This is one of my favorite pictures because the Dutch people are full of vim, vigor and vitality. They are strapping tall, active people with zest. They work more, walk more, eat less and enjoy more. They are examples of vitality.
LuAnn and I were talking about young men that we know. They are smart, caring, quiet and good workers but I said they have no "vim, vigor or vitality."
LuAnn had never heard this expression so I thought I would expound on it. Some of our best young men today are not self starters. They've never had to figure out how to survive on their own. On the other hand, the ones who have that vim and vigor often seem to drop out of school or not pursue a worthy dream. They often fall into bad habits and bad things they never seem to be able to shake.
You can point your fingers to a lot of things that have happened to them since they were born or even before they were born. Their parents choices often reflect in them. It's an observation of mine and nothing too critical because I surely am not perfect. I've been able to work hard and accomplish something in my life without a lot of help, our children have too.
I give credit to parenting from a long line of folks that were raised the same way. We were taught responsibility at a young age and were corrected when we headed the wrong direction. We seem to be a smaller and smaller minority all my life. Maybe I am being to critical here but no wonder we see society struggling when too many depend on the government or someone else to provide their necessities.
I think the caring of livestock and learning how to produce the feed them were critical points in my development. Most people do not have this today, so how do we teach this without living on a farm? Anyone in my county can have a garden and most of them can raise a pig or a chicken so they can learn these important life pieces through 4-H and FFA. Still, so few of the worlds people have access to these programs.
The young men we were talking about will be OK as long as someone with more vim, vigor and vitality is leading them. They are good workers, and that trait is more difficult to find all the time. Ask any farmer or employer who tries to find good help.
This long early spring has been hard on my vim, vigor and vitality. I had to push myself yesterday to get anything accomplished. Saturday is Seed School at Ohio Seed Improvement Association so we will be discussing the vim, vigor and vitality of seed and crops in this blog.
Thanks,
Ed Winkle
Kids are the very definition of vitality, to the annoyance of some parents and teachers who smother it with vitality-killing activities and drugs instead of channeling it into learning and personal development.
ReplyDeleteHaving the right parents and educators who understand the world around is the most important influence for kids. Not much you can do about your own parents, so schools need to teach how to raise kids too, instead of letting everyone figure it out more or less on their own. And there's still a huge amount of teaching the teachers to do to raise education levels to educated levels.
There were several TED Talks last week about education, here's a few interesting ones from educators who haven't lost their vim and passion and curiosity so should probably still be called kids:
http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_how_to_escape_education_s_death_valley.html
http://www.ted.com/talks/geoffrey_canada_our_failing_schools_enough_is_enough.html
http://www.ted.com/talks/ramsey_musallam_3_rules_to_spark_learning.html
http://www.ted.com/talks/timothy_bartik_the_economic_case_for_preschool.html
Here's more: http://www.ted.com/promos/TEDTalksEducation
Radio podcasts too: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/npr-ted-radio-hour-podcast/id523121474
I get the TED Talks RSS feed every day, it teaches me new learnings every day and makes me smarter. The proof: I don't follow RSS feeds about psychiatry and mental disorders and yet I know TED Talks don't make me smarter, only give me this illusion! ;)
http://www.ted.com/pages/198
Ed,
ReplyDeleteGoing to take oposition with you on this one. I no longer consider myself a real young fella but not old though either. Have been able to get in to a decent job and find some promotions. In the farming community seems things are measured by wether you have bought farm ground (and if you had help). With no help and 200+ ac. later at less than 40 (happily married with yard full of kids) yrs of age I think I have your vim, vigor, and vitality. My oppinon is there are really only a few lessons in life. #1 the world does not care about you or your family. Deal with it. #2 Working hard will always win. It would not be called hard work if it were easy it is called hard work for a reason, its hard and long and seems sometimes like the road is never going to end. #3 you have to have some good luck along the way, nothing wrong with luck you just have to realize you must take advantage of it.
Phil A.
Thank you both. Phillip, I am not talking about you. You and your kind are maybe 1% of the population, no more than 10% I am guessing.
ReplyDeleteI don't believe in luck, I believe in God's Graces.
Kids are the definition of vitality but we seem to do a great job of killing that by the time they are 14.
It is just an observation and one that was a little painful to write.
Thanks,
Ed