*Life* is *Competitive*

Adversity is a Fact of *Life*

The Economic Balance of Society is off. Cost of Living is Exceeding Working Wages

Capitalism Demands Continuous Growth in Revenue and Profits

Society has Grown in *Complexity* and *Difficulty* Driving Significant Increases in Pressure and Stress on Individuals and Families

Societal Expectations for Individual’s Daily Performance are Exceeding Reasonable Levels

What is Required Every Day of Mothers?

What is Required Every Day of Fathers?

What is Required Every Day of Students - High School and College?

What is Required Every day of Professionals

What is Required Every Day to Sustain a Reasonable Level of *Life* Comfort?

Capitalism’s Demand for Continuous Growth is Driving Societal Expectations for Individual’s Daily Performance Higher and Higher

The Playing the *Game* of *Life* is Becoming Exceptionally Challenging

Social Media is subject to the Negative Aspects of the Expression of Human Thoughts, Feelings, and Emotions

Studies show the average human (Who wants to be average!!??) has 60,000 thoughts per day

75% of these thoughts are NEGATIVE!!!!

95% of these Thoughts are REPETITIVE!!!

Why Do So Many Members of Society Accept Overwhelming Amounts of Negative Thoughts????

Why do so many People Insist on *Expressing* their Negative Thoughts, Feelings, and Emotions???

Is it the Condition of Today’s Society?

Is Society’s Increasing Economic Imbalances Driving Frustration and Fear in People to Levels they Can Not Handle?

What Happened to Appreciation for the “Power of Positive Thinking”???

What is the Impact on Individual People and Society in General of Wide Spread Negative Thinking?

*Life* is *Adverse*

Sustaining Happiness Requires Strong Character

Healthy *Self Love* Powers Strong Character

Strong Character Overcomes Adversity

“It is a *Reality* of *Life* that Men are *Competitive* and the Most *Competitive* games draw the Most *Competitive* Men.

That’s why they are there - to *Compete*. To know the Rules and Objectives when they get in the game.

The Object is to Win fairly, squarely, by the rules - but to Win”

Vince Lombardi - Hall of Fame Football Coach

What does it say about the Business - Professional Environment when many of the most Successful Companies like Google, Facebook, Amazon, IBM, Disney, and Microsoft laid off employees?!

What does a Person have to do to create Security in their employment?

The Divorce Rate in the U.S. has been at 50% for many decades, for way too long.

Why has it become so difficult to Establish and *Sustain* Healthy Committed *Relationships*?

Your Parents Entered You in the *Human Race*. Your Parents conceived You so here You are in the *Human Race*

You have No Choice - You Must *Compete* for Your Healthy *Life*

One of *Life’s* Fundamental Principles is:

To the Victor go the Spoils

The Harsh Reality of *Life* is the Human *Race* is NOT FAIR

The Hard Truth is Many People, too Many, Lie, Cheat, and Steal on all/any levels of *Life* in the effort to reach their *Spoils*. Ultimately these people are unhappy, with themselves, and with all of life

Life Owes You Nothing.

Happiness is *Earned*

The *Reality* of Today’s *Society* is the combination of *Capitalist Economic Factors*, Societal Expectations, and Individuals’ sense of Status, Elitism, and Entitlement have pushed *Competition* in *Life* to levels which *Challenge* Healthy Morals and Values, and *Decisions* about Behavior

Parents Raising Children

Healthy *Self Love* is a Teenagers Most Important Character Element

The Every Increasing Cost of Living is Warping the Equation for Raising Children into Mentally and Emotionally Healthy Adults

Healthy *Self Love* is the Foundation for a Mentally and Emotionally Healthy Human Being

“Readers are Leaders”

If You Want to Lead Your Family as Effectively and Efficiently as Possible Read at least 30 Mins/Day

Parents Must Respond to the Increases in Difficulty of Building and Sustaining a Healthy Stable *Life* by Adjusting How they Raise their Children and Prepare their Children to be Effectively Competitive in their Adult Lives

Parents are supposed to be leaders who lead by example…in all areas if life…Providing housing, food, clothing, an education and a healthy family life are the fundamentals. How are the increasing costs of everything in *Life* impacting Parent’s ability to provide a healthy childhood experience?

High School Students

Societal Expectations for High School Student’s Levels of Achievement have Increased Significantly in the Past 40 Years. Parent’s Expectations, More Demanding Curriculum and Testing Processes, Higher Levels of Entrance Requirements for College, Have Made the Path to Graduation Steeper and More Difficult

Curriculum is being increased in complexity at the same time amounts of homework are being increased. The K-12 environment has become more demanding of students in their daily performance, and performance over the standard High School 4 year Freshman - Sophomore - Junior - Senior progression to graduation.

