Mindfulness meditation can make some more selfish and less generous

"Take the word “namaste.” In modern Hindi, it’s simply a respectful greeting, the equivalent of a formal “hello” appropriate for addressing one’s elders. But in the U.S., its associations with yoga have led many people to believe that it’s an inherently spiritual word."

While I appreciate the fact that many Americans take an interest in foreign cultures and are very knowledgeable about certain cultural connotations, it is quite different from the understanding that actually being brought up in other cultures provides.

Namaste is a common Hindi greeting which can be used to greet anyone, however it is derived from Sanskrit where the word has spiritual origin and it literally means 'I bow to the divinity in you'.

American's focus on the "I/Me", and its resulting selfishness has never been more noticeable, and troublesome, as since the pandemic, manifesting as resistance to masks because it's "an infringement on my rights, or is uncomfortable", and now as objections to the vaccine because "the government can't tell me what to do", or "I'm not putting THAT in my body".  It's all about ME.

The Japanese vaccine reluctance, for the same reasons as some Americans, about putting foreign objects into their body is a hypocritical individual act in a country with the societal norm of being a "We" culture. They too are only thinking about "Me" when it comes to the vaccine.

The pandemic is not primarily about the individual:  it's a "We/Us" problem if there ever was one. A global "We/Us". Getting a vaccine is not about "me"... it's essentially about saving the planet and the global population.  

I would expect this attitude from the selfish Americans, but I'm surprised to see it in Japan. I guess we're more alike in some ways than we think.