Many people will be happy to know that 2010 is behind them. By all definitions the year was a tumultuous one in which many saw their lives pulled in different directions. For many analysts of the global economic scene, the end of the year might have signalled the end of the global recession and the slow climb of many countries back to some form of economic sanity. In the final days of the year Jamaica declared the recession over. There is the suggestion that the country is poised for growth, the government having convinced itself that they have put in place the necessary conditions for economic expansion and growth.

This may or may not be the case. There are still a number of things that are broken and that need to be fixed if we are to achieve the needed but elusive economic growth to propel us forward. It is not my intention to get into them here. Many financial and economic analysts far more qualified than myself, have spoken to what needs to be done. There is no dearth of ideas about what we must do as a nation about the things that ail us. I sometimes get the impression that the fecundity of our minds often paints us into a corner of paralysis where we fail to do the things that are appropriate and urgent, indulging instead in the trite and unproductive.

I am not one to make New Year’s resolutions or compile “to-do” lists for a new year. One often finds that the things that you may wish to do in the new year are the things which you are already doing and to which you ought to pay closer attention as one year rolls into the other. As the book of Ecclesiastes reminds us, there is nothing new under the sun, and this also applies to years. As December 31 turns into January 1, there will be no magical change in our economic circumstances, in the way we conduct our relationships and hopefully in our aspirations for a better life.

The best we can resolve to do is to ensure that we do better at what we have been doing so long as this is legal and enhances the human space. I would suggest that we start with the small and seemingly insignificant things in our lives that we often ignore. Often we cast our gaze at things that are beyond our capacity to reach. We yearn for them and envy others for achieving them. Some even kill in their desperation to achieve what others by their own industry have worked hard to achieve. Life does not offer any of us such an easy escape from its realities. There is still no good road that you can take which bypasses hard work and fixity of purpose as the route to personal success.

So let us start with the small things that we can do well, the things in which we are gifted, and do them well. You can be the best carpenter there is, the best mason, the best plumber, the best professor, the best parliamentarian and yes, the best prime minister. To be the best in these and other areas of endeavour encompasses the same set of values: a good work ethic, integrity and transparency in what we do, a commitment to improve the lives of others by what we do and a desire to improve oneself while doing it.

Those who have been lazy and expect to be fed by a nanny state must be told in no uncertain terms that there is indeed no free lunch. If the recession has taught us anything, it certainly must be that we cannot go on expecting to live off the largesse of others. We hate to admit it, but for too long we have been a mendicant nation, begging our way around the world for every scrap of meat that falls off the table of the rich nations. We are by this token and others not a self-respecting nation. We could learn something from the Chinese. China, not America which is highly indebted to China, is like the proverbial Atlas carrying the world on its back. You do not have to go far to see why this is so. They are committed to a vibrant work ethic as a baby is to its mother’s breast. They do not go around behaving as if they owe the world something. Instead, they make the world owe them.

Like America, we are building up an unsustainable debt load that will be a burden for generations to come. If 2011 can lead us on a path on which we truly come to terms with the fact that the success and viability of our country is in our own hands, and take small steps to demonstrate that we truly do, then we would begin the long climb to self-respect and nationhood. This does not happen by wishful thinking, but by hard grit and determination. Where is the statesman in Jamaica to lead this charge? Leadership is important as we all say, but where will it come from? May I suggest that beginning this year we take leadership over our own lives and have a sense of responsibility for the things we say and do. Is it too much to ask that we begin to take a very serious look at our own need for personal accountability for our words and actions? Self-accountability is the platform on which successful lives are built.

stead6655@aol.com

www.drraulston.com