Plus ça la même chose

All the talk these days is about change. In business sometimes, change almost seems to become the whole point. It doesn’t seem to matter what is working and where a firm is heading, as long as there is change the leaders would be happy. And of course there is always resistance, especially to change for change’s sake, so some leaders are never happy.

Technology and globalization and social and demographic trends have indeed led to an acceleration of many previously unnoticed changes. Each time we stream a movie or join a teleconference or even simply look something up, we should marvel at how such things have made our lives simpler.

But it is also instructive to look for things that have stayed the same. Here are some examples.

An obvious example is religion. Many religions have traditions going back thousands of years. When I take mass somewhere new, I often wonder at how many others have done the same thing in the same way that very day, and every day going back generations. It is no wonder the cardinals are so scared of making changes like introducing women priests, they must feel they are guardians of history.

Even more interesting to me are the rituals around ritual and their secular equivalents. There are many similarities between prayer and modern breathing exercises, between chanting songs or mantras and an AA meeting, between listening to a homily or going to a movie, or attending a service or a sports event. Each serves a role around personal well-being, filling a need to stay healthy and balanced.

I was fascinated to read that an atheist “Church” has started up and is becoming popular. What do they actually do? Well, they meet with each other. They sing songs. They listen to readings. Someone makes a speech. There is time for reflection. Essentially they acknowledge all the human benefits of the rituals without the beliefs that go with them. Very wise.

In a similar category are universal hobbies, like walking, fishing or swimming. The therapeutic value of these is timeless.

Another category of things that have changed little is family rituals. Death is handled just like it was hundreds of years ago, it just that people are more spread out now so it seems less intimate. There is a reason for a thing like a wake. Marriage has become more glamorous, but its essence remains the same, even down to the way a couple woos. Birth rituals have changed little. Nor have more everyday things like family meals and the role of grandparents and respect for elders. All these traditions have weakened marginally due to the world becoming smaller, but all have retained their key characteristics.

Then there are traditions that started around the industrial revolution but still persist in similar form today.

Education has changed remarkably little. Kids start in a nursery with a mainly social function, then have a gentle step to elementary and a senior system with set exams in mid teens towards a tertiary level for elite minds. Most of the time, kids are in classrooms with a single teacher. True, ages have changed, universality and participation too, but the framework is similar. Isn’t that remarkable?

Then take work. Almost everyone has a boss. The boss has to check you do the things in your contract, and assess you for raises and development, with a variety of tools to help. There is a hierarchy and a pay structure. You work a five day week and an eight hour day for nearly forty years, and then you retire. At its heart, this has not changed.

When this happens, we need to ask why? Then, when change starts, we need to be very careful about unintended consequences. There are always lessons.

Take the last example first. The work structure is gradually breaking down, as highlighted by a wonderful report in last week’s Economist. Why? It is because of various huge trends. Why has the structure persisted? Partly for the good reason that it works for growth and society and families, and partly for the bad reason that it suits an elite. The elite is trying to stall the change, and so are the workers, out of fear. Yet the change is inevitable. In this situation, the consequences are really to be feared, since whole structure depend on a fabric that has become unreliable, yet everyone is in denial about it and no-one seems inclined to act decisively. I really fear for the generation entering the workforce now.

With education we should be less frightened. Again, it has stayed the same because it works, and those parts will stay the same. But the reason for the stability seems poor: it suits the powerful teachers, and it used to suit families before work structures changed. But these have changed, and now it is silly that schools finish at three while parents work until six or later. And computing can make education so much more personal and affordable. Bring it on. Just be careful about unintended consequences.

The family and other timeless rituals are different but the lessons are similar. Generally, the reason something lasts a thousand years is because it works. There is something in there which is healthy for humanity. Find it and treasure it and be very wary when people argue to change it and very worried when change happens from outside forces. But also look for non-core elements that only serve an elite, and argue to strip them away.

In family rituals there is little benefit to any elite so they are probably all good. Luckily, global changes are only fraying these rituals at the edges. We can still enjoy a family meal or be soothed by a funeral. If there is a lesson, it is to cling to these things. Be very loathe to fall out with your own family. Think twice before moving far away, since you are pulling in anchors you made need. And don’t mock the old traditions but embrace them.

