PARADOXICAL

We are NOT as Intelligent as We Think We are, and That is a Good Thing!

"Uy ang talino mo naman!"

I feel uneasy every time someone gives me that remark just because of what I wrote. Why? Because I know enough about various kinds of intelligence and have met a lot of people who have shown me first-hand what intelligence means: that it is NOT limited to the 3 Rs.

I may be good at words, but once upon a time I saw how my cousin routinely beat me at math in grade school. Our Grade 3 teacher, Mrs. Evangeline Tagulao, had this habit of staging a mini-contest using cards where two pupils guessed the answer to basic math operations. In those contests, it was humiliating for me to realize that I wasn't good in math, not at all. Although 1+1 and 2+2 were basic for me, if my teacher asked a combination higher than those, I would have to relax myself, sit down, and think hard to get the answer right without using a calculator. (No joke, no joke.)

I don't know how I survived school subjects like geometry, chemistry, algebra, physics, statistics, and calculus. It must have been because of how good my teachers were, like Mrs. Cuchapin and Mrs. Saygo.

I may be good at writing essays, but you won't believe how much I admire another cousin who could play the guitar and read notes and chords on this little song book called "Song Hits." As for me, I tried playing "Yellow Bird" one time on the ukelele, of all things, and from thereon accepted that I wasn't born to be a musician. Maybe a critic, but not an actual player.

I know my intelligence is limited whenever I am with someone in a strange place, like a city with streets winding this way and that, and the person has no problem getting lost in it. ...Because left to my own devices, I am pretty sure I would end up panicking like this fool pleading for help inside a labyrinth or deep within the jungle after I ventured a little off the hiking trail.

I admire people who know how to cook well by instinct (even without going to culinary school for it), because I am kind of bad in this department.

Even as a writer, I am envious of people who can write poems, fiction, and especially novels, for which I have no energy doing.

I know my so-called intellect is no match to the innate talent of athletes, so I can't afford to brag about it in the face of their skill.

I may have a way with words, but you can't expect me to be like McGyver around the house, with my knowledge of carpentry and electrical wiring close to nil.

I admire people who can be the life of the party, an event host -- things like that. Because I can't do that even if my life depended on it. Or will only do it at gunpoint.

I am excellent at being a recluse, though. I am fond of ruminating, of navel-gazing, of stargazing. But not to the point of making a career out of it, or coming up with a profound philosophical treatise. Maybe by being the client or patient of the psychiatrist, yes.

They say interest in the natural world is called naturalistic intelligence, and I think I have it in spades, and that is why I took up BS Biology in college. So maybe there is at least one other type of intelligence that I can say I possess. But it only resulted in cultivating succulents that refuse to bloom. I discovered that most plants die on you if you give too little or too much of sun, water, nutrients...

Some people may be secretly envious of me for what I have, or what I have developed (though sheer passion and hard work), but I am, in fact, envious of people who can do anything I am not as good at. Especially singing and dancing.

I am probably the most unbalanced person you know. This thought keeps me humble. My saving grace, I think, is that my interest will strike most people as incredibly wide. As a writer, this enables me to treat most subjects as though they are the most interesting thing in the world.

Anyway, I am glad that no person has a monopoly of intelligence. I don't think I have met anyone who has ticked off all the boxes by Howard Gardner. A few exceptionally gifted people like Jose Rizal may be polymaths, but they, too, have weaknesses. God, in his goodness and generosity, must have distributed intelligence in different ways to different people.

What a wonderful world it is, if that is so, because it means we were born to collaborate with our multiple intelligences, with our own unique giftedness.

posted by Resty Odon  # 3:26 PM 0 Comments

We are all marked men

by Francis J. Kong 

Here is an exciting piece I’ve kept for years and found funny. The article is titled: Nine Important Facts to Remember as We Grow Older.

#9. Death is the number one killer in the world.

#8. Life is sexually transmitted.

#7. Good health is merely the slowest possible rate at which one can die.

#6. Men have two motivations: hunger and hanky-panky, and they can’t tell them apart. If you see a gleam in his eyes, make him a sandwich.

#5. Teach a person to use the Internet, and they won’t bother you for weeks, months, or maybe years.

