Your Perception Is Always 20-20 But Your Looking In The Wrong Direction

Image via WikipediaIf you watch the TV on a regular basis, listen to the radio, or surf the Web you will hear and see that the economy is on the brink of collapse. Bad news seems to be in an ever abundance these days. From the tsunami in Japan, European economies on the brink, Medicare and Social Security in danger of failing, and our incredible debt; it can keep you up at night. Bring it down to your own situation. How's your personal economy?

We all are on different points on our life's path. Some are doing better than others. Personally, times our a little tough. My income is down and my expenses are continually rising. But for some, things are looking pretty good.

A friend of mine, ten years older than me, has recently retired. He has a pension from the state, a sizable investment portfolio, Social Security and Medicare. With all that, he lives very comfortably. His house and car are paid off and he has no debt. But the icing on the cake is he has been hired part time at $45 per hour in the same type of job he had before; and he can set his own schedule to work only when he wishes to. Not bad!

If I ask my friend how the economy is, he responds, "Pretty Good!". When we think about our personal economy we judge it by how well we are doing financially in our own lives. Our neighbor can be out of work and in foreclosure and it won't effect our perception. The neighbor's perception of the economy is that it's in the toilet and that he will be standing in a soup kitchen line any day now.

Perception is key here. It's hard to feel the pain of others, but easy to feel our own. What we all need to do is turn off the news and Internet. Get out a book, watch sports, go on a picnic, or just take a walk. Look around you and see a wonderful world. Visit your kids and shut the noise out. Get a hobby or just spend time with family. Soon you will see that your perception will change. You will see that things are not so bad and you will have the energy again to work through your problems.

In life, we walk a path of hills and valleys. For most now we are in a pretty deep valley. Valleys in the world usually never continue forever. By definition valleys are surrounded by hills and mountains. Soon we will be approaching the hills again, followed by mountains. It's going to take a while though.