Self-Help

My duty as a volunteer is to bring the wind of modernization to people and help and assist them to develop the country, Ghana. So what’s necessary for us to develop countries? If you just give “completed things” to developing countries (except infrastructure), it doesn’t help development of the country, or rather it could destroy the future of that country. The key word is “the development of people”. First of all you must show the way to go then lead them to the right direction, and lastly you need to bring up people as citizens who have the sense of modernized country. If people are lazy, they can’t develop country; if people are industrious, they can develop country. There is no trick, there is no magic, and there is no shortcut. Development of country is done by people of country.

Here, I would like to introduce you to the book called “SELF-HELP – with illustrations of CHARACTER AND CONDUCT” by Samuel Smiles. This book was translated into Japanese in 1871 as “西国立志編 (Saigoku Rishihen)” by Masanao Nakamura and sold more than 1 million copies by the end of the century. A lot of Japanese at the dawn of new era were so inspired by the words in the book and brought up their spirits and qualities necessary for modernization. So what is necessary? The author Smiles suggested 6 factors as human qualities in the extract below:

Attention, application, accuracy, method, punctuality, and dispatch, are the principal qualities required for the efficient conduct of business of any sort. These, at first sight, may appear to be small matters; and yet they are of essential importance to human happiness, well-being, and usefulness. They are little things, it is true; but human life is made up of comparative trifles. It is the repetition of little acts which constitute not only the sum of human character, but which determine the character of nations. And where men or nations have broken down, it will almost invariably be found that neglect of little things was the rock on which they split. (VIII.12)

(Underlined by D@IGO D@IGO)

I would add, “responsibility, devotion, sincerity, honesty, fairness, and carefulness” to his idea. In fact, they are the words that I always teach my students in my class and the values for Japanese people in life. No wonder that Japan could make modernization on its own in the last 100 years.

Let me introduce a story. The founder of TOYOTA was successful in cotton spinning industry, and when he imagined the future of Japan, he advised his son to challenge the new business to produce cars and gave him the money that he made from the patent of spinning machine ($10,000 at the time, now $100 millions value). It is said that people were opposed to the business that even big companies like Mitsubishi and Mitsui gave up, saying “It’s money down the drain.” The son bought a new car from America and dismantled it and assembled it again, again and again day by day to learn how to make a car. There was no textbook, no help, and no money left for the development of the car, the company had already invested more than 5 times of the first capital. Finally in 1939 September, they made the first domestic car of Japan, and the son, Kiichiro Toyoda, instructed sales people to tell the truth of the car like the following: “Our car is the worst jalopy (bad car) in the world, but this is all domestic, we need to bring up the car industry in Japan. If any inconvenience occurs, we will sincerely repair it immediately, so please give it a try.” As expected, there were so many cases of trouble reported but they devoted themselves to repairs and improvements of the car.

There is no trick, no magic and no shortcut to develop your country, but devotion, sincerity, honesty, fairness, and responsibility to your country by all members of country. The choice is yours.