Crisis what Crisis?
Remember the band Supertramp? They sang "Crisis what Crisis?" the Logical Song and Breakfast in America to name but a few big hits from the early '80's.
How apt is that song today? Everywhere you look, there's another story of crisis. More specifically the Global Economic Crisis.
As this label gets tired, the headlines adapt. Emergency! Catastrophe! Disaster! Meltdown! Climax. Recession! Depression!
We're at a juncture, tipping point. crossroads. What does it all mean? Should we go back to bed for a couple of years until it all blows over?
Yet I'm wary of buying into labels that define my life expectations. Someone you know, is currently enjoying possibly the best day of their life. Someone else (unlikely to be the same individual) is alas enduring the worst day of their life.
-Unless the mother-in-law has just driven off a cliff in his new Ferrari!The above experience in fact mirrors the experiences of tens of millions of individuals on the planet. Crisis therefore is contextual. If unemployment reaches 10% this is so much more evocative and sellable by the media than the multitude of experiences by the 90% that are employed.
Should we not empathise with the victims of this Global Economic Crisis therefore?
That's our choice of course but whether we should partake in a global wallowing in doom and gloom as the media would have us indulge is not my cup of tea at all.
"Always look on the bright side of life" as the irreverent Monty Python would have us do, is perhaps a tad facetious, but not entirely ludicrous. Misery feeds misery as the older relatives mumbled knowingly has truth to it.
There's a bunch of elite individuals in Doha/Switzerland (about 2000 in fact representing 91 nations) currently discussing solutions to our "key economic concerns" bureaucratic speak for the mess we're in right now. Issues include Poverty, the Environment, Globalisation and the dangers of protectionism. Not a bad agenda for four days of discussion.
After the networking experience is over one wonders what solutions will emerge or whether this global elite (this is after all invitation only) will merely re-label our current crisis to fit the expectations of our palette.
What's going to be on your menu this year? Your best ever year or otherwise? Me? I'd like to feel I can create my own positive expectations of achievement, you too I hope.
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