)

In relationships of all kinds we should be just the opposite of the above, Whether a guy or a girl, our relationship is affected greatly by many questions, including the question that whether or not we want the other person to think positively about us and appreciate us. While majority of the females are used to hearing “You look so beautiful” from guys, real people who want real relationships can slowly realize whether or not they are being sincerely appreciated by their significant others. The same way you get bored and even annoyed hearing “Wow you are such a good person” from people who never help you when you need help but they say such things when they need your help, why would you accept a relationship where you are rarely appreciated sincerely? , surely any one who would be honest would know the right answer here ...and any one who can understand this would know what can MAKE a relation worth it and totally enjoyable..

A relationship exists between two people to know each other and to sincerely let the other person know that their actions and thoughts are helping the other person, among a few other things. Such appreciation should come naturally and not at times when you are in a situation or when you feel that appreciating the other person will get that person off your back or is going to be an escape. Still, many relationships exist where one person, is rarely appreciated. This happens when there is an assumed mentality or there is a hesitation or simply ego.
The choice and decision is also yours whether or not you wish to be in a relationship where the other person takes for granted what you do for yourself, for the relationships and for the other person. But I strongly believe that any relation where One is not appreciating the other for small things, as small as appreciating for bringing a smile on the face wouldn't be strong and lively for long. The person being taken for granted would surrender to the idea believing that Life is just like this and nothing could change it, after all there isn't enough motivation to sacrifice or compromise for the other.

There is a difference between appreciation and focus. Appreciation usually happens when the other person is reacting to your actions, by letting you know somehow that he is very happy or satisfied and grateful that you are doing something that the other person likes.
Giving focus, on the other hand, is the original action. If someone is appreciating you because you cared for them while they were not keeping well, it is usually because you focused part of your life on that person. You focus on something, and get appreciated in return and if not gradually you stop focusing and resulting into a not enough dedication to the person as now you really don't want to(although you do)care much as it ends up leaving you dissatisfied and hungry.

People, appreciation is not that difficult, its just a matter of time when we would find it easy to appreciate, surely for us who are not used to this would find it a mammoth task to appreciate but its just once or twice and it would become a part of our lives.

I strongly urge to bring in appreciation into your lives to keep any relation Live and Rocking!!!

Happy Appreciating..!!! :) :)

Cheers!!

Vaibhav

4 comments:

deepti said...

Totally agree appreciation is necessary.We all look for that everytime.But you could have included another angle....appreciation Vs/and criticism.Appreciation alone sounds good but usually this is always accompanied by criticism.The questions applicable are HOW/HOW MUCH/WHEN do one appreciates the other. If a person criticizes his/her partner repetitively then perhaps any kind of appreciation would not be ENCOURAGING..this is the basic purpose of appreciation. Perhaps we cannot look anybody beyond ourselves....Humans are self obssessed..Surely it takes a lot to look beyond yourself..

Vaibhav said...

sure thing, criticism along with appreciation ends up defeating the very cause of appreciation,..and as far as looking beyond one self is all that it takes to appreciate, because then you are giving away some thing to some one and not looking getting any thing in return possibly..and the all I am trying to say is appreciation can only add sugar to a relation(of course appreciation minus criticism, as if criticism is needed, one should keep a different time for that) and make it any better....
as far as humans if are at all self obsessed then it makes it all the more important to look at each other and appreciate and make the person feel good and thus add more to the relation.....Yes it takes a lot to look beyond yourself and its easier said than done as we rarely tend to look beyond ourselves but even an effort to do so could make a big difference....

gregdavid said...

Profound thoughts.
True appreciation must always be selfless.
Loved your thoughts.

Unknown said...

OMG.....is that 'Shantaram'. i must apprecite the blog writerl he is getting comments from gregory roberts itself..// amazing