There is a lot of anxiety making the rounds. Anxiety is an emotion characterized by feelings of unease, worry, and fear about future events1. In recent years anxiety has become a foundational tool in many political election platforms, or at least how those seeking election phrase the ideas as they see them. The clinics definition goes on to say, It can manifest as generalized anxiety disorder, which involves persistent and excessive worry about various activities or events, often out of proportion to the actual circumstances1.
Tariffs threats have created global anxiety. To be honest these musings are causing people to get things totally out of proportion. The threats are serious. They demonstrate a deep commitment to patrimonialism2 by the speakers.
My personal observation is that while the mouths are blowing this hot air forward the real actions are consistently walking backwards. The hot air is rising, but the actions are not being pulled forward by the rise of the words.
This doesn’t make the words any less fretful, however, it does allow those who want to take alternate actions the time to clarify and work on what will truly make a difference.
As Haruki Murakami said in his Jerusalem Prize acceptance speech: “If there is a hard, high wall and an egg that breaks against it, no matter how right the wall or how wrong the egg, I will stand on the side of the egg. Why? Because each of us is an egg, a unique soul enclosed in a fragile egg. Each of us is confronting a high wall. The high wall is the system which forces us to do the things we would not ordinarily see fit to do as individuals . . . We are all human beings, individuals, fragile eggs. We have no hope against the wall: it’s too high, too dark, too cold. To fight the wall, we must join our souls together for warmth, strength. We must not let the system control us — create who we are. It is we who created the system.”
1 Mayo Clinic definition
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