Saturday, November 28, 2009

Econo-ME: micro-local & sustainable thoughts

As you might guess, I spend a lot of time thinking about the economy, politics and business. I am a certified workaholic. I love what I do and get a real rush from both of my "jobs". As a financial consultant, I have spent years helping other people improve and operate their businesses. At Earth Mart, I get to live my passion. How lucky I am.

As a parent, I have grown and learned more than I thought possible. I learned about unconditional love and abject terror. I never understood either really, not until I became a mother. I think this was also my introduction to true humilty, another trait I was not very familiar. And I really believe this has made me not only a better person, but a better businessperson.

And so I have been thinking not only about the Economy, but my Econo-ME. Taking stock of my own worth, attempting to quantify my indefinable spirit, here is some of what I realized:

I have become more empathetic in my 40's than I thought possible. From my terrible teenage years, to my totally self-centered twenties, on to finally growing up at 30 when I became a mother, and now, these "middle" years, days filled with purpose and success, good friends and lots of great conversations. My own self-worth was never really tied to the opinions of others, and I have found that the more I value my own intellect, the more I have to offer others.

This led me to a powerful realization: if we stop thinking only about the macro-economic issues, about which we may feel powerless to change, and begin to have a discourse on the most basic micro-eonomic theory, ourselves, it might be one of the most powerful shifts in a pardigm we ever experience.

It is time to live the truly examined life, to put our values, our words, our dreams to the test of reality. Whatever it is we want to be, now is the time to get started. We should not be putting off until tomorrow what we truly need to do today. We are each of us a Revolution in the making, but somehow we became convinced that it was more important to watch reality TV and shop at discount stores. If we think about these things in terms of your personal Econo-ME, what do they say about your values? What is your impact on your world, your environment?

This superficial disposable world we have created is like The Matrix, and we can kill it, anytime we want, just by changing our actions. If we want to change something, we have always had the power to do so. When did we forget that? When did complacency and ease become more important than honor & dignity?

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