For religion and its rituals it is similar. The rituals are wonderful and they work. Who needs the belief anyway – the Priest will be glad to see you and won’t challenge you too hard. If you must, join the Atheist Church. Look for all the similar rituals in secular life and embrace those as well, from meditation, to breathing, to walking, to self-help groups and book clubs. Mock them at your peril, for in your hour of need these are the things that could save you. They have survived for a good reason. They work. Furthermore, be careful of surrendering them, for example by taking on excess hours in work.

The Church itself is different. We can argue that humans need something to believe in, and it is true that a belief can offer the gifts of humility and serenity. But the rituals can work just as well without. And the structures around religion reek of elite benefits. We can challenge these as hard as we wish, so long as we watch out for the unintended consequences.

This subject is the true dividing line between left and right wing, radical and conservative. The former need to be careful of casting aside traditions that work and of unintended consequences, while the latter need to be challenged about elite interests.

So, wherever you are on this spectrum, the lessons are the same. Look for things that have endured. Ask if this is just to benefit an elite, and if so challenge it, but be careful of unintended consequences. If there is no elite benefit, there is a nugget somewhere inside that could be priceless. Find it and embrace it. Finally, when external change threatens something that has endured a long time, be fearful. The world of work is one such example. Climate is another.

Now, I’ll have a siesta, a walk, and meditate a while, before a good meal with the family. Why don’t you as well?

One Day, many Worlds

One thing I love to do is to break my own routine. Like most people, I love the comfort of routine, the little habits, places, or journeys that repeat and offer peace. But it can be enlightening to consciously try something different, for that is how we can learn to see the world through the eyes of others.

This Monday was a good example. We drive an old Volvo, but not so old that it doesn’t have an onboard computer carrying out background diagnostics. This is smart by Volvo, as it enhances the safety of the vehicle, but it also rather forces the client to act on messages and to use Volvo service areas, for only there can they interpret the computer.

That way I learned (again) that something was wrong with the car and booked it (again) for a visit to the Volvo dealer out in Long Island, about forty minutes away down the Long Island Expressway. And (again) I had the challenge of what to do with my day between dropping off the car and picking it up, with the uncertainty of what was wrong and how long it would take to fix.

The thing I love most about New York City is how all the different worlds coalesce. What Bill de Blasio says about two cities is true, and it is great to see inequality finally becoming a valid political agenda. But at least in the city we must observe both cities, since we are all squashed tightly together. So at the start of my drive I called in Dunkin Donuts for my daily Latte, and saw smart business people, rather sad seniors, close-knit immigrant groups (Russian Jews are most obvious near our home) and people on the edge of society, all of them clinging to their own community but also mingling, more or less happily and at least usually aware of other ways of living.

One recent exception was on another coffee errand, where in the queue were the normal mix of the comfortable and desperate, but where one woman was barking at full New Yorker volume on her mobile phone. She was against the De Blasio tax on incomes above $500,000 per year, on the grounds that it was impossible to live in the city on less than that, given school fees, nannies and everything else. She did not stop to think that probably everyone else in the queue, and certainly everyone on the other side of the counter, might need to find a way to live in the city with a lifetime income of less than her perceived annual minimum. No one grabbed her phone and broke it, but I am sure I was not the only one tempted.

After Dunkin Donuts, the next stop was Hassel Volvo of Glen Cove, in leafy Long Island. On the way, despite it being after nine, the traffic on the opposite carriageway was little more than a parking lot, reminding me again of the blighted life of the commuter. Another world.

The dealership would probably have loaned me a car, but I had reasons not to ask. I have a dislike and distrust of car dealerships, especially their pricing, so I try to minimize my use of their services. Also, I am blessed with plenty of time. It was a rare winter day of warmth and sunshine. And, most of all, the day offered a chance to explore other worlds.

There is a train back from Sea Cliff to Forest Hills, and on previous visits I had taken that. Off peak, it is a lovely journey, but there is only one train every two hours. This time, I had an alternative, since I wanted to take my Apple computer to the store to look at a fault, and the store was only a few miles from Glen Cove.

So I tried the bus. I had researched vaguely where I was and needed to get to and there was a bus stop outside the dealer. Of course, no one in the dealership was aware of this, or where the bus might lead. But there was a young Indian girl at the stop, and between us we knew enough to set me on my way.

I needed to change bus. The first wait was short but the second was forty minutes. There was no other white person on the bus. To pay I needed either a card (which of course I did not have) or to pay cash, using coins only, requiring many quarters, which of course I did not have either, but my new friends willingly helped, and also reminded me to get a transfer pass, that the driver would never have dreamt of asking me about unprompted. Just like the trains, outside of peak hours the busses are irregular and infrequent. They required waiting at unpleasant places of heavy traffic and no covering, and walking on dangerous main roads with no sidewalks. But at least the busses came and delivered me to the mall with the Apple store.

