Trade-offs and Triumphs

Issue 1

Hello, friends!

What would you do if you were faced with:

• A leaking roof - again, for the third time (and this is a new roof, just installed in January 2020)

• A broken dishwasher

• A hacked credit card

After a deep sigh, I made a list and started to:

• Work the phones and text messages to the roofing company, including to the owner of the company

• Find the dimensions of my broken dishwasher and then search on Best Buy for all the dishwashers that had the same dimensions

• Immediately contact my credit card company

When we are mired in what seems to be a disastrous situation, we want to sit with our head in our hands and be “woe is me.”

Except that would rob us of the opportunity to experience small triumphs:

• Like a fixed (?) roof

• Quick delivery and installation of a new dishwasher within days

• Immediate closing of the hacked credit card and quick issuance of a new credit card

This resulted in a much happier mother who had been complaining about everything.

We often have to work through seeming disasters and inconveniences to experience the small triumphs. While it may seem like a great idea to experience a life without disasters, then we would not learn how to make trade-offs that would lead to small triumphs.

And ultimately small triumphs build confidence and an ability to build new skills.

Onward to the next disaster, another trade-off, and another triumph (hopefully).

Please stay safe and healthy, and see you next time!

Jenny Kim

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Does History Repeat Itself?

As you muse about trade-offs and triumphs, check out some interesting articles that demonstrate that maybe we need to study more history:

• The Mask Slackers of 1918 - back when the 1918 flu hit the United States, people objected to wearing masks. Our nation was going through similar political arguments over wearing masks.

• If you don’t want to read the entire article, The New York Times also has put together an incredible Twitter thread:

  The New York Times @nytimes

  In 1918 and 1919, masks also stoked political division. Then, as now, medical authorities urged people to wear them to help slow the spread of disease. And then, as now, some people resisted. Here's how that started — and what it looked like.

  

  nyti.msThe Mask Slackers of 1918As the influenza pandemic swept across the United States in 1918 and 1919, masks took a role in political and cultural wars.

  The New York Times @nytimes

  Masks were called muzzles, germ shields and dirt traps. They gave people a “pig-like snout.” Some snipped holes in their masks to smoke cigars. Others fastened them to dogs in mockery. Bandits used them to rob banks. There were calls to protest, like this one in California.

  

• A Plague Is An Apocalypse. But It Can Bring a New World - New York Magazine explains that America, as we know it, would not have existed were it not for the Black Death in Europe. So how will the world we know change but stay the same after COVID19? What trade-offs will we have to make to have some triumphs?