BAD WORD

Last week, a 2-day Youth Leadership Development Program - Carpe Diem - was organised by Goa Sudharop Community Development Inc. USA in collaboration with Fr Agnel College, Pilar. At the valedictory, the young chief guest, Fr Feroze Fernandes (editor – Vavradeacho Ixtt) chose to teach the students some new, modern ‘bad words’… and one such bad word was ‘good’!

Fr Feroze spoke of how the word ‘good’ as a response was not good enough! So often when asked to evaluate something, we easily say ‘good’ and more often than not it probably means ‘not bad’ or it means that we may be opting to be politely untruthful. But if we really find it to be good, we are more likely to use better superlatives like ‘great’, ‘fantastic’, ‘superb’!

But this miserliness with appropriate appreciation is not just a result of an indifferent or disinterested use of language. It reflects an attitudinal disconnect with the relevance and the consequence of positive reception towards the quality of excellence. The word, ‘Good’ symbolises a plateau… to peak, we need to ‘be better’! Hence, it will be prudent to treat ‘good’ as a bad word, and opt for more exuberance in our vocabulary and our outlook!

In every situation that surrounds us, let’s strive to ‘be better’… with every person we meet, may our behaviour be better than ‘good’… may every response of us reflect our inner resolve to shake off apathy and rise above the chains of mediocrity… may we enlivened enough and proactively provoked to BE BETTER at our deed, thought and expression!

Let’s rid our lexis of the bad word - ‘Good’… now, not later...
In every act and response, may we strive to BE BETTER!

- Pravin K. Sabnis