I've been keeping a fascinated eye on the emerging changes in our global monetary system and when I hear that phrase, 'economic crisis', I picture this....Meet Economy. He's the star of his time. He appears to be thriving to the outside world - growing ever more successful, beaming ever more brightly. Yet, if we look carefully, behind him there trails a foul smell and a dark shadow. Still he keeps going, until something inside starts malfunctioning. Something starts hurting. Reluctantly, he goes to the doctor who tells him that the years of self-deception and neglect have taken their toll and his health is in crisis. It is, in fact, life-threatening.
What does Economy do? If he has any sense, he stops, sits down, and looks with great honesty at his lifestyle. He uses this crisis as a chance to assess what's working and what's not and to give himself a fresh start, built on different foundations.
If WE look with honesty, we can see that our economic system hasn't been working. It's been eating up resources and changing our climate. Money, which was created as a means by which we could fairly share our skills and produce, is now often used as an excuse to do the opposite. Our perpetual-growth model makes little sense when we live on a planet of finite natural resources.
So, Economy has been none-too-healthy and needs to make some deep, far-reaching changes - and how about us?
Well, we've been seduced. Our economic set-up has tempted us away from our passion. We've made Faustian bargains, having been promised: "Do this job that's mindless, boring, stressful and pointless... and I'll give you security now and forever more". We work and work, waiting for pay-day or pension-day or holidays, believing in that bargain. Yet once we start to catch a glimmer of the possibility that we've been selling our soul to an entity which can't be trusted, what happens to that faith?
I know that people hire me as their coach because they're seeking faith in something new. They're fed up with wasting their lives and getting nothing reliable in return. They want to turn their inspirational ideas into reality and all the messages which say they should plod on and consume and earn their 9-5 wage to keep the cogs a-turning just aren't believable any more.
Maybe as the system falls, we'll all make new deals. Maybe we'll make deals with our planet, which really would always be there for us if we cared for, respected and attended to it. Maybe we'll make deals with ourselves, with our health, with others, and with those we love the most. Maybe we'll really hear that the world needs our passion, and needs it now.
Do Things Differently
This week, make a list of the deals you've made in relation to the economic set-up. What have you sold your soul for? What have you received, or what are you hoping to receive - as compensation? What's the deal with your bank? - what specifically do they do with the money you deposit with them for safe-keeping? If you don't know, ask them. What's the deal with your employer, your customers, your colleagues? Now, decide what deals you want to make. What do you want money to be for? What do you want to work for? What do you want to invest your time and energy in? What do you want to receive in return?
Finally, let us know of any inspirational finance systems you've come across. I've been a long-term investor with Triodos Bank who continue to give me hope in a resilient, sustainable banking model. I also enjoy using my local LETS scheme. I invite you to share your favourites with us here.
(c) Corrina Gordon-Barnes, 2008
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6 comments:
Corrina
I like your use of metaphor with Economy as the tragic hero, who has been living a life of self-deception. I know you are using this as a metaphor for our personal responses, but I wonder what kind of personal transformation he has to go through. Next year I'm going to be helping out at a short course at Schumacher college on Holistic Economics with, amongst other teachers, Manfred Max-Neef. It will be interesting to see what state the economy is in by then and what they have to say about it.
In an earlier blog entry, you raise the question: What do I want this to mean. I am reminded of Byron Katie talking about why we don't need more money. When I think of the recession, I think its going to be even harder for me to find a job in Cambridge. I have to ask myself what I want this to mean. Why do I want to "find" a job, how else could I survive? I'm finding it hard to deal with these questions on my own. Maybe its time for me to find a good coach.
"To me this piece is like any work of art, it's something that will touch everyone differently. What speaks to me much louder than any of the individual words is how much you care about the planet and the people on it. It's that passion that will get people thinking and feeling for themselves about what they can do to create a new way of being."
Corrina,
I’ve been stewing over this blog entry and your article in the London paper for quite some time with my “economics hat” on, and there are a couple of thoughts I’d like to share with you:
Firstly, I’m considering how happiness may become more integrated with economic policy. In economics, the “basic economic problem” – the scarcity of resources in relation to human wants – gives rise to opportunity cost. This is the “real cost of the next best alternative foregone.” When you talk about our previously thriving economy within which many workers are doing a job “that's mindless, boring, stressful and pointless” I wonder what the size of opportunity cost of this decision may have been. Perhaps we could collate a statistic of this opportunity cost, maybe consisting of the total spending on stress related illnesses or losses in productivity due to an over-stressed, under “fulfilled” work force. I’ve no doubt this figure would be quite astounding to policy makers, perhaps it could help shed some new light on our priorities as a nation?
Secondly, you ask for an inspirational financial system that we’ve come across. The Grameen bank, founded by Nobel peace prize winner Mohammed Yunus, tackles a significant problem impeding growth of developing countries: to take out loans to finance investments there is a lack of collateral. In groups of five, a small group may take out a loan with equally distributed responsibility for repayments. This has provided a greatly needed boost for countries such as Bangladesh, in particular for women who, due to a lack of land ownership, would otherwise been unable to make investments. The ability to invest in a sewing machine, for example, can lift a woman and family out of dire poverty.
Peppy
Thanks so much, Peppy - I think perhaps you are one of the new economists I called for in the London Paper article!....
Great that you mention Yunus. I'm reminded of the organisation Kiva -
http://kiva.org/ Is there a link?
We can't underestimate the 'cost' of unhappiness and unfulfilment which is why I have great hope that a new economic model would go hand in hand with reprioritising human value.
Thank you.
C
An interesting conversation with the Archbishop of Canterbury on this topic of sustainable wealth:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/default.stm)
although I wish he were brave enough to say, "Do not do try and spend our way out of this". He skirts around it.
We so desperately need courageous leaders who will say the unpopular.
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