A Vaccine Against Fear

Recently, The Fiscal Times asked ten authors, including myself, Jack Welsh and Marlo Thomas, how we would fix America. This was my response:

We're a country run on fear. Fear about the financial markets and the economy, fear that we're spending too much or consuming too little, fear about our national debt. Fear affects everything—jobs we stay in that we hate, how we aren't loving to our spouses, how selfish we are. We've become disconnected from real life.

We need a vaccine against fear. I'd give people tax breaks for doing a job they love. I'd get people to question what their lives are about. I'd encourage them to take absolute responsibility for their choices and beliefs. I would help raise the general awareness of our society. Then our choices become more conscious.

Fear is one of the biggest obstacles to making changes in our lives. It is only through living alongside this fear in faith—in ourselves, in something bigger than ourselves, in our fellow human beings and in the values of love, compassion and forgiveness—that we can finally move forward and live the life of our dreams.

Read the article as it appeared in The Fiscal Times.