In the beginning

There was a woman who got very cranky about the state of the world. Well, more specifically, the state of the economy and the nature of life in the corporate world. This woman had a job end at what turned out to be the most spectacularly bad time in the last very very many years. Possibly the worst time since the Great Depression.
She bumped up against that other thing that trips folks up--gasp!--age. Yes, folks. We still look at people who have enough years under their belts to have learned much and gained wisdom as empty husks that have nothing to offer the younger others who make hiring decisions these days.
So, she has been living unemployed with no prospects for a "real job" on the horizon. This has been so since, let's see, November 08. Pretty ugly, right?
The up side is that these circumstances have allowed her to look around the corners to begin to find new ways to use her skills and generate an income stream. Really more like a tiny, drought inhibited trickle, but flow nonetheless. Doing yard work, cleaning, these are good things--most especially the yard work. More inspiration flows and there are some really interesting possibilities that are growing in her mind. Proposals are in the works and real opportunities to use her gifts in service to others AND generate significant income loom.
The down side. First, judgment. While she has worked with great diligence to find that "real job" the conditions in business and the "A" word seem to be 2 strikes. Very possibly, her disinclination to dissemble in interview would be that game-ending 3rd strike. I figure it's the first 2, because response to hundreds of submitted resumes has been less than 1%.
Does this sound like a diatribe? It is. While pundits pontificate, neocons cry no-fair, financial institutions take bail-out money to save their sacred hides and continue to pay their rainmakers obscene bonuses, the health care system shuts out more and more people based on their lack of ability to pay, families are losing their homes either to foreclosure or eviction, the middle class continues to decline into poverty, people who were, not so long ago, gainfully and productively employed are now driven to minimum wage jobs, if they can find anything at all, and face homelessness. Food banks can't keep pace with people's need. And we spend more hours on the death of Michael Jackson than on any other "newsworthy" event in recent weeks.
Seems to me that we are in a state of cultural, intellectual and moral crisis that has parked us squarely on the brink of societal disaster. I have heard a handful of people suggest that, at the rate we're going, we could see bread riots in the streets of American cities. I think that is not an outlandish notion.
We need to begin to look outward from our own immediate wants. There is this nifty little thing called the Golden Rule that simply says to treat other people the way you'd like to be treated. Not a difficult concept. Not much practiced. How about we, each of us, make a point every day to do one thing, just one thing to practice this idea. Before you know it, you have begun developing the habit of treating people around you with kindness and grace. You be kind, your kindness will expand exponentially as those you touch are encouraged to touch others with kindness. And your life will improve. So will the lives of others. What a concept!