The Apple store was another world. It was full of efficiency and clean lines. Everyone there looked young and cool, staff and customers alike. Despite being neither, I did not feel intimidated, and I received all the help I needed.

Then I sat and took lunch at the only restaurant in the mall. That mall itself is strange. You could not go there and buy a gallon of milk, a bagel, a medicine, school shoes, a magazine or a bath mat – in other words anything I would usually buy. Every store had designer label clothes, and as far as I could see none had any customers, though the huge car park had its share of SUV’s.

The restaurant was packed, despite being overpriced. There seemed to be three demographics, all white (with a few Asians), though all the servers seemed to be Hispanic. There were affluent seniors, and there were some smart office workers, but the biggest group comprised wealthy middle-aged women, no doubt having arrived in their SUV’s. They seemed to be competing on quantity and cost of make-up and maybe even cosmetic surgery, they talked loudly (often of taxes), took their time and enjoyed plenty of champagne.

Over lunch the car dealer rang with two wholly unsurprising bits of bad news. I would have to hang around until five o’clock, and the price, even after negotiation, would roughly equal the entire monthly wage of my waiter, and by the way I needed to invest the same again pretty soon on something else.

So I walked half way back, noticing again the absence of sidewalks or pedestrian lights, as well as the dreadful potholes on the roads. On the way I had noticed a small cinema and an art gallery. Sadly, upon arrival the matinee would only start at four, and the art gallery was closed on Mondays. So I waited for another bus, returned to the dealer, found that the work was well advanced, and eventually drove home.

The day was frustrating but somehow enlightening at the same time, and it certainly offered lots of opportunity to reflect. My first message is to recommend the road less travelled from time to time. You will observe different things, learn a lot, pick up some tips, and enjoy companionship of people you do not normally interact with. If you live in a large city like me, you are lucky that some of this happens even on regular days, because we all live closer together.

Next, I reflected how life seems to become in a democracy dominated by money, media and the majority. Given space, people do not integrate much, and do not even observe the other worlds around them. The bus and rail company, as well as the museum and cinema, provide a full service when it is profitable for them, but almost nothing outside, making life tough for those outside the mainstream or the money. Car dealerships can satisfy the unreasonable demands of their bankers, but only by insulting their customers, most of whom don’t care because they are either rich or not paying themselves. But the result is a whole shadow market of ill-equipped but cheap repair shops, and many cars on the road which are both unsafe and uninsured. For it is hard to live and work without a car, yet impossible to maintain the car properly on a regular wage.

Then I listen to my lady in Starbucks and the well-heeled women in the restaurant and the so-called TV news and the world of Washington, where long-term unemployment benefits seem to be fair game politically. When did any of these people last try to travel by bus?

At the macro level I have few solutions. To paraphrase Churchill, democracy sucks but everything else may be even worse. Sometimes when I observe life in the USA I am not even sure of that any more. Money, media and majority can do a lot of damage if left to their own devices.

Solutions start at the micro level, for the majority is us and we can act responsibly and force change if we wish. It is easier in a city, but even there we can be lazy and one-eyed. So fight that urge, and start by sometimes choosing that less travelled road. You will be surprised what you learn.    

Sickness Benefits

I am blessed with good health. I get colds just once or twice per year, often at Christmas. This year was no exception, and only now am I emerging from the feeling of being less than 100%.

Most colds for me go the same way. The telltale sign is a sore throat, moving to headache and blocked passages, runny noses, and finally a cough. It is not too bad really. A bit like jet lag, the most annoying part is that it goes on quite a while and seems impossible to shake off.

Being sick mainly just slows me down and harms my mood. Joints ache, and simple jobs seem harder. Starting something is less tempting than moping around. My wife smartly suggested that I visit a local steam room, but I didn’t do it because the three-block trek seemed too much effort.

This time, I also consciously noticed changes in attitude and mood. An example is driving in New York City. That is never simple and always an excuse to become stressful, but normally I’m able to shrug it off, and treat the whole thing as entertainment. While sick that facility deserted me. I became nervous of other motorists and tough maneuvers, and the prospect of some journeys filled with a minor dread.

