Feeling proud of your life, your family, your sports team, your farm, your job or work team, is a great feeling. Particularly if you know that you did something that led to success.
I write this on July 4 (USA Independence Day) and reflect on some of the Hoo-ha that’s occurring in the USA including Donald Trump and the Independence Day celebration he’s about to lead in Washington. At the moment many in the USA feel it is not about being proud but more about electioneering and this is the conundrum.
So what I’m stuck on is; how proud should one be and what is the best way to demonstrate pride. My pride may be your vanity.
Bringing it closer to home I am very proud to say I work in agriculture with farmers in north west Victoria. I look at the practices they are undertaking, the improvements they’ve made in the natural environment in the last 25 years and the resilience individuals and communities have shown and it makes me stand taller.
I feel BCG has played a part and I feel pride in being part of this organisation and knowing all the great people who work here, and have previously as staff and board member, and as volunteers.
However, I realise at the moment some parts of society don’t consider farming as a proud and noble profession. I keep thinking about how we can draw such different conclusions from the same observations.
I don’t have an answer.
I don’t think the answer is an over the top communication exercise with jets flying overhead and tanks in the street (or the farming equivalent, whatever that maybe) but I do think we need to communicate our pride whilst still being open to the idea that we can do things better and that expectations of various occupations will forever change.
My call to action is that each of us need to communicate to friends, family and beyond, that we are proud of the industry we are involved in and why. When we do this, we are not employing a show of force but sharing the warm inner glow. Like when we think about advent of no till farming and how dust storms are such a rarity, how we on producing high quality, safe food for people to consume, the patch of bushland land we love walking through when we want to contemplate, the local community that stick fat when things go wrong and support each other.
Sharing these stories, with others who may not be aware of the pride, I think can make a difference.
As John Kennedy, the former Hawthorn coach said “Don’t think. Just do something.”
Make sure you communicate why you are proud of what you do and share some insights of where the pride comes from.
And finally a song (because John grew up in Quambatook and this song comes to mind).
