Today, a post crossed my feed
on the Day of Hungarian Culture.
It was about
what culture means to me.
Human experiences.
Memories.
National motifs.
And yet, something was missing.
As I started thinking about it,
one thing became clear:
We often describe culture
as an internal experience.
But most of the cultures
we talk about in everyday life
are not internal at all.
They are ways of living together.
Leadership culture.
Workplace culture.
Traffic culture.
Smoking culture.
They all share one common ground.
Not
what I feel.
But
whether I take others into account.
Culture begins
the moment I realise
that I am not alone in a space.
That what I do
has an impact on others.
Not out of morality.
Not because of rules.
But because this is how systems work.
National culture is only one layer.
If this human foundation is missing underneath,
it easily turns into:
– nostalgia
– identity defence
– or branding
But not a living culture.
From an HGM perspective,
I would phrase it like this:
Culture is not what we preserve.
It is how we make space livable for one another.
I didn’t want to argue with the post.
Only to notice a blind spot.
Because when we talk about culture
and the other person is absent from it,
something essential is missing.
And perhaps this is exactly
what is worth bringing back
into the conversation, again and again. ❤️