Equivalence shouldn't suffice

Language has a phenomenon that has a great parallel to life.  In language, when people hear words that they don't know or have heard very few times, they guess at the sounds of the words.  And, when people hear sounds that are not in their own tongue, they assign equivalent sounds.  It is almost hilarious to see the written differences (although there are legitimate phonetic processes at work) between ancient Hebrew and ancient Persian.  For example, King Ahasuerus is mentioned in the Old Testament as a king of Persia.  The Greek form of that word is Artaxerxes.  Persian for the word is Artakhshatra.  (Some scholars go with the word Xerxes to be the equivalent of Ahasuerus).

Another example from modern times, and using English, is the last name of a number of immigrants from Vietnam, Nguyen.  English doesn't ever begin a word with the combination ng.  It can end a word with that sound, but never start one even though the sound is the same combination of nasal and gutteral.  The Vietnamese don't have a problem with starting a word with that sound, and English could too, but its speakers have a tradition of not doing it.  Also, most varieties of English in the United States use a blend of i and u (like the pronunciation for yu) for the second sound of the Vietnamese name, the long vowel u.  The Vietnamese would pronounce the letter like Americans pronounce the sound oo.  So, the ng + u + y to an English speaker sounds just like some slightly distorted sound of w.  Thus, Ngyuen becomes Winn to the American ear.  That's as hilarious as the Persian to Greek and Hebrew example.

There are a huge number of examples of changed sounds when going between languages because language speakers resist learning a foreign way to say a word.  They merely select some close sounds in their native tongue and call it good.  That has a great parallel to life's events.  When we experience them, we compare them to what has happened to us before.  Or, we compare the event  to some model we have seen before.  That's dangerous.  We try to have equivalent experiences, then, instead of letting the authentic experience speak for itself.  I had a number of experiences in my 20s and 30s that I tried to fit into some teenage model of mine or that I tried to fit to some prior experience (mine or my friends' or family's).  That didn't get me very far in life.  I missed a lot of authentic experiences.

Not anymore.  It is the highest compliment to someone in Vietnam to take the time to learn to pronounce their names as they would.  And, it is the highest compliment to ourselves to take the time to follow an experience for all it is worth on its own merits.  It makes us more well-rounded people, better people.  Some experiences in life are comparable to other experiences.  But, when I start with an event that has no precedent, I no longer try to make it fit some category that I recognize.  I am certainly better for that.  I understand the human experience a whole lot better... and much more joyfully.