Edward Faircloth | Mt Pleasant, SC

I hear these statements every single day;  “I can’t find a job”, “I can’t pay my bills”, “Can you help my child find a job”, “The phones aren’t ringing”.

There are plenty of people fortunate to have salaried positions, reasonably well isolated from the financial struggling so common for so many of our neighbors and their businesses.   I personally see a great deal of struggling among my middle-class neighbors and friends.

A couple of thoughts for this period:

1)  Think positively.  There is going to be an end to this recession.  There is.

2)  Be kinder, gentler and more supportive to others.  Most are having problems.  Share a smile.

3)   Shop locally.  Avoid online purchases during this period.  Money spent locally circulates locally.

4)   Use this period to push yourself out of your same traditional line of personal and professional thinking.  Get out of your box.  Decide this downturn is going to have proven beneficial to you and your career.

Niels Bohr, the Nobel Prize-winning Danish physicist:  “Every great and deep difficulty bears in itself its own solution.  It forces us to change our thinking in order to find it.”