The New Year provides an opportunity to look in the rear-view mirror to see where we have been, and to think about the direction we want to take in the future. Businesses will usually do this at the end of their fourth quarter and come up with plans for their new fiscal year, making efforts not to repeat past mistakes and simultaneously read the tea leaves about this year. Individuals will also make resolutions to act differently in 2020, promising to be kinder, more thoughtful, charitable, and unselfish.

Unfortunately, individuals will be unable to help solve the discontent and frustration that affect people throughout the world. Every continent seems to have ordinary people fighting the status quo and our world is now accustomed to words and expressions that were not heard on a daily basis just a few years ago – words like “impeach”,“climate change”, “fake news” and others.

In past articles I have tried to exhort my fellow-Canadians to rely on their “inner chameleon” in order to change and succeed internationally, to “recalibrate their exporting GPS” to look for new markets, and to go back to their courageous entrepreneurial roots by ignoring a natural “armadillo-like” tendency to hide from looming change.

I don’t know how many heeded my cri de guerre, but in the meantime many of our current world leaders are busy building and reinforcing their sand castles, ignoring scientific proof that the oncoming waves of climate change will soon make their constructions meaningless.

Except by voting, as an individual it is difficult to influence global events but based on the belief that all change begins with a tiny step, in my own small way I plan to be involved in trying to repair and improve the world around me.

And so, relying on hopefully perfect 2020 vision, I plan to smile more and greet strangers in a friendly way. I will make an effort to compliment colleagues and friends when they make an honest effort to succeed. I plan to turn off the water tap while I brush my teeth. I plan to recycle more and use less plastic. I will sing more and donate more to charitable organisations. In general I want to be kinder and loving, convinced that these small but positive gestures will generate similar reactions in others and, in a ripple effect, make a difference to our world in 2020.

Ennio Vita-Finzi has worked on three Continents as a Trade Commissioner, a multinational executive, a successful entrepreneur and a college and university lecturer. [email protected]