URSABLOG: Posidonia – Time For A Different Approach?

And so it begins. Posidonia is upon us, and indeed for many of us, myself included, it has already started. Before previous Posidonia I used to give advice to others, with admonitions like:

– Posidonia is a marathon not a sprint

– Don’t get drunk

– Stay hydrated

– Respect your hosts

– Don’t get drunk

And so on. But I can’t be bothered to write any of this down this time, and I wonder why. Is it because I don’t want to assist the swarms of my competitors who will be arriving in the coming days? Is it because I very rarely follow my advice anyway? Or is it because I, as a senior broker, simply DGAF? (as I am led to believe is the correct euphemism these days). I would say it is a mixture of all the above, and anyway who is going to listen to me, let alone take my advice?

But I notice a change in my mood too. I have come to the conclusion that in the past, I used to dread the coming of Posidonia with fear and loathing. The prospect of the interruption of sleep patterns, too much pressure on the liver, alone and adrift in large events with no friendly faces, the irritation of passive-aggressive conversations with my brother and sister competitors, humble-bragging or simply lying outright about the business that they had done (or had almost done); all this was not good for my soul. It’s not as if none of this isn’t going to happen this time around, but now I feel energised rather than demoralised at the prospect.

One of the reasons for this may be the happiness curve. Research – using data 500,000 people from the US and Western Europe – showed that we perceive ourselves to be happiest in our 20s, and then have a clear middle-aged slump before we start getting happier again from our 50s onwards. Further data from Asia, South America and Eastern Europe confirmed this trend; it’s a human thing. As Brian Klaas points out:

There are many theoretical explanations for this, but one of the predominant ideas is that our 20s are a period in which the world feels like our oyster and everything seems possible; that we realize in mid-life that some of our hopes and dreams won’t be realized; and then eventually, we accept our lives as they are and grow incredibly content with the life we’ve lived. For some people, that fits, for others, it sounds completely at odds with their own subjective experience. But the data are really robust about the average shape of a human happiness curve.

So maybe I am just climbing up the other side of the ‘U’? Possibly.

But I think there is more to this, and not that I simply DGAF anymore, because I do, deeply and passionately. I want more business, more deals, more ideas, more evolution, more stimuli, more joy. New research may pinpoint why, particularly in the world of perfect competition.

Relative to younger adults, older adults attend to and remember positive information more than negative information. This shift from a negativity bias in younger age to a preference for positive information in later life is termed the ‘positivity effect.’

Simply put, as we humans – and as it happens, monkeys too – get older, we prefer positive stimuli, and are more inclined to simply ignore people who proverbially beat their chests, show off, and use aggressive and threatening displays to project power and status. This description is eerily apt by the way, applying to many an event where the numbers of my brother and sister competitors move into double figures. The younger you are makes you more sensitive and hyper-attuned to it; the older you are, the more indifferent you are. This applies to monkeys too, by the way.

Combining increasing happiness with a DGAF attitude makes some sense to me. I am more at ease with myself, and don’t care as much about the competition, particularly with their behaviour in what are, after all, meant to be enjoyable social occasions, not a shipbroking version of Survivor, or even Love Island. I am going to events – there are enough of them to keep me busy from today until the end of next week, without a break, without a day off – but only to those that I have been invited to. I have never been comfortable with gate-crashing other people’s parties, and don’t really see the point. I am going where I am wanted which, on reflection, is a very nice feeling.

And, once again – surprisingly perhaps, especially considering that my tongue tends to get me into trouble whenever I get too cheeky – I have been invited be a panelist, this time by S&P Global Commodity Insights to discuss the outlook for dry bulk commodities and shipping. This will also give me the opportunity to attend the exhibition itself, which I am also very much looking forward to. In the past I used to exhort my competitors, young and old, to go, find out more about the product they are buying and selling, and maybe even meeting new clients (it’s happened to me) as well as existing ones. But why should I? If they don’t want to go because they are too busy hanging out around the pool, or finding the free next drink at a nameless and forgettable reception, or simply sleeping off the excesses of the night before, all the better for me.

So, on balance, I am very much looking forward to this Posidonia. Apart from moving up the opposite side of the ‘U’, apart from finding the monkey displays amusing rather than threatening, I think it may also be because I now feel I am a part of it, and am not an outsider. I don’t just mean that I am a veteran – this will be my twelfth Posidonia – but I can now, hope, consider myself a bona fide member of the Greek shipping community, on many different levels. I am proud of what is really an amazing collection of events and happenings over the next ten days or so, boosting the Greek economy as well as further cementing Greece as a dominant global maritime centre. I moved here because I believed in Greece, I have stayed here to invest in it further, I have no desire to leave, so why not celebrate it wholeheartedly? This alone seems a good enough excuse to me to go out and enjoy myself, in whatever shape or form I choose.

Simon Ward