What are your plans for the next 1T?

[JasonBlack]

When things finally do get better, what do you think you'll be doing overall?

[JasonBlack]

Personally, I think I'll probably drop off the face of the earth metaphorically. Eras of good feeling and conformity are not my scene. My style of patriotism is more one of "I'm there when you need me", coming in to solve problems, talk about policy or help people make strategic plans. These are still behaviors I will display from time to time, especially to help friends or immediate neighbors, but the "life is a team sport" attitude of fellow Civics just doesn't resonate with me as anything but an emergency measure to deal with urgent problems. My experience with people in general is that they have very short historical memories, and many will casually forget things they did during the 4T that revealed their true colors. In the case of my own age cohort (Civics), most will not realize that it was not their specific behavior that pushed me away, but their more generalized temperament of peer pressure, conformity and willingness to ruthlessly police ill-thought-out rules. These are the kinds of things that make me thing the 1T will be a little bit like those corny pep rallies I always hated in high school, along with greater calls for enforced "good behavior", which, unlike during a 4T, will be of little practical utility (you need people to follow more rules in a 4T. the same is not needed in a 1T).

When times are good, I think I'll go back to mostly being my old, individualistic self, taking some time to have a little "personal 3T" which I wasn't able to fully appreciate in childhood on account of less money and independence: travel, good food, nice clothes, lots of reading all manner of subjects and diving deeper into fiction and the arts. By nature, I'm neither a hedonistic personality, nor chronic stimulation seeker, but tbh....I'm tired of having to give so much of a shit about society. I want to use that time to focus on myself, flex my freedom muscles and demand the best out of life. That's not to say I don't have some Civic "builder" tendencies, but they will mostly manifest themselves via personal rather than public or social projects.

After a few years of this, I'll probably settle into more of a mentor role, perhaps adopting a child and/or finding promising young pupils to council. With my spare money, I will have a handful of charities and projects I wish to contribute to, but, with everything else in my like, that will be on my term's, not the rest of society's.

[galaxy]

Don't plan for turnings. It is impossible to know what they will look like before they happen. Wait for them to happen, and then live according to the present, not according to a plan created in the past for an unknown future.

I feel like recent geopolitical events have really made this especially clear.

[JasonBlack]

(03-17-2022, 06:11 PM)galaxy Wrote: Don't plan for turnings. It is impossible to know what they will look like before they happen. Wait for them to happen, and then live according to the present, not according to a plan created in the past for an unknown future.

I feel like recent geopolitical events have really made this especially clear.

Good planning isn't about preparing for some outcome you think it inevitable. It's about reading trends, looking at a range of possible outcomes based on an understanding of cause and effect and making sure you have contingencies for each.

[pbrower2a]

There will be more room for people to imbibe in archaic culture if they were so inclined before then. I expect to do that.

[Tim Randal Walker]

I am 65 years old. I think in terms of planning for my old age, rather than planning for a specific turning. I figure that a 1T will be okay for that phase of life.

[David Horn]

(03-18-2022, 10:06 AM)Tim Randal Walker Wrote: I am 65 years old. I think in terms of planning for my old age, rather than planning for a specific turning.   I figure that a 1T will be okay for that phase of life.

I turn 75 in a few days.  I don't expect to see the end of the 1T (maybe, but only a slim maybe).  As an elderly white male, this should be perfect for me and hell for others not similarly well positioned.  I can't affect that anymore and feel a sadness that I missed an opportunity to see the greater acceptance of all people.

[sbarrera]

And I am 55. I hope I can enjoy a long period of retirement and focus on personal projects and not have to worry so much about income. Hopefully my stepchildren will be in good shape financially and will be there for support when I get very old.

[beechnut79]

(03-21-2022, 08:13 AM)sbarrera Wrote: And I am 55. I hope I can enjoy a long period of retirement and focus on personal projects and not have to worry so much about income. Hopefully my stepchildren will be in good shape financially and will be there for support when I get very old.

That is a worry because I chose to remain single and childless as did Eric, one of the stalwarts on this board. Came of age at a time when money wasn't nearly as big an issue as it is today. We were the crowd that often tended to throw responsibility to the wind. Today it seems that many if not most of us have become responsibility freaks. Very few seem to miss those freer, more swinging times gone by. I happen to be one of those who does.

