Vietnamese people are lacking… flow

I do yoga 3 days a week with a group of women. I often tell them to stop talking loudly or using their phones in class. I say it is disrespectful to the teacher and the people around them. Maybe that is why they don’t like me very much.

“This Westerner is unsympathetic. I have work to do!”

I can really see that bigger problems like traffic accidents, environmental pollution, corruption... all stem from these small, daily, thoughtless actions.

Going to a comedy club is a wild environment. It is noisy, smells of cigarettes and alcohol, people come from many different countries, speak many languages, wear many different types of clothes, colorful, the cultures are blended very harmoniously.

They often laugh loudly, talk freely and sometimes a bit vulgarly, they don't sit in one place but go around making friends.

If you have never been to such places, you might think: “How can people stand on stage and perform in this noisy crowd? They look like a pride of lions, I wonder if anyone can tame them.”

But when the comedian - a stand-up comedian - walks out, everyone is silent, eyes on the stage, focused on watching very politely and properly. No one checks their phone messages or talks privately. No matter how bad the comedian is, they will still sit there until the end of the show. They respect the person sitting on stage and support the artistry of that comedian.

I have a personal theory that when you create something, be it a piece of writing or a performance, the more attention you put into the product, the more attention you get back from the audience.

Look at music, it’s the same. I don’t think the musician actually writes the song. It’s because they have a very high, very deep concentration, that they “hear” the song and write it down. The frequencies exist in nature, the artist is the one who can “feel” them, until they are satisfied with what they find and then can present it to others to enjoy.

The ability to concentrate is very important. Because the more concentrated you are, the more effective you will be. I don't think there is a limit to how much a person can concentrate.

Author Steven Kotler writes that when we are highly focused, our brains release hormones that can increase productivity by up to 500%. Kotler is considered one of the world's leading experts on ultimate human performance.

He believes that when you are highly focused, this moment is called flow in English, and it is special in that it can change the way your brain works.

I see flow in everything. Like in Japan, zen gardens are so beautifully designed that people want to linger and concentrate on them. The more effort the gardener puts into arranging and trimming the plants, the longer the viewer stays.

Japan knows how to design a smoother living environment, people here can easily flow every day. This is exactly what Vietnam is lacking.

I believe that all the major problems in Vietnamese society can be solved if everyone tries to flow more every day. And most importantly, not hindering the flow of others.

I can point out a few examples where Vietnamese people are affecting the flow of others, either intentionally or they are not aware of the harm that it does to the whole Vietnamese society.

When I was in yoga class, people would call their partners to discuss business, which was beneficial for them but very annoying for others in the class, making it difficult to concentrate.

Or people run red lights just because they want to drive a little faster, good for their rush. But it's annoying and dangerous for other drivers, breaking the flow of others.

Encroaching on the sidewalk for parking, trading… A clean and clear sidewalk, without motorbikes climbing the sidewalk, pedestrians do not need to worry, while walking they can comfortably think more deeply about issues that need to flow.

I joked with my friend Yuki, who is Japanese:

“If you want to walk on the sidewalk and think about something, you have to fly to Japan.”

She lived in Saigon for a long time and then returned to her country. After 4 years in Vietnam, she visited me and I asked:

“Now that Yuki is living a stable life in Japan, what do you think is the difference between Japan and Vietnam?”

“I’m not sure. But I think it’s advertising. Almost every house has one, everywhere.”

Their purpose is simply to steal other people's concentration. I lived in Japan for a year and saw Japanese people decorating the road with many elaborately carved statues and beautiful gardens. To make such a statue, the artist spent a lot of time concentrating, and passersby sometimes stopped to look and felt happy. The statues there are art. Viewers can feel the work in the way they think, helping them develop their own ability to concentrate when they stand and look at them.

While I am writing this, my next door neighbors are singing karaoke and drinking loudly, it is 12am already… They are having fun but others cannot sleep well.

Flow is the best way for you to be creative. Someone once asked me, why Vietnam has not yet been able to build a rocket to the moon or Mars?. That is because each of us is holding ourselves back from being the best example for ourselves, society has not reached a deep enough flow level. Step by step, personal flow, group flow and the whole society develop together.