Hospitality in Building a Relationship

In daily relationship between individuals, we could feel the existence of friendly individuals and the unfriendly ones. We will have a better relation when we are facing friendly individuals rather than the unfriendly ones.

At a glance, hospitality is often regarded as an outer appearance, an effort for showing our politeness, or just a ritual in social interaction. However, true hospitality is come from the deep of an individual’s soul that comprehends with the basic needs of human psychology.

The true hospitality is not the same with the appearance that built with a lot of smiles and beautiful words. It can be said so, but a million of smiles and beautiful words will lose its meaning if they are not coming from the deep of our soul. That kind of hospitality will not last for long. It is only a form of a tiring psychic deficiency. Sooner or later it will be faded or maybe disappear.

True hospitality is rooted from a human’s soul that trying to fulfill their relative’s four basic psychological needs. The four kinds of needs are the need of acceptance, acknowledgement, respect, and comprehension. Those are often called as the basic psychological needs because every individual needs those elements to be fulfilled. Thus, the true hospitality is formed from every attitude or behavior that comes from humans who makes their relatives feels of being accepted, respected, acknowledged, and comprehended.

An individual who does not get those four basic needs fulfilled, especially if it happens at a chronic stage, will appear like a person whom suffers a mental illness. A person who suffers from a mental illness is like a person who has a toothache. They will appear as humans whom are having difficulties for making a good and proper relationship.

Thus, a sincere hospitality is a moral value which has a great role in decreasing the mental pain. It also will take part in growing a good and proper relationship between individuals. In the contrary, the lack of hospitality could threaten the relation’s quality. That will become one of many causing factors that increases the number of people who suffers from a mental illness.

Hospitality is one thing that worth to be struggled for its realization. The question is how could we struggle for it?

These are some suggestions that could be used for consideration:

1. Every individual is always trying to remember that every human whom he or she met is one of God’s creations that have the right for being accepted, acknowledged, respected, and comprehended. Maybe everyone knows that, but the important thing is not only just to know. The important thing is remember what is the thing that being known.

2. Every human is always trying to realize that every person whom he or she met in daily relationship is an individual who not only live with rational consciousness, but also with their sub-conscious affection. The awareness of the role from the sub-conscious affection is very important in order to grow a tolerance with the diversity of habits and behaviors from every individual we have met day by day. That awareness is also important for growing a tolerance with the attitude and behavior ‘oddity’ that may come from people who make relation with each other. The awareness about the role of sub-conscious affection enables us for not easily judged the people that hard to understood, for not easily astonished when we are having bad experience from other people, and it also enables us to understand other people sincerely.

3. Every person is trying to build a relation with other people, serving and working in the middle of their daily life with an optimum rational consciousness. In effort to grow such kind of consciousness, we could use some of these ways:

• Focusing our attention into our life, events, jobs, and here-and-now activity. We may sometimes flews our mind to things in the past or future. But it does not means that we are stuck with the past and being late for predicting the future.

• Avoid automatic (suddenly popped out from your mind), compulsive (naively believing), and habitual (based on habitual behavior) reactions. Try to make responses through the consideration of conscious ratio or clear reasoning for replacing reactions that suddenly comes out from beyond of such kind consideration.

• Continuously expand our knowledge and perception by reading a lot of books, learning, and practicing.

• Do not suddenly show our reaction although our emotion is skyrocketing.

• Do not return any un-politeness with other un-politeness.

• Put hospitality on a highly respected and important value in order to realize a good and proper relation between individuals.

Eventually, people who give their hospitality for their relatives, in fact, have nothing to lose. As the matter of fact, that is the initiate point from the process of receiving more kindness in the future. Humans will never lose anything by giving kindness and hospitality, because if they are giving their kindness and hospitality to each other, they will get more kindness and hospitality in return.



p.s:

1. Taken from Intisari magazine issued on March 2003, 'Keramahan Dalam Berelasi', translated with some adaptations *and mistakes, for sure.. hahaha..*

2. Ampun Pak Tom.. artikel segini aja saya jungkir balik nerjemahinnya.. huiks.. masih ada 3 artikel lagi yang belon diterjemahin.. huaah.. nasib jadi anak sastra.. x(

3. Oh my.. gue terpana dengan hasil terjemahan gue sendiri..