THE AMAZING LABYRINTH OF ABUNDANCE

(originally posted in Spanish July 2016)

-Accept everything as it is so that it can change-.

Many friends, many people everywhere are simply very interested, very worried, and often very distressed about having more money than what they have. Everywhere in Latin America, for example, pyramid schemes like “Women's Gifting Circles” or “The Flower of Abundance” have become very popular (see post Regarding the'Flower of Abundance' by myself and Gifting Circles and the Monetization of Everything by Charles Eisenstein). There is an eagerness for abundance, for money in particular, which is not well directed.

I'm also interested in having more money than I have. In recent years, I would say that I have less and less money, less and less anguish about it, and I live more and more in abundance (one of so many paradoxes). But sometimes I still have anguish. How could I not have it, if the message I have to give is a tremendous paradox: on the one hand, the current system is necessarily mathematically incompatible with monetary wealth for everyone (what a depressing thing to hear, right?). And at the same time: the message that life IS abundance. Both truths coexist.

The message that money is associated with the destruction of beauty: IT IS TRUE! (in case you wondered). See posts Introduction to Sacred Economics and Understanding Money for an introductory understanding of the current money institution. It's natural to feel guilt, disgust or shame about money. Having felt the truth of all that money means, one is freed and can open oneself to receive all the abundance of life, including money, without guilt. That's right, today I'm going to talk about paradoxes.

I said I'm interested in having more money, but I wonder do I really want it? Do I really need it? What do I want it for? Questions that go long ways. Do I really love money? Well, the truth is that I don't love it right now. How can I love it if one fundamental part of the message I share is that the institution of money has to change... To love it would mean in my heart to love the narrative of progress that is extinguishing the Northern White Rhino (see In a Rhino, Everything), which is exhausting the Amazon Rainforest, which is leaving the Jaguar without habitat, which is leaving my children with fewer and fewer clean beaches, fewer moments of silence, less pure water springs... (See post When Do We Stop The Destruction of Nature?).

Or, can I accept money just as it is for it to change?

-Accept everything as it is so that it can change-.

To fully accept money is to me exactly the same as accepting everything as it is. And I declare strongly that I will make absolutely no effort to accept everything as it is. Trying to "improve myself" was what caused me the most suffering in my life. The only thing I want to "accept as it is" is myself. At this moment I embrace this paradox, this contradiction with much joy in my heart, without any need for solution. And, strangely enough, unintentionally, I feel a little closer to accepting everything as it is.

There are multiple reflexes of this collective yearning for more money. Several people who come to my sacred economy workshops have as their main motivation the question "How do I get more money? And I ask myself: how can I answer this question? That's exactly why I'm writing this essay.

That's how I found out about Mr. Fernando Blanco, very popular in California, who is basically teaching how to make more money. On his website "Curso Blanco Para Prosperar", he says that "every human being is obliged to have one of these two things: either he has money, or he has excuses why he has no money". In this kind of view, the lack of money is due to a lack of attitude (actually wanting it), and specifically to a lack of technical knowledge that one must have if one wants to earn money (knowledge that it is indeed possible to acquire by taking his course). Clearly, this view is part of the narrative of the Old Story, where it is knowledge, education, science, control over oneself and the forces of nature and adversity that solve our problems. That is clearly no longer the case.

If one really understands the current economic system, one understands that it is mathematically equivalent to the game of musical chairs, where every time music stops someone is left without a chair. And "music" is coming to a halt more and more often in these times: financial crises are becoming more frequent. Every time there is a financial crisis, someone (person, institution or country) falls into bankruptcy. For example, someone looses their home. The bank auctions it and another buys it. The result: fewer and fewer people now own their own homes (most of them rent and the proportion is increasing), and properties are accumulating in fewer and fewer hands. In other words, a few are getting richer. Problem of greed? NO!, the underlying problem is that money is issued as debt and this requires economic growth (see Understanding Money), and today it simply remains less and less possibility of economic growth on the planet.

It is true, poverty and inequality are endemic in the system. They cannot be solved with public policies, nor is it a matter of correcting intentions, attitude or knowledge.

