Hard Times

I have spent a fair amount of time over the last few months bemoaning the economy and its impact on my life over the last few months. But maybe I was missing the point.

On the way to work last week, I caught an interview Terry Gross did with Linguist, Geoff Nunberg.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=104869163

He made a really interesting point about how in folk music from the Great Depression they talked about "hard times" not bubbles bursting and the bad economy. Our (my) fascination with figuring out how to blame and what went wrong has been a distraction from how it currently feels to live and work in this country. These are hard times!

The uncertainty is hard. The cuts are hard. The layoffs are hard. And that, as simple as it sounds, gives you a much better idea of what to DO next, after all that happens. Of course, it is important to figure out what went wrong to ensure that it doesn't happen again, but for us, as individuals, and for me it is way more important to feel how this all feels and then figure out how to proceed. Fretting about credit default swaps, collateralized debt obligations and rating agencies just keeps me up at night, it doesn't make any of this any easier.

It'd be neat to have someone to blame, but once we've expressed our righteous outrage, then what?

These times are hard, which means we examine our situation, streamline our lives and hunker down and get to work. It may seem like semantics, but I've found this shift really empowering and focusing. What a different our words make?!?