The Truth Underneath Our Collective Thirst for More 🔥
Our problem is not our longing for more;
it’s seeking the limitless in the wrong places.
I thought I didn’t understand economics. Then I discovered that economics doesn’t understand us. Dangerous stuff—and a wonderful opportunity.
So, are things becoming better or worse? I’d say both. The Trumps and Musks of the world are turning up the heat on methods of obedience, control, separation and competition—and more and more people are waking up to the insanity of a debt-with-interest economy, in which more can never lead to enough.
But waking up, as I’ve come to see it, only happens when we stop pointing the finger outside and start looking at never enough inside.
As a child, I saw grown-ups playing a 'normal' game that I found bizarre. But because they seemed to be so good at it, I started believing I was the insane one. And come high school, there was one subject I couldn’t get my head around: economics.
I bluffed my way through, hoping I’d come to my senses later, but more importantly, I bluffed my way through to secure my ticket away from home and towards freedom—a high school degree.
What an illusion.
Fighting the fight
For years, I battled myself, trying to fit in while rebelling. I wanted people to like me and I wanted to show I didn’t care who thought what about me. I wanted to be strong and smart and I wanted to be open about my fears and doubts. I yearned to be myself, but only if being myself helped me to be what I thought other people wanted me to be.
I went to university because that’s what you do with a school degree. I found work because that’s what you do when you finish university. I built a ‘good’ life…
that was blown to smithereens, first by finally daring to admit that I wasn’t living for anything I genuinely cared for, then by Charles Eisenstein’s poetic and moving Sacred Economics (you can find a link to the 12-minute video at the bottom of this post).
But it wasn’t until I started looking deeper, underneath the systems that seem to control us, that I realised that banks, bankers, people with money and money itself… are not the root of all evil.
Advertising poster for Oasis soft drink, Scotland, 2015
(one of the most honest ads I've ever seen)
Bankers are not the wankers
Fresh from the digital press, chapter two of the book Money is Never About Money delves into:
- What’s (gone wrong with) money?
- What’s wrong with more? (Hint: nothing, except when…)
- Economy and rivalry
- The wonderful kernel of truth underneath our collective thirst for competition, acquisition and more-more-more.
To lift part of the veil, here are two conclusions I draw in ‘This is not an economics class’:
- When we play the interest-bearing-debt game—and almost all of us are doing it, whether we’re aware of it or not—we’re pushing away the promised land of Enough faster than we can work towards it.
- We can bust loose from this game, but only when we’re prepared to look at the confusion that’s turned economic growth into a holy grail.
And this, for me, is where things get really interesting. Our perception of lack is rarely about having too little and almost always about being too little. Or rather, about the stubborn belief in not being good enough.
The problem (and solution) is us (sorry 😄)
Our problem is not our longing for more; it’s seeking the limitless in the wrong places. When we (unconsciously) hope to find fulfilment in things, inauthentic ambitions and inflated self-images, we create a vicious cycle. The more we seek, the less fulfilled we feel. The more we seek in the hope of still finding fulfilment, the even less fulfilled we feel…
We’ve co-created a society where it’s become normal to fend off avenues that feel vibrant, creative, valuable or meaningful, and instead do this now for fear of that later.
A wonderful opportunity, because we’re all players, and we all have it in us to change the game.
Gaining insight into money’s deeper dynamics has greatly helped me to pierce through limiting beliefs and destructive behaviour—without and within. If you want to believe it’s all ‘them’, I advise you not to read the chapter. If you long to be the change we’re waiting for, I warmly welcome you to dive in and see what’s there for you.
More:
- Charles Eisenstein’s Sacred Economics—the twelve-minute video that opened my floodgates to understanding money, misery, and opportunity.
- John Nese’s Soda Pop Stop—another twelve-minute video that did the same, but with cucumber soda 😄.
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