Finding Yourself

I work for a company that is accepting of diversity. They have good policy towards LGBTQIA+ and they are taking the right stance on Black Lives Matter and other issues that affect people of color. Whether it bears out in practice, I’m not the one to say. But leadership does push the right buttons to get people on board. They recognize, rightly so, that it’s not just the right thing to do, but that we won’t be at our best unless we can bring our whole selves to work, and they encourage us to do that, because it helps the business. Makes me wish that I could feel at home here too. But what if you don’t know who you are? What if the only thing you hide from your co-workers is how lazy you can be? Should you tell them that?

And if the underlying cause of laziness is depression? Or maybe you really do hate your job, and it’s not the depression talking. What if the job is the cause of your depression?

Should you bring that whole self to work?

When people say that they want to find themselves, most think that’s an excuse to indulge a sense of entitlement. Admittedly who among us knows how to go about it efficiently?

Here’s what I think. I think that when you set out to find yourself, all you really want to know is what makes you happy. To figure that out you need to forget convention, forget what other people think. Whether something is right for them or not, has nothing to do with you.

I imagine that if I ever found myself, I would no longer be jealous of other people. That’s how I’d know. I’m jealous of anyone with a cause, women, black people, native Americans. I’m jealous of retired people, and of anyone who looks happy, or has something I think would make me happy whether it makes them happy or not. I’m even jealous of people who have lost their parents, for the freedom and independence, and who are divorced, also for the freedom and independence. That’s the desperation of someone who hasn’t acted for himself and worries too much about what other people think.

Your Story

Your story is the story of everyone who was alive when you were born. That’s the story you started with and that’s what you continue with. As life goes on more and more of the people that are a part of your story die off. If you’re the last one to die, you win.

And that’s the end of your story. nothing continues after that. New people were born, of course, and they continue, but you were part of their story, not the other way around. You were here already when they were born.

We need to work together

When this virus first spread, I was thinking, you can’t just close the world. Economic collapse also ruins lives.

When we did start closing the economy, I was frustrated that we didn’t have an exit strategy. How long will it take? This can’t go on indefinitely.

I’m still frustrated that we don’t have an exit strategy, a plan to get where we want to be and an end date. But to those who still think that the closing of the economy is unwarranted, that we should brave the risk of Covid and keep everything open, for the sake of the economy, I have this to say.

There is no recovery of the economy without controlling the spread of Covid.

Because we can force businesses to close, or we can allow them to open, but we can’t force people to patronize them.

And as long as the virus is out of control, people won’t go to sporting events. They won’t eat inside restaurants or have business meetings face to face or take dance classes and yoga and go to the gym. They’ll even stop going to bars, and weddings (and funerals). They certainly won’t take cruises. Even if the virus wasn’t that big a deal, unless everyone knows that, a surge in cases is going to hurt business.

People don’t want to get Corona. They believe it can be serious, that there could be lasting repercussions, and that they could spread it to someone who is even more vulnerable, most likely someone they know.

Even if they’re wrong, that’s what they think. So they’ll stay home.

For a case in point, look to Sweden. Of all its Nordic neighbors, Sweden was unique in that it decided not to shut everything down. To them, it wasn’t worth the effect on the economy, and now, among their neighbors, they have the most cases and the worst economy.

Covid doesn’t scare you, I get it. I’m not that scared myself. But when you don’t wear a mask, you scare other people. And then their fears are realized with a spike, and maybe someone they know gets sick, and they change their behavior and the economy suffers. It’s not an unreasonable or unexpected reaction. It’s logical. These are smart people.

See, unfortunately (or fortunately) there are still more smart people than stupid people. So, if you care about the economy, practice behaviors that will get the smart people supporting the economy again.

We need them. Smart people serve a purpose too. We need to work with them.