In time of crisis... show the best of your faces...

It´s difficult to  start this blog´s entrance. Its purpose is trying to encourage everyone in this difficult time, including me. In many ways, most of us are not having the best time of our lives: some with precarious jobs, other with no job at all, others with a salary that last only ten days... What´s the use of enumerate?

As many friends of mine know through my "Facebook" profile, I like to be inform. This effort is not a waste. This is my way to try to understand this fast, ever-changing world. The intention of publishing articles is to help other to take a decision by being informed, to be conscious about that the next step they are going to take is the most correct one possible.... At least, we can say: "Given all possibilities, I chose the best option".

As far as I know, Spain is still the country where the cleverest doesn´t run: he/she flies; where the one that gets the power doesn´t want to leave place to others even when this person has ruined more than a business for his/her bad management, so they can try to solve the situation; where many jobs are not designed according to the market´s needs but to the worker´s need (or "string-pulling"); where, it doesn´t matter how much hard you work, you won´t be compensated with some economical stability... I could say many other examples but I don´t want to bore you to death.

Giving all those reasons, I just want to throw in the towel many times  and I wonder why so much effort wasted: I´m going to get to Suspense Blind Alley every time. Then I look to my daughter´s picture, happily and confidently smiling at me and I say to myself:  "Even when I return to the same alley, I have to do the impossible to get out of there and find other better way...".

Some years ago I had the pleasure to meet a family with two children: the mother, from Venezuela, the father from USA... both kids austistic. It seems that both parents got the recesive gen and they coudn´t have any other child, having the sure risk of an autistic child. One day I asked him if he didn´t consider his fate unfair: what he answered made me change about misfortunes: "You, latin people, are very influenced by the Catholic Church´s culture: you think that this misfortune is a God´s punishment. I think that we are lucky to raise this special children, that this will make us stronger and we have to be grateful that we are the ones and not any other that can not confront this situation"... What a lesson!

And once more, defeated by my positivism, I think that every experience will make me stronger and more ready for anything that will come. If I keep up this attitude I will value whatever I will have to live in a just way  and it will improve my life... ... There´s no other option possible!

(First published on December 1st in http://maritza-gonzalez.blogspot.com/)

Fixing the world

Nowadays, wherever you go, the conversations tend to be about the same subject: crisis. Amongst the unemployed, in the phone calls, in social meetings, even at your home. All of us think we have the magic potion to solve the world problems (me included). The majority of us have suffered, directly or not, the consequences of this situation.

What´s the easiest thing to do in this circumstances? Blame others. It´s true that a few took advantage  of some persons´ greed to create finantial holes: only God knows where the rock bottom is. The banks have created expetations to the whealthiest through the modests´dreams, those who couldn´t held so many debts and had to leave everything they fought for all their lives…

Globalization has contributed to make the family debts in Alabama influence the bank around the corner, that denies you credits... The reason is because that bank trusted in disguised subprimes and doesn´t know if it will be possible to pay the employer who´s attending you. This had been said many times by the the most respected economists and comediants in the world.… There are some economists that are taking advantage of the crisis: they give conferences around the world, publish books explaining what is going on, you even can see them in a very well known petrol company´s ad... They sell themselves very well!

We forget this is not the first time Capitalism colapses from inside out: in 1979, 1973, 1989-90… It´s true that this time it´s not possible to see the light after the tunnel but, essentially, the basement is the same: some take advantage and many are sacrified… All these crisis were useful to reject what didn´t work, create new situations and businesses adapted to the real social situations. This time the change is going to be deeper than before: there´s the need to find another cheese when ours stinks (“Who moved my cheese?”, Spencer Johnson, recommended reading for now and written more than ten years ago). In other words, if my business doesn´t work, I have to find another way to change the results and, if that doesn´t work, find anything else to do. To do things like always, because it has been done this way for generations is no longer valid: You either change or die… just look at Madonna, the changing queen.

 

Anyhow, we all have responsibilities, too. Do not look around waiting for a miracle. You need to try. It´s important to know our priorities, leave behind what we can live without... I think that many of us are doing this now.

In any case, for me, the definition of crisis doesn´t mean that I can´t buy the latest TV set, nor flying away. A real crisis means I can´t afford to pay to my kid a roof, education, clothing or food. While those prioritiess are met, the rest of them are not needs. When I go to a shopping mall and I see cafes full of people, lines to get inside of a cinema and shopping carts with the last Wii games, I wonder: Where is the crisis?

An advertising gifts´ company (“Público”) gave us a present with a piece of paper where you could read the following message: “Crisis is a difficult moment where the strongest or cleverest don´t win but the one that best adapts to the environment…” .

 

(First published on August 16th 2009 in http://maritza-gonzalez.blogspot.com/)