#4. Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in the hospital, dying of nothing.

#3. Weather teaches us a valuable lesson. It pays no attention to criticism.

#2. In the ’60s, people took LSD to make the world weird. Now, the world is funny, and people take Prozac to make it normal.

#1. Life is like a jar of jalapeño peppers. What you do today may be a burning issue tomorrow.

This list was funny to me years ago when I was much younger. But now that I am in my senior years, the humor doesn’t carry quite the same punch.

Ryan Holiday, an author I follow, recently launched his book, Right Thing, Right Now: Good Values, Good Character, Good Deeds, where he talks about Marcus Aurelius. It didn’t matter that Aurelius was powerful and wise, nor that so many people depended on him. It didn’t matter that he maintained the stern, rigorous habits of his youth.

Marcus Aurelius was getting old. Like all of us, he faced the path of time, walking it daily, going only in one direction – away from his younger self, never to return.

In Meditations, we catch Marcus as he comes to terms with this reality. He had always meditated on death (that’s what the practice of memento mori was), but now he was no longer a young man. In fact, he was a marked man.

It’s a painful realization, one too many of us try to deny or distract ourselves from. We push the thought away, fantasize about breakthroughs in medicine, or dream of a fountain of youth. We see others as old, but we? We feel the same as we always have, so we pretend nothing has changed.

Seneca faced a similar shock when he visited his boyhood home. The sight was disappointing, especially the old and dying trees surrounding the house. In his youth, the house had been surrounded by lively, green trees he’d helped plant. That’s when Seneca was hit with an unavoidable truth: they were the same trees from his youth, now nearing the end of their lives – and so was he.

We all face the path of time. We all get older. We are all marked men.

In youth, we may feel invincible. But reality eventually arrives. Some face it with courage and acceptance; others deny it, hiding their fear behind superstitions, like: • Avoiding the mention of death • Mirrors in the house • Carrying charms • Knocking on wood • Numerology and death

Fear of numbers like 13 in the West and four in East Asia (due to its phonetic resemblance to the word for death) and shying away from the number “nine” on their birthdays illustrates how numerology is linked to death superstitions.

The wise prepare for this eventuality. They don’t wish to burden their children with unfinished affairs. A responsible leader always plans for such times.

We cannot live fully unless we are at peace with death. Senior Pastor Chad Williams of Union Church of Manila shares a little-known fact about Winston Churchill, who planned his own funeral. After the eulogy and benediction, one person in the eastern tower of St. Paul’s Cathedral plays Taps, and on the opposite side, Reveille/Sunrise, Sunset rings out. “Oh, Happy Days!” indeed.

As the psalmist says: “Lord, teach me to number my days right, that I may gain a heart of wisdom.”

A yellow sticky note pops up on my computer screen every time I log in. It says, “Francis, live each day as if it were the last, because one day, you’ll be right.” This is wise, and I hope you agree.

posted by Resty Odon  # 4:53 AM 0 Comments

By all accounts, I shouldn't be a devout Catholic, I should've been more of a communist rebel or at least a leftist activist. At young age, I had everything going for me to become a rebel. I came from a poor family but moved in a circle dominated by kids from well-to-do families. I knew first-hand the thousand humiliations of being materially inferior.

Couple this with another sense of inferiority: physical. I was the proverbial ugly duckling. I grew up in a family where being mestizo or mestiza was openly preferred and extolled. Growing up bitter was written in my stars, so to speak.

I also grew up with a father who seemed to me to be distant and also struck me as a disciplinarian, militaristic type. I hardly saw a loving God the father in him. I also developed a lack of self-esteem.

It didn't make sense to believe in a loving God. It didn't make sense to have faith. And yet, despite these twin wounds that ran deep inside me, I became the good boy, the nice guy, the one who wanted to please everyone. It wasn't obvious to me then, but I apparently was hungry for love and acceptance. And aside from that, I became a religious kind of guy, a churchy person. Apparently, I too was trying to win God's love and approval.

I am not sure how or why I ended up being so, so today is perhaps a good time to trace it.