[Tim Randal Walker]

I may get a glimpse of the next 2T. Early 2T. If so, it will likely be an Apollo 2T per the double rhythm. Gives me something to look forward to.

Didn't have any offspring. I suppose I will end up in a nursing home. My friends happen to be older than me, so I will likely be alone.

[pbrower2a]

(03-17-2022, 09:57 PM)JasonBlack Wrote:

(03-17-2022, 06:11 PM)galaxy Wrote: Don't plan for turnings. It is impossible to know what they will look like before they happen. Wait for them to happen, and then live according to the present, not according to a plan created in the past for an unknown future.

I feel like recent geopolitical events have really made this especially clear.

Good planning isn't about preparing for some outcome you think it inevitable. It's about reading trends, looking at a range of possible outcomes based on an understanding of cause and effect and making sure you have contingencies for each.

It's easy to predict that unless the next High entrenches an authoritarian regime in America, then the range of political discourse will pull toward the political center that practically disappeared in the current era. Basically the plutocratic ideology of what Sowronek calls the neoliberal era (Reagan through at least Trump) will be cast off. Skowronek's"neoliberal era corresponds to the current Crisis Era (or at least most of it) and the preceding 3T, and is roughly half a Saeculum. The orthodox ideology holds that the sole purpose in human existence is to make those already filthy-rich even more filthy-rich. An opposition builds in politics, and it is capable of winning some elections, but it wins by becoming more radical. Its fault is that even if it is good at making its point it is ineffective at achieving anything when politically in charge because the Right has gutted taxes necessary for implementing any major, and even needful reforms. Thus the liberals fail and the right-wing ideologues give lavish support to politicians who stand for the intensification of economic inequality and the promotion of crony capitalism.

Mass culture, whatever the ideology, will be less brash and more overtly commercial. Anything exotic (think of "Latin" and "Hawaiian" inclusions in popular music in the 195's) will be bowdlerized into something innocuous. I expect Millennial tastes to reflect that. Instrumentals will be one way to avoid political and cultural controversies. Corridos that laud drug traffickers will not be the sort of music that passes the censorship of marketers. After all, children might be listening. Some parts of American culture have gone as far as possible with "Hang Mike Pence!" and "F--K Joe Biden".

The best opportunity for young adults will be in creating the foundation of a material order that far better meets basic human needs. Construction and manufacturing will expand in the renovation (if not reconstruction) of those parts of America that got left behind under the recent ethos of "the Devil take the hindmost". Green energy will shove fossil fuel use into narrow niches. Think of all those convenience store-gas station combinations; recharging the electric cars that will supplant current "gas buggies" over about fifteen years will reshape how people do much of their retail business. People adapt or go broke, and businesses adapt or go bankrupt. Skilled labor will pay better than the glorified clerical work that most college grads end up doing.

I almost expect undergraduate education to return to its old objective of expanding the mind (so that graduates become more nimble thinkers) and improving the student. Undergraduate specialization will be abandoned so that one does not learn with an economics major the jargon of economics and strictures of an economic focus while being unprepared to put one's learning to use. In view of the great expansion of knowledge and entertainment, we need more people to recognize that there is more to life than "sex&drugs&rock-n-roll", material gain and indulgence, bureaucratic power, and cheap thrills. Maybe if one is lonely one can listen to some opera.

If you disliked the style of the Barack Obama as President, then you will dislike the coming 1T. Except for a liberal agenda, Obama was the perfect conservative.

[JasonBlack]

(03-22-2022, 12:10 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: If you disliked the style of the Barack Obama as President, then you will dislike the coming 1T. Except for a liberal agenda, Obama was the perfect conservative.

tbh, the main thing that pissed me off about Obama was that he acted like a neocon Republican with regards to drone strikes and drug-related SWAT raids. I actually admired his calm, authoritative personal style. It's something this country needs more of.

[sbarrera]

(03-21-2022, 10:00 AM)beechnut79 Wrote:

(03-21-2022, 08:13 AM)sbarrera Wrote: And I am 55. I hope I can enjoy a long period of retirement and focus on personal projects and not have to worry so much about income. Hopefully my stepchildren will be in good shape financially and will be there for support when I get very old.