And at the same time there is a magic of life, an abundance that is above the measure of linear logic. There is giving, giving from trust in the generosity of life. There is an openness to receive, which is to be filled with love for oneself. There is that mystery, I am living it myself with my family. As I said before, I have less and less money and I live with more and more abundance: I have new shoes, we have a car, we drink imported mate, and we share more and more without noticing the "justice" of our sharing, that is, each time a little more relaxed and unconditional in what we receive in return. It is my wife Javiera who has encouraged me to open myself up to give and receive with both hands, simply because as a woman she knows what is beautiful and what is ugly (thanks to my love).

A curiosity. While writing the previous paragraph, where I mention the abundance that little by little, day by day, we live in my family, I imagined the people who come to my workshops sometimes. I imagined them saying, "Oh well, Felipe already lives in abundance. What a relief. So that means I can make a smaller contribution to the sacred economics workshop". I almost deleted the previous paragraph for this reason. We tend to think that our personal abundance depends on giving less: that if I give less to others I have more left for myself. Do you see how the notion of abundance based on the conception of being separated is contrary to sharing? The separated being has a given credit available, and when he gives he is left with less. The notion of abundance in the conception of the inter being is not about what and how much I have, but what we co-have, what we all have and share. Deeper, I feel that our notions of abundance can change in many unimaginable ways.

Accept everything as it is so that it can change.

I recently watched the video "Orders of Abundance", where Brigitte Champetier des Ribes is interviewed about abundance from the perspective of family constellations. Although the view of Sacred Economics is quite different from that of Brigitte Champetier des Ribes, I decided to listen, open up and ask myself what I can learn. I have realized that if I move to the place where someone else is looking, I can understand why they see things the way they do. Every human being has something very valuable to contribute. Brigitte's gaze and the constellations seem to me to be very interesting, very healing, and I also think that she is representative of a wide spectrum of looks at economics from consciousness. That's why I wanted to share some reflections, moving through my own internal searches.

Allow me to pick up some of the things that Brigitte Champetier des Ribes says. First of all, Brigitte says that money is an energy of gratitude, which comes to us when we serve others, when we give, when we love those who are difficult to love. Money represents for her an exchange that occurs in proportion to a service. Abundance comes in a climate of gratitude; if one is displeased with life there can be no response from the universe.

Problems with money or abundance are, in this view, a reflection of something from the past that has not been assumed. For example, a debt is a systemic way of paying for an unassumed fault of an ancestor (maybe ours). This generates an attitude that does not allow the universe to be generous with us.

She adds that people with money difficulties have abandoned gratitude to life, they have no respect or love for money, so money simply goes away. If, on the other hand, I accept life as it is and I am grateful for whatever it is that concerns me and be able to serve, then life itself is grateful to me: I am in the enjoyment of life.

Brigitte Champetier des Ribes acknowledges that there is a belief that "money is bad". However, from the viewpoint that money is simply an energy exchange, eliminating money does not mean eliminating energy exchange. In other words, it doesn't matter if it's called money or otherwise: it's still the energy of exchange.

Well, first of all, I feel that it has its importance, it has its place, to see money as Brigitte says, as an energy, from peace, from gratitude. The truth of the matter is it is worth looking at all things, including garbage, nuclear bombs and the ego itself, from pure peace and pure gratitude. I was touched deep down, being an activist for the radical change of our civilization and economic system, to hear the phrase: "Accept everything as it is so that it can change", as the fundamental paradox. A phrase that is not new, and generally applies to the very intimate. In my experience, when I have seen something of myself that I didn't like, and I wanted to change it with my will and effort, the result hasn't been as expected: the remedy is worse than the disease. Deep changes don't really happen through the effort to "get better," but through love, peace, acceptance.

So, dear Brigitte, thank you because from your words of your heart, I feel a call that reaches to my being, to accept money as it is. It's not a little call you make. Because for me it is the same call, without any difference, to accept the extinction of the White Rhinoceros of the North, to accept the destruction of the Amazon and a series of things that make me very sad. A series of things with which I am very attached, at the same time, like all my urgencies for the system to change, for our culture of separation to change. Imagine how absurd I am, when I unfold my flag that "we have to build a culture of inter being that replaces our culture of separation". What could be ‘more separate’ than trying to change a culture of separation?

Accept everything as it is so that it can change.

Back to sacred economics, money is not just an energy or form of exchange. It is also a social institution, born from a narrative of progress. It is a reflection of an internal culture or collective neural arrangement. It is not only a form of exchange because every official currency is issued as debt, and as such, it forces economic growth. Therefore, stopping the destruction of the beauty of life is incompatible with the institution of money we have today. I will repeat it so that it will be heard well: Stopping the destruction of the beauty of life is incompatible with the institution of money that we have today (See the posts Introduction to sacred economics and when will we stop thedestruction of nature? to understand this fundamental point). This is the great paradox, which we must accept.