(To be continued)

posted by Resty Odon  # 7:04 PM 0 Comments

Thoughts on an FB Reel

posted by Resty Odon  # 7:28 PM 0 Comments

Slander Season Begins

It's election time once again, and so the mudslinging is expected to pollute the airwaves to 100% saturation. Hey, are you actually expecting a campaign debate about platforms and programs? Don't be ridiculous. What you can expect are slander and defamation galore, not to mention the spreading of lies. 

Complementing this reality is our love for showbiz gossip. As of this writing, the word war between comedian-actor Dennis Padilla and his beautiful children with Marjorie Barretto are competing "Trump's tariff tantrum" (as one editor deftly put it) and China's military drill for an impending invasion of Taiwan. The noise generated on social media, I figure, could power solar panels and nuclear reactors enough to avoid outages for 10 years. 

If we are not careful, we can easily get caught up in the ensuing maelstrom. After all, who doesn't love to listen to juicy stuff? As one veteran media man once pointed out, "That's why FB reels are most effective as clickbait."

It behooves us, therefore to reminder ourselves of basic do's and don't's. What can we discuss in public and what can we not? 

What I learned is that, public matters, including very public acts of public officials concerning matters of public concern are par for the course. Private matters, including private faults or sins, when discussed in public is gossip: malicious and defamatory in nature. In Christian moral terms, gossip, whether true or not, is slander, if uttered inappropriately -- that is, if discussed with a third party who has no business knowing it.

In legal terms, as a former colleague turned lawyer pointed out, there are notable differences. "Truth is a defense to defamation whether as libel (written form of defamation) or slander (non-written form of defamation). If defamation is against a private person, then malicious intent is presumed, but if against a public person, you have to prove negligence."

She explains further that defamation in the Philippines is "more confined to imputing to someone a crime, vice, or defect that tends to put a person in dishonor or discredit him/her. So for example, if you call someone who is indeed bald "kalbo," then this is not considered defamation, but if you call someone "prostitute," then it is a case of defamation."

There are a few exceptions to the rule against gossip and malicious speech.

In the case of persons considered as "public property" like showbiz people and celebrities whose livelihood depends on the public consumption of their professional and personal affairs, their issues may be legally discussed in public by common folk. If a celebrity airs his/her dirty laundry in public, that would be fair game for public, er, interpretation and analysis.

(Personally, I would still be uncomfortable lest I end up judging a person's character especially since I don't know him/her personally and I am not privy to the whole story. (Remember that every story has two sides -- even three sides: the sides of the two antagonists and the side of the one caught in the middle and took a neutral stance like, say, Switzerland).

There are very few other exceptions when it is legitimate or necessary to discuss a person's faults with a third party, like when a sibling reports another sibling's wrongdoing to their parents with aim of correcting a mistake, or when you are confessing your sin to a priest, or when you're in a counseling session when you need to reveal identities, but in confidence and within a safe space, or when you are reporting a crime to the police when a misdeed takes on a public dimension.

Another important exception is when discussing an issue to share a lesson or illustrate one's point, but without revealing identities.

An extreme case is during war or when facing criminals, murderers, torturers. Of course, why would you reveal that you are hiding 1,000 Jews in your basement, or that you are entrusted with the family's jewels in the attic, or that you know the state's secrets? Being overly honest in this case would be plain stupid, even under the pain of torture and death, as long as the aim is to uphold what is right and good and true and protect life and limb and property.

It is sad that, during elections, a lot of people take slander lightly. They think it is okay to spread lies, assume doubtful things as truth, and invent malicious things against fellow candidates when it is, in fact, equivalent to murder, the murder of reputations. 

The worst cases are out-and-out cybercrimes, when some people have the gumption to steal other' people's identities to make threats or extort money from the unsuspecting.

In Christianity kasi, when it is none of your business to talk about a person's private faults with a third party (emphasis on private), it is not just uncharitable, it is a serious sin even if the accusation is true because it is impossible to take back what you have released like minute spores or seeds in the four directions of the wind. How much more when the presumption proves to be untrue? -- it becomes a case of bearing false witness against thy neighbor. 

Righteous speech is one of the hardest things to obey, of course. But we can't deny its wisdom, especially when we find ourselves on the receiving end of malicious thoughts from a judgmental public.

posted by Resty Odon  # 7:59 PM 0 Comments