That is a worry because I chose to remain single and childless as did Eric, one of the stalwarts on this board. Came of age at a time when money wasn't nearly as big an issue as it is today. We were the crowd that often tended to throw responsibility to the wind. Today it seems that many if not most of us have become responsibility freaks. Very few seem to miss those freer, more swinging times gone by. I happen to be one of those who does.

I get nostalgic for the freer times, too. I didn't think about the future or have a care in the world through my 20s and 30s. But time is relentless, the true master of us all.

[pbrower2a]

(03-24-2022, 01:00 PM)JasonBlack Wrote:

(03-22-2022, 12:10 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: If you disliked the style of the Barack Obama as President, then you will dislike the coming 1T. Except for a liberal agenda, Obama was the perfect conservative.

tbh, the main thing that pissed me off about Obama was that he acted like a neocon Republican with regards to drone strikes and drug-related SWAT raids. I actually admired his calm, authoritative personal style. It's something this country needs more of.

I'll take Obama's predictable foreign policy to the erratic, anything-but-conservative mess of Donald Trump. George HW Bush was excellent at foreign policy, and deviations therefrom have yielded troublesome consequences. Presidents should be wary of kissing up to despots who act as if they do not need America. Trump may have suggested that Ukraine was isolated for failing to yield to Trump's effort to blackmail its President.

F--K drugs! American addicts supply the blood money which has made war zones out of some countries that deserve far better..

[JasonBlack]

(03-24-2022, 07:43 PM)sbarrera Wrote: I get nostalgic for the freer times, too. I didn't think about the future or have a care in the world through my 20s and 30s. But time is relentless, the true master of us all.

I was kind of the opposite: thinking seriously about the future has come naturally to me since I was like 7 (spent most of my teens hanging out at this tea shop with a bunch of Gen X and boomer businessmen where we talked about investing, history and differences between living in different countries). It's thinking about the present which life experience and time had to beat into me, and which I am now, at 30, only just getting a grasp on.

[JasonBlack]

(03-24-2022, 11:31 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: F--K drugs! American addicts supply the blood money which has made war zones out of some countries that deserve far better..

yup. This is an issue I wish more people paid attention to. Liberals and libertarians need to join forces against neo cons on this one.

[Eric the Green]

(03-26-2022, 08:59 AM)JasonBlack Wrote:

(03-24-2022, 11:31 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: F--K drugs! American addicts supply the blood money which has made war zones out of some countries that deserve far better..

yup. This is an issue I wish more people paid attention to. Liberals and libertarians need to join forces against neo cons on this one.

Yes, count me in. The drug cartels in Mexico are a direct threat to us, and have ruined that country.

[sbarrera]

(03-26-2022, 08:49 AM)JasonBlack Wrote:

(03-24-2022, 07:43 PM)sbarrera Wrote: I get nostalgic for the freer times, too. I didn't think about the future or have a care in the world through my 20s and 30s. But time is relentless, the true master of us all.

I was kind of the opposite: thinking seriously about the future has come naturally to me since I was like 7 (spent most of my teens hanging out at this tea shop with a bunch of Gen X and boomer businessmen where we talked about investing, history and differences between living in different countries). It's thinking about the present which life experience and time had to beat into me, and which I am now, at 30, only just getting a grasp on.

One must keep the future in mind and be prepared, but if one worries about the future to the point of being paralyzed into inactivity in the present then one has no ability to affect the future. That's how I see "being in the present." Allowing yourself to be focused in what you are doing in the now, to effectively apply your energy. 

Also, "now" is the only moment that actually exists but that's more of a metaphysical observation.

[pbrower2a]

When I was a child (born 1955) I could recognize the absurdity of much of the conformity of a 1T -- even "choosing" a cigarette was an act of conformity. Cocktails were heavily pushed, but there seemed to be little imagination. As a child I could recognize such because I was obviously not in the market for tobacco or booze. I was more free to make rational choices, and as someone who got to see Dean Martin mock drunks (the beverage that he was drinking was apple juice) and was of an impressionable age when the Surgeon General exposed the link between smoking and pointless death I could make a rational choice to not smoke.

I saw the last 1T only at its end, when it was collapsing of its inner absurdities, especially on race.

Today the absurdities are on extreme inequality, science versus superstition, and authoritarianism and freedom. Much has gone on (like the Michigan plot and the Capitol Putsch) with further exposures of insidious involvement by people in the supposed Establishment.