Here are two words that I came to learn deeply about recently, first word is the word Fargin, which I first came across about a year ago while listening to an episode of The VT podcast-Ideas That Matters. The word itself originates from the Yiddish language (Yiddish is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews) and is loosely translated Joy in other’s success without envy. The second word Schadenfreude is a German word meaning deriving joy from someone else’s misfortune.
Many of us raised in Sierra Leone were raised in surroundings that okayed our ill-fated will for each other (especially when we don’t have any direct benefit to get from each other). As a matter of fact, a former president of ours once said “Salon man gets bad heart” a phrase loosely translated will have a close meaning to the German word. But where does this ill-fated will for others come from? For instance, why should we feel happy because of the misfortune of others? Or what prompts us to feel the need to go out of our way to ensure others face misfortunes.
As I think about this, I realise that I am also without blame. Everyone (Yes, including you reading this) has laughed at the misfortune of others before. While for some people, it is a more deliberate act, for others, it is usually an expression of our immaturity (like that one time your friend falls face flat on the ground in front of you). My point, no matter what our end goal was, we are all guilty of having derived joy from the misfortune of others.
And as our society becomes more complex and the constant battle for social status continues, we are drawn to the temptation to facilitate misfortune on others. In today’s society, we feel more compelled to spread rumours (irrespective of their basis) than it is to share the success of others (Except in rear cases when there is a need for some social media aggravation). When we often share the misfortune of others or rejoice at them, what we are hoping to achieve is mostly to compensate for our shortcomings. For instance, when a business of a young person fails, we are happy because it provides us with evidence of why doing business is a waste of time, or at least makes us feel a bit better about our failed/failing attempt. We subconsciously compare our fortune to others and, as such, their failures (misfortune) they suffer make us feel better.
This practice is common amongst young people, who have more to benefit from Fargin than schadenfreude. So why are we not practising Fargin? Well, the answer to that question is subjective. A general reason why most of us do not practice Fargin could be because it is easier for us to justify our failures when everyone else around us fails than it is to celebrate our success.
To truly succeed as a people, we must rely more on Fargin than on schadenfreude. We must understand that with the practice of Fargin, we are able to contribute to the development of others and be open to supporting them without envy. We should be able to establish that for our benefit, being happy for the success of others contributes to our ability to develop ourselves. Until we are in a place where we deliberately introduce the context of Fargin in our society, we will continuously fight to pull each other down rather than build up.
Fargin generally will help us build trust amongst each other and open up the opportunity for more collaborations and positive economic development. So, challenge yourself today to practice Fargin and fight the temptation of schadenfreude