That felt like a neat microcosm of sickness generally. Our capacity is reduced a little, we are a bit slower, but mainly the sickness hits us in the head, by making us avoid tasks, see things as more difficult and take misery where we normally take pleasure. In a similar way, our view of others tends more to the glass half empty tendency.

I found it healthy to note and recall these feelings. Because I think it can help me show more understanding for others.

I started by claiming to be fairly healthy. I believe I am. But how can I judge that? There are many dimensions. The number of times per year I get sick and how much that debilitates me is just one of them.

Physically, I am weak. If I have to do heavy lifting, I mess it up and suffer. I was always one of the last picked for teams at school. I was one of the slowest at cross-country, and I remember an experiment in biology where we all measured our lung capacity, and mine was the smallest. I get tired easily, and have low physical stamina. In my career, I think this ultimately held me back, as the grueling schedule of early planes and nights in hotels took its toll. I was always in awe of those who could work on planes and go straight into an office and perform: all I could do was try to rest and recover.

Then there is tolerance for pain. On that one, I seem to be quite healthy. I never had any problem at the dentist or doctor, and if I am hurt I can get over it soon enough compared with some I observe.

What is harder to assess is whether I am prone to different ailments. I have grown a little bit overweight since turning thirty-five. I have always put that down to lack of exercise and a sweet tooth, but is there more to it than that? Can others do the same and get a different result? Is my sweet tooth a consequence of a bodily need rather than a hedonistic taste in food?

These are a few dimensions of physical health. There are just as many in mental health. Start with my mind. I seem to be blessed with above average intelligence and the sort of mind that can be put to many practical uses, at least if doing a business plan is weighed more highly than working out how to get a sofa through a door. So far, this mental agility seems to have held up, but of course one can expect a decline in later life. My Mum always claimed that I should not semi-retire, as it would affect my mental health. Only time will tell.

Then there are many sides to mental health that are harder to judge. Am I emotionally balanced? Am I prone to depression? Am I empathetic, or needy, or prone to unusual anger? Someone whose performance declines noticeably under stress? On most of these questions, I don’t really know. On all of them, I have developed coping strategies. But whether that has required more or less effort of me compared to others I have no idea.

This brings me to my point. Some of these attributes are judged more harshly than others. And in many cases this can be questioned.

It is always salutary to think back to the abuses of the past. It used to be acceptable to condemn people at birth based on lineage. Sadly there are still huge advantages for some and mountains to climb for others. Then there is discrimination based on gender, skin colour, or sexual preference. Ever so slowly, the world develops and we manage to move on from such abominations.

Next, consider disability and mental illness. It has taken my whole lifetime to give respect to people with such disadvantages. Look at old TV shows or documentaries and movies. Each time I see a reference to cripples, or lunatics, and their treatment, I am ashamed. But I also remember that I didn’t see anything wrong with it at the time. I joined in with idle talk of spastics or subnormal people, I didn’t see an issue with institutions even though my own grandmother was housed in one, and I joined the chorus of complaint at political correctness when someone tried to promote disabled Olympics or wheelchair friendly pavements.

Yet we continue to make the same mistakes, with the next generation of disrespectful assumptions.  ADHD is an instructive example. When most of us hear of a child with such issues, often from a distressed parent, our natural reaction is not supportive. Instead, we silently blame the parents for being away too often or giving a bad diet or being too protective, and compare an earlier era when an over-active child was just required to conform or suffer.

Now, there is always a balance to be struck. Good parenting does make a small difference. But the luck factor is enormous, and slowly science is helping us understand what may drive that luck. We should condemn others less, and support progress more.

But I expect over the next thirty years genomics and other branches of medical science will help us uncover all sorts of other health drivers of performance. I recently learned that a relative of mine had received a diagnosis to help explain why she is often sick. Before this, my shameful reaction had been to conclude that the relative was work-shy and should just try harder. Now I find my assumption challenged.

In the end, there will always be differences in effectiveness between us, and society has to play to its strengths to progress, not just support the challenged. However, this does not mean early condemnation of those with manageable challenges, there are often ways to compensate and create opportunities for people.

Few nowadays would support the Downton Abbey mentality that only those of good birth or appropriate gender can be trusted with certain jobs. I look forward to when other drivers of health are better understood and coping strategies developed. In the meantime I thank my relative for the timely reminder to count my blessings and to think before I condemn. I’ll try to recall how I have felt this last week, and recognize that others might feel like that, or worse, all the time.