Explaining where it all went WRONG

A lot of people now a days will grumble about this generation or that generation and how it use to be when I was a youngster.

I know there seems to be a lot wrong with this generation and where exactly it went wrong or started going down the drain. This generation has a lot of redeeming qualities as well as faults just like any other generation if you look hard enough. Not all people from any one generation are characterized by the general description of their generation as well. So, with that all being said I will place foot upon soap box and step on up.

For me the defining moment for when things started going downhill for future generations was when the lady who spilled coffee on herself at McDonalds and was awarded 2.86 million dollars. Ultimately, she only received 640,000 dollars. This took place in 1994 and the rest is history. Her name is Stella Liebeck.

Although to me suing a company or person for a mistake you yourself made over something any person with common sense should be aware of or avoid is a selfish act by a money grabber trying to get something for nothing. This one act lead to the what I call the money for nothing age and began the start of the me me me generation with the help of many authors writing about self-help and putting yourself first. The direct opposite of the generations who fought the great wars who always put everyone else first.

I could go on for days about the reasons and what attributed to today’s society. As I said before not all can be lumped into any one group and thank God for that.

I am in the Gen X group. It was all about a good mix of music and fun with a good balance of work ethics thrown in. A pretty balanced generation in my opinion. Not as good as the “Greatest Generation” who fought the big war but far from Gen Y or millennials in my opinion. Gen X was all about just enjoying life as long as we got the work down. Not particularly great at dreaming or changing the world.

I won’t go into all the negatives most see attributed to Millennials like the idea that everything is owed to them simply for showing up. I blame those that came up with the great idea of a participation trophy. I laugh audibly to myself every time I think about the term. There should be a winner and a loser else why even try. Valuable lessons will be learned on both sides of the winning and the losing. Character is built by both winning and losing.

People make mistakes and accidents will happen. It’s what you do in those situations that define your character and help build a good character or bad. Most good leaders understand this and just want you to be accountable and correct the mistake.

If you burn yourself with hot coffee you do not sue the company because the coffee was too hot. You learn to be more careful around hot coffee. If you take part in a competition and lose. You train harder to win next time. You get out of life what you put into it and deserve the rewards equal to the effort you put into a thing. Your owed nothing. Nothing is free and anything great or of importance is worth working hard to obtain. A thing easily obtained is not appreciated.

In the words of Robin Williams from “Dead Poets Society” “Carpe Diem, Seize the day, make your lives extraordinary”

This is Will B. saying you get what you give.