July is a time when business people are ending their fiscal year, taking a mid-summer look at how things are going and making plans for the remaining six months of the year in order to have the best possible results in their business.
Recently I wrote about some things we each can do to make our own world, and the world around us, a better place to be in terms of economic and physical comforts. Let's consider what we each can do to make our world a kinder, gentler place to share.
We are living in troubled, uncertain times. A number of people have lost their jobs, others have lost their homes; some have lost both. The lifetime savings of others acquired over a period of many years is gone, and they approach retirement with the fearsome question of how they are going to get along. There is fear, anger and confusion.
We often speak of the world and the many worrisome, fearsome things that are happening all over, but when did you last give more than just a passing thought to your own particular little world?
Many years ago, the manager of the office where I worked had an efficiency expert come in to check us out. The first thing he did was give each of us a steno pad and asked us to write down what we did every minute of the workday and for how long — every phone call, every trip to the file cabinet, every conversation with a client, absolutely everything we did. At the end of the workday we were to date it, sign it and give it to him. You can imagine the howls of protest that went up; however, some of us had to admit that we were surprised and amazed at just how little time we spent on some things and how much time we wasted on others. It was truly a learning experience.
Being out of work and looking for a job is difficult. The physical demands of the task are great, and the longer it takes, the greater the threat to one's sense of well-being.
Just about every day we see, hear or read that important changes to improve our health care will be made by the federal government. We don't have a timetable yet as to when this is likely to happen, but it is expected to bring about tremendous changes in our medical world.
From time to time, those of us who live alone consider the possibility of sharing our homes with another person, perhaps a friend or relative. It could be from loneliness, or it could simply be that we'd like to have someone with whom to share the expenses and responsibilities involved in maintaining a home.
Our nation has come through many difficult economic times, and it seems to me that in each case two basic things happened. People took stock of their situation and looked for ways of cutting back on their living expenses. Then they began to find ways of sharing and working together in order to help themselves and each other.
