The past couple of days, I have been hearing a lot of people voice fears about the recession in general and how it might affect them in particular. It’s easy to get caught up in the anxiety. Our economy is in major flux and chaos. Corruption is rampant and few legislators have the guts and the will to tell the truth and clean up the messes that are facing us. Every day there is some new story about a bank’s insolvency, more people being laid off and businesses shutting down. However, if we don’t let our fears engulf us, there are great individual and societal opportunities awaiting us amidst our personal and collective crises.
I love to play with words and I can’t help but notice that the first two syllables of the word “recession” are re and cess. Taken together they form the word “recess”. According to Dictionary.com’s primary definition, recess is “a temporary withdrawal or cessation from the usual work or activity.” Now, there’s an opportunity if I ever saw one! Just the chance we have all needed to stop, take stock, look around at the wreckage and begin to re-vision a more equitable and sustainable path for ourselves and others. Read the rest of this entry »
A man is slowly walking down the street, his head is facing down, his back is bent forward and he is seemingly unaware of anything but the sidewalk beneath his feet. There are people walking toward him and behind him but he plods along neither greeting nor stopping for anyone. If I were to ask you how this man is likely to be feeling, what would your response be?
I have used this scenario over and over again and nine times out of ten, people tell me that the man is depressed or sad. “What is the evidence for this?” I ask. People answer, “His head is facing down and he’s not looking at anyone. Plus he’s walking very slowly and not particularly aware of his surroundings.”
“On the contrary,” I reply. He’s actually very excited. His head is down and his back is bent forward because last month as he was walking down the same busy street he found a lottery ticket. Nobody claimed the ticket and he won a million dollars. He thinks that if he was lucky once, he could get lucky again. He may be greedy but he’s certainly neither sad nor depressed, merely dedicated to his task. Read the rest of this entry »
The past couple of days, I have been hearing a lot of people voice fears about the recession in general and how it might affect them in particular. It’s easy to get caught up in the anxiety. Our economy is in major flux and chaos. Corruption is rampant and few legislators have the guts and the will to tell the truth and clean up the messes that are facing us. Every day there is some new story about a bank’s insolvency, more people being laid off and businesses shutting down. However, if we don’t let our fears engulf us, there are great individual and societal opportunities awaiting us amidst our personal and collective crises.![[del.icio.us]](http://theopportunitygame.com/blog/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/delicious.png)
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