And, by the way, a different institution of exchange - a different kind of money: it is not an issue of improving the engineering of its design. It's not just about printing money without debt. First of all, a change of culture is needed, an internal arrangement of neurons, to replace the concept of "progress" as a permanent goal of humanity. It is necessary an expansion from the separated being to the inter being: an expansion of our mind and heart. A new money institution could only be born from such an expansion, an external reflection of a new internal reality. Because we are only capable of creating what we are on the inside. What we create reflects our inner state and not our intentions. That's why I insist so much that it is not an issue of improving our intentions.

Accept everything as it is so that it can change.

In reality, I have often felt very absurd, very utopian, talking about the need for a new institution of money, which could only be born from a new internal reality. How convincing can it sound to speak of a reality that we have never lived as humanity? So, I am calling at this moment on the antipoetry: to love money and the current system as it is. A love that is born with little sincerity but with much need, with a lot of passion. With a sensual hug, yes.

Thank you to all the people who, from consciousness, are called to accept money as it is. I only ask you, I beg you then, to open up your acceptance to a future of cement and pig crap (see In The Rhino, Everything), because you cannot accept one without the other. For my children, so that what we accept can change, without asking it to change.

To all those who have difficulty with money, whether it makes them sick, rejected, ashamed or guilty. I would like to tell you that perhaps your sentiment is totally legitimate, and not a part of your being that needs to be "improved". [And why not? Check out what old patterns or issues in our past have not been taken up, which may be blocking us.]

To all those who feel inadequate or maladjusted because they cannot make enough money, I would like to say: "It is not a measure of health to be well adapted to a deeply ill system" (Krishnamurti). I would like to say to you: that IS the way it is, it is the reality that we are all living: it is easier to make money by participating in ugliness, in the commercial inertia that already exists, than by co-creating a new reality of beauty.

The natural movement that money should have at this moment in human history is to return to its origin. Money was born and accumulated for centuries from transforming forests into cellulose and human communities into networks of impersonal commercial transactions. In other words, the natural purpose of money today is to restore the Commons (our natural, social, cultural and spiritual heritage). It's very simple: it is not possible to make money by cleaning up a polluted river. Why do you think so many people who dream of a different world have so much difficulty making money?

And another question: do we really need more money? If one decides to accept money as it is, having as a goal that accepting it will bring more money, then there is a small trap: one is not in the acceptance that the collective reality is a reality of little money. That possibility must also be accepted.

It is assumed that if one speaks of economy and spirituality, the correct word is abundance. The possibility of scarcity, on the other hand, is like a taboo, as if it were a betrayal of the Divine towards creation... But in nature there have always been deserts and the little plants and animals that live in the desert do not seem to complain. In nature there have always been times of drought, for example. What if this stage in human history is a drought stage, in which there will be less money in our pockets? What if there is another abundance hidden within the apparent scarcity? By changing mindsets, our notions of abundance and scarcity can change completely, unthinkably. If I am prepared to accept money as it is, as well as the extinction of the Northern White Rhinoceros, why should I not accept the scarcity? In fact, it doesn't seem so hard to accept! In fact, I feel that by accepting it, it has already changed, and a new abundance has arisen behind the scarcity that is not measured with the same metric, which is not understood in the same words.

Dear friend Brigitte, thank you again. I dream the same as you do, a world where cooperation takes precedence over competition, so that we all improve and not just one. All my support and respect for your work. From this collaborative virtual meeting, I stay with 2 things. First of all, the call to accept everything as it is so that it can change. I will continue to open myself to this call that I sense is most valuable. And secondly, that improving does not necessarily mean having more money (or having more money does not necessarily mean improving). Perhaps improving means embracing what we thought was scarcity and in that embrace discovering a new, less linear, more mysterious abundance.

To avoid misunderstandings, I am not making an apology for scarcity. To improve also doesn't mean to have less money, nor does having less money mean to improve. Let's say things as they are. Whoever believes that having less money has the merit of participating less in the corruption of the system is living an illusion, because in the first place, he or she continues to participate just as much as anyone else. And secondly, he is living the trap of pseudo-loving himself through a story where he claims merit, but in the deepest truth while one rejects something external (the system), one is rejecting oneself.

