My Daily Challenge to Write about 300 Words per Day

Daily Challenge

I promised myself I would make definite changes this year to fulfil my dreams. I want to start writing daily. 

I share some really inspiring TED talks with my students who are learning English. One of them is Gary Slutkin: 'Let's treat violence like a contagious disease', another is Johann Hari: 'Everything you think you know about addiction is wrong'.

I just love these talks because they were tackling almost unsolvable problems. Society and government have been handling those problems for ages in the same way. Actually, some our convictions can be seriously wrong even though we are so sure they are right.

Violence as A Contageous Disease

Gary Slutkin handles violence like it is a contagious disease. First going to the source, getting trained interrupters to talk to the person and deal compassionately with him or her and helping them see there is another way to solve their problem in a non-violent way, then social workers will follow up on them to help them integrate their new way of solving problems or mindset and make it their way of life. They will also identify the second related circle of friends and followers and reason and persuade them too. Gary has been so effective with this method in many major cities in the US and abroad that the percentage of crime and murder rates in these areas has dropped drastically.

The Main Reason for Addictive Behaviour 

Another favourite talk of mine is my Johann Hari who researched about drug addicts and addiction to find out the reason behind these addictive behaviours and how to overcome the problem. He mentions about an experiment about a single rat in a cage who was given a choice of normal or drugged water and it chose drugged water over the normal one every time until it killed itself.

The scientist also observed another rat in a ‘paradise’ cage full of toys, food, other social rats and also gave it a choice of normal and drugged water and it chose normal water over the drugged water every time. As well as observing what happened to drug addicts in Portugal when they decided to take up the challenge of decriminalising drugs, helping the addicts to have a reason to wake up in the morning by helping them get a job and integrate them into society without shaming them or labelling them as incorrigible.

So Johann Hari concluded that addiction not just to alcohol but any sort of addiction can be due to the lack of skills to bond with others especially with family members and those closest to us.

It is surprising that both talks supported one another and reinforced the other too and gave us, my students and me, a completely new way of seeing violence and addiction.