Lesson 5: On Cross Cultural Kindness
My sincere hope is that you have reached this stage of the journey looking forward to this final lesson, on being kind.
Social stratification is the sociological topic for our final lesson together. We will rely on our friends at Crash Course one last time. While the host is the same, I am happy that the focus is primarily global in nature.
View the video below.
https://youtu.be/b350ljkYWrU?list=PL8dPuuaLjXtMJ-AfB_7J1538YKWkZAnGA
Wealthy countries, poor countries, and all in between are interdependent upon one another over time. When exploitation happens, as it has throughout history, it eventually inhibits the wellness of all (e.g., Climate Change). This is difficult to understand in smaller increments of time (e.g., decades) but does hold true over centuries. In reality, we will interact with one another as a global community, this is more relevant today due to the technological revolution (i.e., 4th Industrial) of our time.
Work is certainly impacted by these broader sociological questions.
Read the recent report that summarizes several students from across the globe. 
So… this is NOT an international politics or sociology course. These contexts, and the questions posed from different perspectives, are important to understand as they determine the environment within which we and our clients work. Regardless of our view on global social stratification, our job is to understand our clients in their context and help them navigate the world-of-work available to them within social limitations while advocating for fairness and justness.
Take a moment and read a portion of Pradip Chattopadhyay’s poem When Lose A Job.
With the job you lose goes the earn
don’t think there you would be stuck
soon for you the tides would turn
come knocking your door good luck.
You never really loved the job you lost
money was the only call
but it made you pay a high cost
and the return was meagerly small.
Ruined your hours numbed your soul
the job robbed all your smile
surely on you took a heavy toll
caged your mind all the while.
Money is the need to pay the bill
for even breathing needs buck
but the job you lost stole your free will
made you to be a lame sitting duck.
First, take 5 minutes to write about loosing your current job. In other words, imagine as if you lost the job you have now. If you were to write a poem, what would some of the emotion focused words in your poem be (you may write a poem if you are so inclined).
For the next 5 minutes, I want you to imagine that Pradip got your job (imagine it was outsourced if you will). Would your job change Pridip’s need for money? How would it feel for their bills to be paid? Would the emotion focused words likely change in the poem? What would they change to?
Write in your journal now for 10 minutes.
My instinct is that you will find the following in your thoughts and on your journal page. Gratitude for what your job provides. Humility in the face of the fact that the job is yours and not someone else’s. Your writing process is an exercise in empathy for Pridip. Thoughts of care for yourself, and then for Pridip and their family likely seeped into your mind.
View this video of length 2:30.
https://youtu.be/O9UByLyOjBM
The G.H.E.C.K. Model is based on the scientific relationships between gratitude and humility (bidirectional) with empathy, care, and kindness. These are mutually reinforcing aspects of our perception and have great power to change our cultural expectations and cross-cultural skill.
Kindness is often defined as being generous and considerate. I see this very differently than being nice. I see kindness as acting with great care for oneself and the other. Please register for my G.H.E.C.K. I course to learn about the science of kindness and the other G.H.E.C.K. variables.
My hope is that you are feeling awash in kindness as you prepare for the final dialogue video in this course. View the video below. Length 9:31.
https://youtu.be/jtqHJ5uBXSE
Now that you have finished with Class 5, you are finished with GHECK Check II the course! Answer questions 13-15 on your worksheet. Move on to the concluding section after you mark this section complete.