Pulling Together

Pulling Together

Are we in for a year of discontent and strikes? I hope not. “Not fair. Not playing. Go play with your own busted ball, this one is mine.”
No matter who caused it, or why the country’s financial deficit came into being, it is here and will stay, getting ever larger unless something is done about it. If someone owed thousands on one credit card, it seems ridiculous to keep getting more credit cards to pay the interest that continually forms month by month on each one until the whole pay packet is spoken for.
Oh yes, it is annoying if you never get into debt yourself, if you live on a modest income, look after what you have and never throw anything away, but we are in this mess together. It is even harder on those whose jobs are threatened, or who have not been able to get work since leaving full time education. And not all are blessed with the knowledge that they have a public sector pension to look forward to. As disclosed, many people are actually better off when they retire and quite a few can retire early and live in comfort.
Inevitably, we have a financially unequal society. But, the “Spend, now, pay later (with interest)” culture is what got us all into this mess.
So how is the debt to be paid? Hard decisions have to be made. We CAN live on less to preserve jobs. We don’t have to go abroad for holidays, throw out clothes, wear the latest fashion, eat nothing but ready meals, drink till we’re silly, spoil our children, turn Christmas into a squalid episode of indulgence.
Personal responsibility has eroded over the years. Time to think what WE can do for the Community, rather than sit back and grumble. Helping others brings great rewards. So does living simply. “Money isn’t everything.” “Enough is as good as a feast.” “The best things in life are free.” So I was brought up to believe.
Years ago, when some of my family worked in Africa with Mercy Ships, one of the boys asked his mum why the children there seemed to be happy — smiling and laughing. After all, they hadn’t got toys or anything else. Their food was simple and (in our eyes) monotonous.
Looking back to my childhood, everything was wonderfully simple. Sure life was hard at times, food was plain and only just enough, but we never went without. Simple toys and games like whip and top, marbles, skipping, balls, and hop-scotch, kept us fit and happy for hours. Would TV have made a difference? Yes, likely we would have been less fit and less sociable. No money needed for electronic games or mobile phones — they had not been invented. Perhaps it is time to rediscover simple pleasures?
I pity the rich who get everything they want.
Jesus said, “Consider the lilies of the field, they spin not neither do they weave. Yet Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.”
Looking to the beauty around us and within people, doing our best for those in real need might just enrich us beyond our wildest dreams.