Tag Archives: acting precipitously

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

The whims of the people

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Over the last couple of years, electorates have been choosing strong conservative candidates like Rob Ford (Ontario), Donald Trump (US) and on their way to select Jason Kenny (Alberta).

It seems like a significant majority of the populous is seeking to focus on themselves.  Its all about me is becoming a mantra for political choice.

Brexit is just another example of this.  the aforementioned politicians and their ilk are full of rhetoric that demands actions and uses bullying tactics (threats) to reinforce their case.

Are we all that Simple

For me it is frustrating.  Do the majority believe these impossible pronouncements.   I will balance the budget.  I will stop terrorism.  I will end illegal immigration.

Surely feasibility should be part of the decision process for people deciding which politician to support.  There is ample evidence that this popular but impossible promises never get implemented.  Still masses of people blindly accept them, why is this?

Continuous Improvement

Governments can enhance the lives of their constituents but the focus should not be on promises to get them elected but rather practical actions that can both be implemented and will lead to positive change.

In today’s environment of wide open communication channels flooding the airwaves with any and all messages is easily done.  Misinformation, particularly in the political arena, is rampant.

For our own good, we need to raise our filters.  Everything should not be accepted at face value.  Ask, is this promise real or just attractive?

Whether the government is conservative, liberal or communist, as long as their policies can be implemented and improve everyone’s lives I support them.

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Death walks in front of you

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I heard a phrase many years ago, I don’t remember the source or the exact wording so this is not exactly a quote.  Death walks in front of you, so slow down you don’t want to catch up.

I think the more common view is death is stalking us from behind.  The opposite of this, the idea of slowing down so you don’t catch death is intriguing to me.

Contemplation

As with so many of my posts, events of the day often become the topic.  I just found out that one of my closest university friends (and my wifes roommate) died.

She was my age and of course this can bring thoughts of my own mortality.  We were not close in recent years but I did know her well.  This led me to the opening quote.

Death and Taxes

I just completed my annual tax return yesterday so there is an interesting symetry to the two events, death and taxes, being the things often stated as inevitable.

Of course change is probably the most truly inevitable occurance in everyones life and death does fall into that category.  It is a very significant change.

A Life Enjoyed

Not catching up with death is not intended to imply avoidence but rather it is about focus.  Enjoy each moment, don’t rush, there will, at some unknown point, be an ending.

It just is.  You can’t stop it, so little point in chasing it down.  A line from one of my favorite Black Sabbath songs can be perverted to express this sentiment.

Enjoy, don’t waste your life “Killing yourself to live”.

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Constant Change

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When things are made different whether a behaviour, an object or a physical transformation,  a  change has occured.  Of course change can range from small to radical and every measure in between.

Both small and major changes occur around you every day from the instant you are born until death.  Given all the possibilities for things to alter, from the color and make of the car you own to the way you think both conciously and unconsciously (e.g. a bias) change is inevitable.

Pace and Value

Change will occur, but how much, how fast and what order of magnitude will the impact be?  Will the change result in immediate satisfaction, dissatisfaction or will it be neutral.

Alternatively the impact of change may take some time to become apparent.  The future result of a change could be both unexpected and surprising (unexpected is usually a surprise but not necessarily).

What you can do about the pace and impat of change varies and certainly you can embrace changes, resist or ignore them.

Things are changing, so I can do what I want

Whatever change is, one thing it is not; an excuse to behave any way you want.  To say, I behaved badly because things are changing does not fly.

Whatever motivated a particular behaviour,  future change is only valid as a motivation if the possibilities, impacts and rationale are at a minimum communicated inadvancd.

For example to say I acted this way because things are changing is a pretty lame excuse.  If things are changing why not indicate what the anticipated change will be, why it will impact the way you behave  and then act?

Seems like a reasonable and effective sequence to me.  If you behave badly because you are arrogant and self centered, blaming bad behaviour on the fact things are changing is pretty weak.  After all things are changing all the time.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Boiling a Frog/ An aging work force

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Al Gores movie “An  Inconvenient Truth” was the first time I heard the frog analogy.  Basically if you put a frog in hot water it recognizes the danger immediately and hops out.

On the other hand, if the frog is placed in cold water it will stay (Frogs like water after all).  If you slowly bring the water to boil, the frog does not recognize the danger until it is too late and boils to death.

Whose going to do the work?

Boiling the frog is not only an a apt analogy for globally warming but generally applies when the danger signs are ignored until it is too late.

A recent article I read about skilled worker shortages in Ontario reminded me of the boiling frog scenario.  In the mid 2000’s, demographers (those whose study populations) predicted most nations in the industrial world would experience labour shortages as the populations aged  (if not all) .

As time has progressed nothing immediate happened and we the populations of the industrially advanced countries, have become omplacent.

Over 40% of the Japanese population is over 60 years old.  The prediction that the retired Japanese population will overtake those working is clearly slowly coming true.

In Canada, skilled worker shortages are becoming more apparent as the aging trained workers leave the work force.  Replacememt is exacerbated by the fact the younger generation are exhibiting a tendancy to foresake manual labour, factor and trades in favour of professional roles.

In Short

We know an aging population and changes in the preferred occupations are going to lead to labour shortages.  In fact we have known this for over a decade, yet, like the frog we are just complacent.