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Oct 6, 2003 Back in the 1920s when the depression hit hard, many people didn’t think about their depression. It was the entire countries' depression and we all had to do our part. Men scrambled for work, CCC and WPA were started, Home relief was instituted and education programs were started to help those change paths. Today we now have the same problems but it seems as though most people handle problems differently. Have we become soft? Have we become a country of neurotics? Recently having been given an assignment I had to read “ Who Moved My Cheese”. About mice that have to face the difficult task of changing careers and dealing with change. No different than “ What Color is Your Parachute” of the late 70s early 80s. Yet it is interesting to note just how many people are not only afraid of change but actually cause an entire series of events to foster around them. Mame Dennison of the 1920s was a woman of extraordinary insight and resiliency. Having been to the very top of the elite world. Hobnobbing with exotics and bootlegging whisky. Her trademarked phrase “ life is a banquet and some poor sucker is starving to death” is also my saying. How true that the world is so full of interest and education and knowledge that so many people simply get stuck where they are. How does this happen. There are many ways this happens. First let us look at the ideologies of the 1900s forward. Education was not available to everyone (even today) so many parents worked hard so their children could afford a better life than working the land with their hands or even being laborers. Though many laborers did much better than most common people thought. Just look at your modern contractors and builders. They are laborers with a nice income, though seasonal. As the children became parents they did not want what their parents did. So they aspired to go onto college or enlisted or were drafted and got a different type of education. With modern times upon them they changed. Became different than their parents. And that's where the break came in. Now, with the mid 20th century offering new paths in engineering and development children wanted more. And more is where many problems became the problem. When you didn’t have anything, you cherished and maintained what you did have. Today we have a completely disposable society. And jobs and training are that way as well. People and their talents have become disposable like a paper plate or old cup. And these people that are mid aged and still with some values are those that are left in the cold. They worked hard to become truly educated and competent and good at what they do. How many men today can actually draw on a drafting board? How many can prove design computations on scratch paper? How many people can look at something and simply do it right without the computerization and thoughtless assist of the modern age. I can tell you honestly, not many. There seems to be a cut off of age as well. It seems to be that people that born in the early 60s were the last of the old fashioned people. Those that were open to new ideas and yet taught the old ways. These are the people who could appreciate the traditional methods and understand the potential failure of modern ways, and yet combine that with the old ways to ensure that the knowledge and talents get passed on and maintained. How many people today would be lost if there were no power? No computers? No access to the Internet? How many of you would be totally lost without a calculator or email, approximately 90 percent of the common population that’s how many. The small amounts of Amish, Orthodox Jewish, and old order communities, and those of non-conformal ideals would be those that would be able to cope. And cope they do. They have almost no psychological disorders, no nervous breakdowns, and no coping problems. Their ways are steadfast time honored and time proven. The non-conformist literally rolls with the punches. Change is always good, no matter how you look at it. Though many find the pitfalls more distressing than seeing this change as opportunity to develop as a person, or something as simple as trying something new. They have stayed on a path that is extremely narrow and non- bending. And those are the people that so many self-help books have been written for. Instead of seeing the event or catalyst of change as a break from their straight and narrow, or seeing it as a way to experience or change direction or even as an expansion of their current way of thinking, they often see it as a dead cold frozen wasteland of winter. Unable to cope, unable to rationalize and often they are placed on antidepressants. For these people they are often called The Prozac generations, Wellbutrin generations. Buspar generations… Soma of the Brave the New World generations. And yet we the free thinkers, those that look at life differently can not fathom their disparity as a whole. It is simply matter of the facts of life that things change. And we often irk the populace that becomes down on them selves when things go awry. We simply shrug and find something else that interests us, and we excel at those things and that irks them even more. We can not join them in their deep confusion. We simply carry on. If we as parents take on an attitude of “life is an adventure, opportunities abound “and this can be good for us and be fun for us. Then perhaps books like “Who Moved My Cheese,” and “What Color is Your Parachute”, would be less of a mainstay and more of a rarity. People in a nut shell… Your cheese is in your heart. It’s your own drive to do something. It is your life. Sample it. Make it an adventure. And if what ever you do or whatever life hands you doesn’t work out. Look on the menu and see what does interest you. Sample it. You might be surprised what would taste better than plain cheese…. ------------ Email Julia Sherman Talley: jimmysdevoted2@bellsouth.net Comment on this column in the forum. Tell a friend about this site! ------------ |
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