Parental Behavior has Grown Increasingly Challenging of the K-12 Environment in the form of Seeking Greater Amounts of Control. Parents are Seeking as Much Control and Influence over the School Boards and District Leadership as Possible

Entrance requirements for Colleges and Universities are Driving levels of stress and pressure to unhealthy levels. With Entrance Exams, and the Requirement to write essays detailing how your individual presence at a given school will improve the overall quality of the schools environment is forcing Competition to levels never before experienced. Their Resumes must include excellent academic achievement as well as involvement in as many activities and athletics as possible

The cost of a college education has exceeded the Return on Investment the majority of college degrees provide which is having the impact of degrading the earning/spending power of the graduate once they are out in *Life*, which is leading to negative impact on the overall economy in the form of reduced Consumer Spending

How do continually rising costs for *education*, food prices, clothing, vehicles, insurance, effect young people’s *Choices* and *Decisions* about their future?

Why are Mental and Emotional Conditions such as Depression, Anxiety, ADHD, and medical challenges such as obesity, strokes, and cancer on the rise?

How do these factors effect the future of the *Country* and *Society*?

How Effective were your Parent(s) at setting examples of and teaching You how to build a healthy happy life in Society’s Growing, Increasingly Complex Environment?

How effective were Your Parents at setting expectations for Required Behavior and Amounts of Effort to Achieve Healthy Happiness?

Did Your Parents Teach You the Significant Importance, Value, and Role of Healthy *Self Love*

**Me Too**

The Emergence of *Me Too* in the mid-late 2015-Current Highlights the Impact of Society’s Growing *Complexity* and *Complexity’s* Negative Impact on Human Behavior

The increase in numbers of women in the work environment combined with the advent of the Internet and its ability to broaden the amount of and availability of information has brought a massive spot light on the existence of unacceptable abusive behavior in Society

What is the Solution?

Healthy *Self Love* Creates the Strongest Possible *Character*

Societal Expectations in these Prevailing Economic and Political Conditions Demand Every Individual Develop the Strongest, Healthiest *Self Love* and *Character* Possible

Healthy Habits of Eat+Move+Learn = Healthy *Self Love*

Focus on Status and Elitism is Blinding Society to the need for Quality and Strength of *Character*

Society’s fascination with Status and Elitism has Grown to Unhealthy levels. “Keeping up with the Jones” has been discarded in favor of “Exceeding the Jones at All Costs”

Society has become significantly *Complex*. The Internet and Technology have significantly increased the amount of Information available. Social Media is subject to the negative aspects of the expression of human thoughts, feelings, and emotions.

The increase in information available, the increase in population, the increase in wealth of individuals and commercial organizations have all combined to make Society Complex to levels our Founding Fathers could not possibly comprehend.

This increase in Complexity of Society includes Economic factors which have driven the Cost of Living beyond reasonable levels for the vast majority of the population.

The resulting Pressure and Stress created by the increase in difficulty for finding viable solutions to the Economic and Social challenges as they currently exist is Driving the Behavior of many members of the population to extremely immoral levels while degrading values. *Character* is Suffering. See the recent College Entrance scandal of the early 2020’s as the most glaring example of human behavior being distorted by extreme Economic and Social conditions

Suicides have Reached an All Time High

The Increase in *Intensity* of *Societal Expectations* is Combining with Increased Levels of Required Economic Achievement to *Increase* the *Intensity* of Pressure and Stress on Individuals on a Daily Basis which has led to the *Increase* in*Suicides*, which have Reached an all time *High*

Year 2000: Suicides 10 per 100K

Year 2020: 14+ per 100k

*40% increase*

Depression, Anxiety, and ADHD are being diagnosed at all time *Highs*

The rate of ADHD diagnosis has increased such that there had been a shortage of one of the primary ADHD medications, *Adderall*, across the country throughout 2023.

Increased Penalty for Mistakes or Failure *Challenges* Human Minds with greater intensity of stress and pressure every day

Societal Expectations and Social Media have Combined to Exacerbate the Worst Traits of Teenage Behavior, and the Behavior of Society at Large

*Decision Making* is *Compromised* and *Undermined* by Significant Amounts of Negative Thinking Combined with Society’s Overwhelming Increase in *Complexity*

*Prevailing Wages* are not keeping up with the constantly increasing Cost of Life. Inflated costs of housing, food, insurance, clothing, education, have reached levels that are “comfortably” affordable by Only a small percentage of the population that are significantly wealthier than average

The challenge of finding solutions to today’s increasingly complex and demanding financial requirements are real and painful. The result is increasingly harsh levels of stress and pressure on Individuals

Social *Competition* and Individuals sense of Status and Elitism are driving behaviors which are degrading the Quality of Society. See the College Entrance Scandal of the Early 2020s for examples of the extreme behavior in which people are willing engage in the effort to gain perceived advantages to succeed in *Life*

Human Character is being Tested More and More by ever Increasing Negative Social, Economic, and Political Factors