What will shape us in 2021.

What has been and what will come!? 

No more lockdowns in the first trimester would be a welcome surprise that is more likely not to materialize. Corona will be with us for a few months into late summer and fall. In 2021, we will live in tension between two extreme positions:

Resignation - Mistrust - Aggressiveness.

On the one hand, people are getting even more tired. Resignation, mistrust and aggressiveness characterize their emotional mood, fueled by rising unemployment, financial insecurity and long-overdue insolvency rates of small and medium-sized businesses that are now coming to fruition. These are sad individual fates, to be blamed on a small virus that multiplies on its host of too much physical closeness and lightheartedness of many people. Nevertheless, quite a few company fates are probably also self-inflicted, due to the carefree, wasteful handling of one's own and other’s resources in the golden last economic decade, characterized by: Unreal low and even negative interest rates. Consumption before stability. Wastefulness before thrift. In these cases, the virus acted only as an accelerator, not as the real cause.

Entrepreneurially creative people make the difference.

On the other side of the field of tension, we find the ranks of the active and self-determined. These never see themselves as victims and always seek ways and means to make the best of every situation. Not "What can the state, the general public and society do for me?", but "What can I offer others? Something that will be useful to them today and perhaps also tomorrow?" It is entrepreneurially creative people who make the difference in how intensely and, more importantly, how long a crisis strikes. Or to put it in Walt Disney's words, "I've heard there is going to be a recession. But I have decided not to participate". The global stock market developments in 2020 seem to have adopted Walt Disney's principle. From March into the summer of 2020, people speculated on what the stock-market-Corona-year would be. There was talk of an L to be avoided, a desirable V, a probable U, an almost certain K. It became a V with all time highs. It will probably become a W in 2021. The crash is predicted by financial experts from mid-2021, although we now know that there is no crystal ball on stock market topics. The fact is global debt has never been as high as it is now. An incredible 365% of global GDP is becoming a multi-generational burden and one of the biggest challenges for the future. 

Breathe a sigh of relief - be grateful.

Many are expecting a better new year than 2020 was. Corona related mortality will decline first thanks to warmer temperatures and eventually thanks to vaccination of all those who are not "vaccine opponents". Corona will be defeated despite conspiracy theorists and despite vaccination opponents. The irony is that these also benefit from the vaccinated, even if the shitstorms to the labelled “pharmaceutical industry obedient stupid” continue. The pharmaceutical industry and scorned science will significantly reduce suffering worldwide with the vaccine. One could say, despite all the sad fates, we have escaped with a black eye. We can breathe a sigh of relief and be grateful. 

Happiness in life has found new content in 2020.

Health. Meeting family, friends and acquaintances. Being allowed to go to work and school. Celebrating. Traveling. Having an after-work beer or aperitif with colleagues and friends. Attending events. Enjoying art. Dr. Reinhard K. Sprenger propagated many years ago that happiness is the result of an active, self-determined life. A life-shaping principle for all those who internalize and implement it. Nevertheless, it is not enough, because happiness in life simply also requires "luck”. The good thing is, the former can be influenced by oneself, the less good, the latter unfortunately not. 

A thoughtful rhytm.

2020 has taught us to endure. To pause and get some distance from the speed of our time. That this is possible would have been dismissed as utopian before Corona. The last year has shown that we could live in a more thoughtful rhythm, where less is more, where people are important again and things are not.

If something of this remains in 2021 and beyond, then we are heading for a good new year. A healthy, good and happy new year, I wish you all.

Markus Weishaupt