The only improvement I can identify is the one that has to do with breaking down our concepts of improvement, our distinctions of scarcity and abundance, to let a new mentality emerge. Embrace the mystery.

Economics Nobel 2017 for Thaler

Returning from a workshop in Uruapan, I found this interesting news. Thaler, another professor at the university where I studied, receives the Nobel Prize in Economics, one of the founders of Behavioral Economics. The interesting thing is that this view emerges from allowing people's non-rational behaviour in economic models. According to the Royal Academy of Swedish Sciences, Thaler "has incorporated psychologically realistic assumptions into the analyses of economic decision-making".  And one of the main criticisms of conventional economics is the assumption of rationality! 

Is it a good sign that economists are finally opening up to another discipline like psychology?

Does the fact that these ideas reach the mainstream means a "breakthrough" in economic science?

NO! Not at all! In a fundamental sense, I am going to argue that it is not.

I recommend this link to anyone who wants to investigate a little more about this field. Thaler's award note at the University of Chicago here.

In a sense, it is an extremely attractive field because it invites you to reflect on the systematic ways in which human behavior tends to be non-rational; and at the same time it invites you to consider what exactly is rational behavior.

As an introduction to the subject, I briefly mention two examples of non-rational behaviour.

(1) People suffer more when they lose what they already have than what they enjoy gaining something of equal value that they did not have before. It may be called an aversion to losing, or a bias in the willingness to lose, versus the willingness to win. Hypothetically, if someone with an aversion to loss competes with someone who does not have this bias, the unbiased person will have a better chance of winning in the long run. That's why it's considered non-rational behavior.

(2) Inconsistencies between the long-term decisions one makes (e. g. quitting smoking), and short-term decisions. Neuroeconomic models, for example, explain that one part of the brain is responsible for long-term planning, and another different part faces immediate decisions, in the here and now. Mathematically, these models consider hyperbolic intertemporal discount rates, which in simple English means a disproportionate bias towards the immediate versus the distant future. So that decisions you plan ahead, when the time comes you change them systematically, generating inconsistencies of an irrational nature in behavior.

It is worth mentioning that whenever there is irrational behavior, within the narrative of our modern science, there is something to correct at the same time. That is to say, the look that if it were possible to rectify your behavior to the rational, you yourself would be happier. For example, in the second example above, if there were an external force, some authority that would compel you to maintain your long-term decisions so as not to succumb to the temptations of the short term, you would be happier. (Of course, that means that happiness has more to do with the mind that plans than with immediate satisfaction, something that is of course debatable).

A series of implications are very interesting to reflect on.

A first fundamental point is that non-rational behavior is seen, throughout this field of economics, as a weakness, as something to overcome; and that as humanity progresses in its intelligence, our behavior will become closer and closer to rational behavior. “R. Thaler was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics for clarifying how human weaknesses such as lack of rationality and self-control can affect markets "(elfinanciero. com. mx, the bold is mine). Rational behaviour is therefore an ideal.

A second fundamental point is that rational behaviour is presumed to exist, which is at least questionable. If you pause a little, you realize that it's just an abstraction, something that is intellectually conversated while having a cup of coffee with cookies in a seminar, and that makes sense only within a narrative about reality. What narrative? The reductionist narrative that assumes that there is an objective reality. This is just a cultural belief. Extremely heavy indeed, but it's still a cultural belief. It's not a truth of life. The truth of life is far more elusive and irreducible to mere intellectual understanding. Just as objective reality does not exist, neither does fully rational behavior exist, not even as an ideal. (This topic is a big deal and I may have to write more about it later; for now I hope to express a panorama, a look that liberates. For a deeper understanding see the related post Human Reason).

Under the idealization of rational behaviour, it is justifiable to apply public policies that rectify people's behaviour. The logic would be that people need mechanisms to correct their behavior in order to bring them to their own greater happiness, which they do not achieve on their own because of their limited intelligence. Naturally, here is born the ethical suspicion (and further justified by the bad reputation of governments), of allowing a governing authority to "improve" the free decisions of people, no matter how much they may be against their own good. In any case, this is already happening! For example, in policies that require cigarette packets to show the terrifying effects on health. This may help people who actually decide not to smoke any more, but it is very difficult for them to maintain their decision.

