The Productive Pessimist

  "People who grew up in financial hardship more likely to be NEETs." "People diagnosed with ADHD or autism in childhood more likely to be NEETs." "Teens with depression and anxiety more likely to be NEETs." "Kids who were chosen last for school team sports more likely to be NEETs." "Children who spend breaktimes alone more likely to go on to be NEETs." NEETS - people, especially those aged 18-25, who are N ot in E ducation, E mployment, or T raining - are a persistent fretting point for politicians, and a frequent hand-wringing focus in the media. Almost every week, we see yet another "X type of child more likely grow up to be NEET" headline.  It seems as though there are so many  social problems causing people to shy away from paid employment, higher education, or worthwhile training pursuits.  So many problems, that need so many  schemes and organisations set up to address the problems  (often by Friends of People in Whiteh...

  The Productive Pessimist's focus is on "living the problems to bring through the answer."  That focus statement acknowledges three things: 1. There's always more than one problem 2. There's usually a single answer which covers all the problems 3. The best answers come from those who've lived the problems personally. This focus means we often find ourselves at odds with the more prominent non-profits of the UK, who do very well because businesses like to believe they "can't possibly afford" to pay for services - until their friends, network contacts, and family members are providing them as a business - but like to show their generosity and social engagement by publicly donating to well-regarded, prominent charities in some way, and the British public like to console themselves that the "lower taxes" they insist on every election are an entirely reasonable demand, because the voluntary sector will just mop up all the various socioecono...

I'm not a Christian, but I follow a focus on energies and expectations which centres a world beyond the one I walk through and work in.   I do not believe I will have an eternal life elsewhere as the form of "myself" people who knew me in life would immediately recognise, but I do believe some aspect of me - what people mean when they talk about a 'soul' - will  endure, in some altered form.  I believe everyone's essence and energy endures, as part of the collective unconscious, the source of those moments of inspiration, those sudden thoughts, those flashes of insight, that the living feel "come out of nowhere." Good Friday, for me, isn't about commemorating the Christian God. But it is  a position in liminal time - a period where the energies of the physical world shift, sometimes imperceptibly, sometimes more noticably.  And, for me, whose focus includes a Dedication to a Goddess of Death, it is a day to centre and honour death. To become comf...

  We're way past the point where we can pretend there isn't going to be another global conflict. There's too much bureaucracy that's amputed process at the knees, hogtied it, and then mired it in slowly-solidifying cement.  Process itself is too heavy, with too many moving parts that are too separated, and too frequently told they're the only team that actually  matters. There's too many people in positions they have no qualification or competency for, and too many people in society who'll keep f-cking putting people like that  in those positions, because "they're so funnneeeee!!! I looooovvvve   their Twitter drama!  And snowflakes deserve to be triggered,  hurrr-hurrr, am I right?!" There's too many bullsh*t jobs which have no justification other than the barriers they create to people in jobs that are actually achieving things society will genuinely benefit from - because there are too many vested interests involved in keeping people in ...

  End of the road for economic growth in the UK? The UK government - and most Western European governments - hyperfixate on economic growth  as a measure of political success: If growth is strong, the claim goes, then the government of the day are doing things right, regardless of how popular their policies are with the public.  If growth slows, the government has clearly made the wrong decision, and needs to alter course, and prove that they deserve  to be in charge. This is something that has become a sacred truth in government.  "This will destroy  growth!"  "This risks crashing  UK growth prospects!" have become ever-more aggressive reactions to policy suggestions from opposing parties, or individual politicians.  Initially, I assumed this was deliberate fear-mongering; because the public associates "economic growth" with " my  individual life improving, me as an individual  having more money for less work, and everything gettin...