Coping with accelerated changes in the new era – part 1

After the first a lockdown my wife and I decided to go to some showroom to buy a new fridge. The shops were open finally, so we decided that’s what we were going to do, go to the shops, buy a new fridge so that it’s actually delivered before Christmas. When we went there, we found what we were looking for and then it was time for paying for that fridge. And as we were talking to the salesman, we found out that there was nothing in the warehouse, this fridge that we are paying for was still at the manufacturer’s warehouse in Europe and it could only be delivered in two weeks time. So this person was telling us that one other thing that we thought about at that point in time I said, OK, so you do not have anything like that in store? He says, no, no, we don’t have anything in store. They have to come from Europe. So I said okay and at that point in time, what I was thinking about was possibly what you believe, that warehouse or that what I was thinking at that point in time was possibly the best thing to do was to just go to another shop because these guys were just delaying us. But what I found out was that all these channel shops were connected. So what he was actually showing me was a screen that was showing me the earliest delivery for the whole of the United Kingdom. So he had I had it there in front of me. So over the years, what has happened is that, there have been so many changes. Things have changed the way most retailers operate. Instead of keeping things in the warehouses, they only bringing things after customers have already paid for them.

So todays subject what we’re going to be talking about, we’re going to be talking about Change. Change is our today’s subject change is inevitable. For example, you and I are not the same age as way of yesterday. We have changed from what we are yesterday. So we are always moving. What happened in 2020, which is last year, is that we had all these accelerated change and this accelerated change has been brought about because of measures to deal with Corona Virus and covid-19. Why should we care about these accelerated changes that have just taken place? We care about these because they have got an impact on our purpose in life.

So the next question that possibly needs to be asked is, what is our purpose in life? I’ve been thinking about this question, our purpose in life apart from survival. Is that we have to grow and contribute. We need to contribute towards the enrichment of others, the reason for that is for our own benefit, because for us to survive, we need contribution from others. So for example, the food that you eat was possibly, unless you’re a farmer yourself, the food that you eat was probably planted by someone else, the clothes that you wear were made by someone else, the electricity that allows us you and I to see each other at this point in time, someone else was responsible for that. So in order to survive and grow, we need contribution from others. So for that reason, one of our primary purposes is to grow and contribute. So if you think about these changes that have taken place, they’ve got an impacts on our primary purpose in life of growth and contribution.

So in terms of contribution, how do we contribute towards the enrichment of others? We contribute by way of our career choices, our financial contribution, possibly our relationships. That’s how we make contributions towards the enrichment of others. And let’s talk about some changes that have taken place that have an impact about these contributions. Because of covid 19, what has taken place is that we have changed our working methods. In many cases, we are not allowed to work in offices while we’re dealing with covid 19. We have to work from home so our homes become our offices. And then the other thing is because we’re working from home we’ve had this accelerated technology where we’ve had technologies such as Zoom or Skype that I used to make us communicate with each other visually. So these visual platforms, I’ve become like the cornerstone of our communication. Because of covid 19 we’ve ended up with some social changes. So for example, as I’m talking about it now, when lockdown number three. No household are supposed to mix and we can only communicate via the use of technology. And the other thing that is emerging out of this covid-19 outbreak, is that because there have been so many stoppages or interruptions in the economy, what it means is that after covid-19. A new type of economy is going to emerge. So for that reason we should care about these changes because they have got a direct impact on our purpose in life. So let’s summarize what we’ve talked about so far. Change is inevitable. Because of covid-19 these changes have been accelerated and why do we care about the changes that have been accelerated is because they’ve got an impact on our purpose in life, which is that of growth and contribution. They have an impact on our careers, on our finances, on our health and on our relationships. Now what is it has meant is that our methods of working have changed. Technologies have changed, social trends have changed there’s a new economy that is emerging. That’s why we have to care about what is happening. In the next section, we’re going to look at What You and I Can Do About It Next. I’ll catch up with you shortly. See you in the next section.