What are some long term occupational goals?

What strategies work to help individuals raised in generational poverty learn to shift their thoughts to prioritize long term planning, and help them set goals and achieve them?

• I have worked for many years with people raised in generational poverty. One of the biggest challenges to overcoming poverty on an individual level seems to be the difficulty in long term thinking, especially since daily living is such a struggle for survival. What have you seen that works?

• Answer:

  You are looking at it from the outside-in when you say they have such "difficulty in long term thinking, especially since daily living is such a struggle for survival." Long-term thinking is a luxury if you are struggling for survival, see Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Instead, focus on solutions to making the daily living less of a struggle -- teach basic organization skills so they can find the pieces of paper (bills to pay, birth certificates) so they can pay the bills on time to avoid cut-offs, apply for the programs that will eventually help them get out of the morass. I was raised by a mom with four children who had to go on welfare for a short time in my childhood, but escaped poverty because her motto was, "we may be poor, but we are neat and clean." Besides working hard she focused on cleaning and organizing us, and I do believe that is what got us out of poverty. I do believe that people who have never learned organizational skills in childhood are the ones who remain in poverty.