Sometimes people say,
“But this is business too, isn’t it?”
And I suppose, in one sense, they are right.
After all, the money we use comes from the money our customers have paid us.
So if someone calls what we do “business,” perhaps we cannot say that it isn’t.
But Mama and I believe there is something more important.
Can we do it from the heart?
If something begins with the thought,
“They paid us this much, so we have to do this much in return,”
then we would rather not do it at chiduru.
Mama and I have both decided that.
Hmm…
How should I explain it?
I think that when you do something with a hidden motive,
when somewhere inside you there is an expectation of getting something back,
things rarely work out well in the end.
There is a Japanese expression that Mama often comes back to:
“Is the motive good?”
Before we begin something new at chiduru, we ask ourselves again and again:
Why are we doing this?
Is the motive genuine?
Is there some hidden expectation behind it?
We question the reason,
and question it again,
until we feel we understand what is really behind it.
Only then do we decide whether to go ahead.
Even so…
there are people who look at what we do and think,
“This is just another form of business, isn’t it?”
Perhaps what they mean is:
“You are being kind because you want the customer to come back.”
It is difficult for me to explain how that makes me feel.
Perhaps it is simply a matter of the people we happen to meet.
And considering the world we live in today,
I can understand why people might be suspicious of kindness.
It may be difficult to believe that someone would do something without expecting anything in return.
I understand that.
Still…
it makes me feel a little lonely.
And a little sad.
Perhaps I shouldn’t feel that way.
But we are human too.
So sometimes,
I do. 😢
Mama feels it too.
That part is the same for both of us.
But there is something very different about Mama.
For me, sometimes the feeling ends there:
“It makes me sad…”
Mama doesn’t stop there.
She doesn’t argue with someone who thinks what we do is merely a business strategy.
She doesn’t try to prove that they are wrong.
She simply continues doing exactly what she was doing before.
Quietly.
Normally.
And then she smiles and says,
“It’s all right if they don’t understand. I do it because I want to.”
And somehow,
she resets herself.
I think there is a kind of strength in that.
Of course, what she feels will never reach everyone.
But there are also many people who understand her and lend us their support.
Sometimes I find myself thinking that there is something almost like…
Mama magic. 😅
In the article above, I used the word “promise.”
But I didn’t mean a promise that we make equally to every person who walks through the door.
It is difficult to explain.
Perhaps it is more like people being drawn to one another.
When someone is good to us,
we want to be good to them in return.
We continue doing that until they begin to understand what we mean.
And even after they understand,
we continue doing the same thing.
From my position as the person responsible for the accounts,
there are many times when I become a little worried.
I sometimes think,
“Isn’t this balance getting rather strange?” 😅
But Mama doesn’t seem particularly concerned.
Her attitude is closer to the old idea,
“When someone is in trouble, we help each other.”
And strangely enough,
little by little,
the number of people who become fond of her continues to grow.
I don’t think they become fond of her simply because she is a woman.
That isn’t what I mean.
From where I stand,
there is something about her as a person that is very attractive.
It is something I feel I should learn from.
But at the same time,
I don’t think it is something you can acquire simply by studying.
Perhaps it comes from the circumstances someone was born into.
How they grew up.
The people they met.
The hands that were once extended to them.
Perhaps it is made from all of those things.
Because we continue doing things in such an inefficient way,
things that may have very little chance of ever becoming profitable,
chiduru is still rather like a battered little rowboat.
For a long time,
Mama and I were the only two people repairing that boat.
A patch here.
Another repair there.
Trying somehow to keep it afloat.
But now,
there are people who sometimes help us repair it.
People who support us.
People who lend us a hand.
And so…
perhaps the time has finally come for chiduru to become a luxury cruise ship?
No.
I’m joking. 😅
A luxury cruise ship would be asking far too much.
But perhaps our battered little rowboat is gradually becoming the kind of rowboat that people won’t laugh at quite so much.
Maybe that is enough.
And while I think about things like that,
I hope I can continue supporting Mama.
She may look bold and carefree from the outside.
But actually,
she is far more sensitive than people might imagine.
So if she continues reaching out her hand to people,
and if she sometimes gets hurt because of it,
perhaps my role is simply to stay beside her
and help keep our little boat afloat.
That’s what I found myself thinking today.
That’s all for today. 👋
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