The Life Lessons I Learned From Watching Anime

Back in February, I shared my thoughts on why I continued to watch Anime. Still, the special thing about Anime is its ability to cover a wide range of topics and in some instances, show the little things in life. It makes me wonder, how does Anime presents this? (Image Source)

During my years of watching Anime, while I watch mostly slice of life comedies, there are some shows that leave an impression on me. It’s because we can relate to characters depending on how they are developed. Furthermore, Anime is able to exaggerate emotions of the different sides of the spectrum. Still, I think it’s easier to share some examples on how different anime gave me different perspectives on life from shows I already watched.

Clannad – (Importance of Family)

While Clannad remains on top of the list of favorite anime because of its emotional story, it also gives a nice lesson that family is there to help even if you are in a bad situation and that there is always hope. Tomoya shows this when he changes his life around after meeting Nagisa and eventually married her. Even after he loses his wife, he starts raising his daughter again and mends his relationship with his father few years later, which ultimately allowed him to escape from a sad fate. This wouldn’t have been possible if the Furukawas didn’t help him steer away from the same fate that his father had.

Five Centimeters per Inch – (Long distanced relationships (especially romantic ones) does not always work)

In this heartbreaking and emotional movie by Makoto Shinkai, I think it shows the mere difficulty of long distanced relationships, especially intimate ones. In this movie, it shows how the relationship between Takaki and Akari became distant as one moves far away and don’t contact each other for years. These days, we have smartphones and social networking to keep in touch with other people at every moment. However, it’s not the same as physical contact as the emotional touch isn’t there. But the thing that gave me a different view on life is that it’s probably best to move on if relationship, especially intimate becomes distant as people changes and just keep them in memory. That way, it won’t become a big burden on one’s life.

Natsuiro Kiseki – (Memories can keep a friendship together)

However, long distance relationships don’t have to be that way. As shown in Natsuiro Kiseki, Saki eventually has to move away since her father is opening up a clinic on an island outside of Tokyo. Because of this, the girls create a summer to remember by wishing things at a wishing rock, which make crazy things happen. Despite the silliness of the wishes, the important life lesson I got from this show is that memories can keep a friendship together. Also, moving away doesn’t necessarily break a friendship as there is other means of communication and Saki can visit during the summer break. As seen with the five-minute original animation where the girls unite several years later, the girls are still best friends. Not only that, Yuka still wants to form an idol group!

The Idolmaster – (Unity is Strength)

Although being an idol looks fun as you can wear cute outfits and sing cheerful songs, it’s not exactly easy as it sounds. A successful performance doesn’t only require practice, but cooperation from other people. For instance, Haruka obtains some drawings drawn by Chihaya’s deceased younger brother from Chihaya’s mother when Chihaya is in depression from the gossip she received by the press. From here, the girls write a special song for Chihaya to perform, which allows her to regain her ability to sing. They show this again when the girls drift away doing their own things and forgot about preparing for the second big live performance until they take notice. Despite the comedy and the awesomeness of this show, the girls’ teamwork shows that cooperation is a valuable lesson as certain jobs requires interaction with other people to finish a particular project or activity.

Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha (Defeat Means Friendship)

In history, there have been instances where the winner becomes friends with the loser. It happens in elections, wars, game shows, etc. However, Nanoha’s idea of friendship is rather hilarious in my opinion as she beats the crap out of a person before she becomes friends with someone. While I don’t advise using physical violence in real life, it’s still a rather amusing life lesson as you can make new friends while beating other people at different activities like sports.

With that, these are all the life lessons I can share at the moment. As a whole, I think Anime does a good job at subtly showing its wisdom through its plot and character development. While there is more I can share, feel free to share what lessons did you learn from watching Anime. ¶