Similarly, with or without specific knowledge of economics and psychology, private companies are already explicitly or implicitly addressing the irrational weaknesses of consumers with their marketing strategies. This is nothing new, the novelty would be that they now have more precise engineering for their marketing programs thanks to Thaler (I don't think this is his intention). Perhaps some reader is thinking at the moment: "we have to improve the rationality of people so that marketing strategists don't take advantage of their weakness". Nothing further from what I want to express!

In the example (1) I mentioned above, about the aversion to losing, I would like to make an interesting observation, which I hope will tear down schemes. If you have an aversion to losing, you have two possible routes. One is intensively studying the rational paradigm, and behavioral economics, (I "recommend" to enroll in a phd program in economics for it), so that you develop so much your understanding of your rationality and your irrationality that by exerting control over yourself you "overcome" all irrationality in yourself.

A second possible route is as follows. Perhaps you have an exaggerated longing for security, and therefore you miss opportunities to be happier. Maybe you have a low tolerance for change. You're just scared. You can choose to feel your fear, and release it through feeling. Which way do you prefer? The first of reason and control over yourself? Or the second of freedom and sincerity to feel what you feel? In my experience, the second route takes you further.

An even more profound and thought-provoking observation is the fact that scientists who observe and model the irrational behaviour of people are (ilusory) fully rational in their observation. Their observations, hypotheses, theories, their way of writing, their manner of conversation, their contemplation per se, are fully situated within the idealized rational paradigm. (While drinking coffee and eating cookies at seminars). Note the size of this contradiction: to observe the irrationality of the real world, from an abstract rational narrative, i. e. unreal. It would be more "reasonable" to observe the irrational from an irrational yet realistic narrative.

Thaler told the award committee (theguardian. com) that he "planned to spend the prize money irrationally". What an interesting joke. I don't know if Thaler really meant this, but anyone would be happy to receive a gift of a lot of money that was indeed so unexpected, that it would give you license to be irrational. Permission to not make any calculations, to relax, to rest. To celebrate life. Because, on the other hand, in the conventional culture we live under the weight, under the exigency of being rational. With our salary we have to be rational and plan for the long term, to ensure our old age and the future of our children, etc. Things that give you peace of mind, true, but that take such an effort of cold reason, that if we were honest with our human soul, we detest. If we "had permission," we would never want to live life rationally. I know this has many implications for discussion and reflection. I'd love to cover them all, but I'd have to write all week.

For this fundamental reason, the 2017 Swedish Academy economics Award is NOT good news: the idealization of rational behaviour has not been questioned, but rather strengthened. Recognizing the lack of rationality in people, is done only with the programming that someday human behavior becomes rational. At the cultural level, it only reinforces people's efforts to improve the rationality of their behaviour.  It is even attractive, thanks to the observations of behavioral economists like Thaler, to realize the various ways in which our behavior is weak, irrational, and devote ourselves to becoming more rational in life. A grave mistake for those who are interested in freedom and happiness.

Certain characteristics of behavioral economists as researchers are very interesting indeed. In this respect, yes, this Nobel Prize is good news. Characteristics typical of children, and very rare in conventional economists: their ability to distract themselves from the assigned task, a sense of wonder, a tendency to ask embarrassing questions, and a distrust of adults' ideas about which issues are worth thinking about and which are not (bloomberg. com). This is undoubtedly the way to enjoy the beauty of the mind, to think the unknown. The only problem with this is that when the thinker becomes very full of thoughts that fascinate him, he no longer admits a profound questioning. Rather, in the face of such fascination, he easily forgets what thoughts are at the base of all the rest of his thinking. So that it becomes very difficult for him to consider new understandings, new avenues of thought, new stories of life (truly new).

My deepest passion is to question the validity of the rational paradigm. Not just because of his falsehood or how absurd it is. But more than anything else because of the unhappiness that permeates our lives as we place our soul's trust in reason. On the other hand, I enjoy the beauty of thinking like everyone else, and the surprises that life has in store for us no matter what path we choose. For example, I hope that behavioral economics will help people quit smoking. It is welcome to include in electricity bills, the value of your neighbours' average electricity consumption, so that it induces people who consume a lot to consume less (this is an example of a positive idea from this field of economics).

It is also welcome that thinkers think too much, and become fascinated and glorified in their intelectual achievements. No problem and no criticism to them. Sooner or later, when your intellect has been satiated, your own soul will ask for a more sublime wisdom.