I've been talking to a number of people lately experiencing the recession... I suppose that's a euphemism for saying that a lot of the people I'm close with are finding themselves hard up in this economy. In these conversations, my peers want to share their stories, their feelings, but something stops them. There's this sense that others don't want to hear about battered finances and unemployment checks--that others would look at them differently, like they somehow deserved to be laid off or it's their fault for not saving. Blame the victim.
Mostly, we're expecting our parents' generation to collectively hop out from behind a bookshelf and yell we told you so.
So we keep quiet instead--saying nothing about our fears in public. Because money and fear are taboo.
And none of this is helping. People are terrified that they won't be able to make rent and are too afraid to talk about it.
I think it's time to break this silence.
Say something people! :-)
3 comments:
It's a scary time. I've personally been touched by the economy - both my best friend and brother were laid off from this jobs in the last few months - and it's always in the back of my mind am I next? (even though thankfully my company is doing well right now). What's scary is how unstable our entire economy is, years and years of oversights and corruption are not going to be cleaned up immediately and can't be swept under the rug. However, we can't live life in fear - it just compounds what's going on in the economy.
Am I scared? Yes. Do I try to save a little bit more here and there? Yup. But, still, we have to keep pushing forward and doing things that make us happy - that make life worth living instead of cowering behind the unknown.
I'll admit I'm scared too. I work in the service biz and I serve at the pleasure of my clients--which also means that I serve at the pleasure of their investors, accountants and boards. It can be unsettling to have the decision makers so far away from the work you do.
The scariest thing is not knowing how the market will turn, or when. And when your clients run out of money, so do you! You know?
We have to diversify as younger people--which is so ironic because our educations have been about specializing to the point of being the best or only person in a subfield of a subfield. But doing more than one thing keeps you fresh; I think it's more fun that too, assuming you can keep from going loco!
Love this post, Sandy. It's timely, it's relevant, and it's real.
Having done quite a bit of reflecting about this on my own, I can only add to the optimism that JayVee wrote. We really have to do the best we can and hope that it's enough. As for diversifying our educations, I couldn't agree more. We're multi-taskers by nature (IMO) and our schooling should really reflect that. This is actually the best opportunity we have to express the different skillsets we own because in order to survive in this economy, we literally have to pull ever trick we have out of the hat.
Here's to taking it one day at a time and hoping that we all come out of this wiser and wealthier down the road.
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