Perspective - on the Employment Crisis, or Anything Else

Thoughts for today come from the emailbag. My clients and correspondents are savvy and practice learned optimism:

From Nancy, who has started a group to help people who suddenly find themselves without a job:

Despite high unemployment rates, major job losses and decreasing employment numbers, the latest numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed 22 states recording measurably lower unemployment rates than the national average -- 7.2 percent -- in December 2008.

Wyoming recorded the lowest unemployment rate, 3.4 percent, followed closely by North Dakota, at 3.5 percent. Total employment increased in only one state, Louisiana, and the District of Columbia. Louisiana improved by 3,700 and employment in the District of Columbia increased by 100.

From Richard:

But many emotions are "caused" by the intellect (as opposed to immediate stimuli). All anxiety about the future, for instance, is simply reactions to scenarios invented by the mind and played out in the imagination. There's no intelligence in THOSE emotions. They are just responding to stimuli produced by the intellect without any connnection to what is "really" happening. You feel emotions in response to what is happening and to what you think might happen, or did happen, or what you thought happened, or want happen, or wanted to happen.

From Laura:

Abrasive executives rub their coworkers the wrong way. Their words and actions create interpersonal friction that grates on subordinates, peers, and superiors, grinding away at trust and motivation, inflicting deep wounds and disrupting the smooth flow of work. The management styles of abrasive executives include one or more of the following characteristic behaviors: overcontrol, overreaction, threats, public humiliation, and/or condescension.