To understand what a “gamechanger” is you may want to have a look at this animation first. We couldn’t have expressed it better ourselves.

Anyone can do it. This is my gamechanger story. I live in the Netherlands and may call myself such gamechanger in practical reality already for over a decade. It is indeed exciting, especially if you play the game as seriously as I do, expecting in the end that our constitution, legislation, human and institutional interrelations, sustainable expectations and social culture, change too. I am even more ambitious and hope the rest of world will play “my game” too one day. It is exciting to play, not just because of the game but the changes that occur.

What is does it take to become a gamechanger? 

You need three things:  belief in what you do, a new game and players.

Most people know and complain about what’s wrong with society but have no clue how to create another one. Many do not even think twice about it, unaware as they are that societies are simply a set of agreements and a culture. Agreements can be changed, culture too.

The current Dutch society is money driven, based on consumption (goods and care) and debt. The principle rules of this game were established not too long ago, somewhere in the 1970’s, inspired in parts by the USA, even though certain fundamentals date already back from our first constitutional development in the 1790’s. The game was adjusted in the 1970’s to address the growing needs for financial means. The key instruments became money, debt, interest rates and speculation on shortages. Even though this game in Holland had the noble thought of creating and continuing a society of “care” over an aging, greying population, at the end of the day today we see it evolved into a financial dictatorship and monetary slavery at the expense of human dignity. Money and money based systems have become dominant and the human being the instrument.

The law of opposites
When human values evaporate due to system’s interests the name of the new game had to be around “human values”. In the old game people and institutions are forced to only think in money instead of values. If we want values they should be upfront in our approach. We need to turn around the culture 180%. That’s the law of opposites (commonly used in marketing too in a certain way).

This is where the belief in myself comes in. I have gone through hell with my children because of the inhumane dominance of the financial world, up to a point that I decided “to create a different world to pass on to my children”. Back then I was only aware of my own pain and the game I did not want to play anymore. Only later, while developing my mission I came across the equivalent pain of the rest of humankind and our environment, locally and worldwide. I became aware that the my own good was common too. I was just a front-runner in pain and awareness, talented maybe to try alternatives. The rest would follow at one point or another.

It brought me to a key point of the game change: self interest. Self interest is the best motivator for change. Many talk about the “common good” to be dominant over individualism. That’s true but no one serves the common good if there is no reciprocity to the individual. “What’s in it for me” is even the driving force of the largest idealists.

My gamechanging is done for me and my children first. Changing the game for the rest of the world is a logical consequence. In that part I can become of help but it is the rest of the world that needs to take responsibility by playing if they want, not just I.

This brings me to the next awareness: When I change game the entire world already changed. It is just a matter of growing the new game. My views of reality are real, my game too even if it is played by one, maybe two, four and eventually many who will not even know where it started. They don’t do it for me. They all do it for themselves and their children, only if it makes sense to them.
All I can be is the inviting party to this new reality, convincing other about the logic of my solutions.

The world turned upside down
The new game is different. It is not based on money but value creation, not on interest rates but on talented contribution (with reciprocity through value sharing) and not on shortages but creating abundance. That’s easier said than done.

The overall picture of opposites is clear. The choice is either-or, nothing in between. But both games are abstract. They need to become materially visible for people to understand. To do that we can look how the current main game evolved, producing climate change, pollution, illnesses, extreme healthcare costs and very high potential expenses due to rising sea water. Those consequences are not caused by the big picture but the sum of all the little things. The big picture is then the consequence. Most global leaders try to change the big consequences without  disputing the game we play. This has its logic because the old game made them global leaders in the first place. The true global leaders of change are hence the new players that are all gamechangers after the example of someone who started.

Money is an abstraction that has materialized into our everyday needs. We use it for everything. It has gone so “crazy” that I deal with people who grow food that they sell to get money to go to the groceries. That’s the process we need to turn around. The essence of my new game is “everything we can make ourselves we do not need to buy”. If we don’t need to buy things we can do without money. This ends the old game that looses its dominance and dictatorship. If we change the little things the big ones are forced to change too. The game has then changed.

Sustainocracy – small things that are big
I made Sustainocracy more visible by defining our key values to be: nutrition (including clean water), health, safety, self sufficiency and awareness. If we look at our current society we lack all of those values. They are only accessible through money, if accessible at all. We don’t have health if we have a good health care, we cure sickness. We don’t have safety with a good police force, we address criminality. We don’t have food in a city of cement, we have shops. We don’t have awareness through education, we have schools that teach how to deal with money. Behind all that we have money driven hierarchies that want to produce more money, not value. We see then scandal after scandal in our food, our environment, in our human relationships, cancer in our bodies, etc. If we want value we need to create it ourselves.

The opposites works, not just as a new game with an objective, it is a choice. The counter part is collapsing. People, even leaders, need a way out, an alternative. The “What’s in it for me” in the old game is money, not just at the expense of a destroyed habitat and life expectancy but also the position of old game leaders.

Scientists can dispute the details, politicians can negate the consequences, business analysts can try to sell green business but the simple facts are that the old game is game over. It is disappearing due to all the negative effects that it is causing itself. Even in Holland we see now that people do not want to be policy maker anymore because they cannot win, only loose in the old game.

People need perspective, purpose and a personal drive. That is part of the value of being alive. If we feel that we are being blamed for the atrocities of society through taxation, inflation and lack of a job, and only get financial dictatorship back, then there comes a point that we take responsibility ourselves and turn things around. No old laws will stop us, we create new ones. Leaders cross over too, step by step if they think they can be more influential in the new game then the old. Businesses develop along the new rules, etc. etc.

Experimenting with reality
The gradual collapse of the old game is the only way to be able to get players for a new game and create openings to address true, measurable change. If the old game would be going strong there would be no awareness to the need for change. That’s why certain leaders in the old games try desperately to get back to the old strength rather than change, blocking whatever gamechange they encounter. But their chances are low because their struggle is upstream, short term and extremely tiring. The gamechanger has time, uses up the empty spaces that appear when dominance collapses and develops change gradually.

The strongest assets for the gamechanger are the weaknesses and collapse of the other game. The strengths are the exact opposite. The gamechanger does not have to explain the weaknesses of the other, just work on its own strength and invite the world to participate and share the results.

This is great in theory, especially looking back at hindsight, but for years I needed to experiment with my new reality to find a way through the old system. As said, a lot of people and institutions are hijacked through the money driven dependency. They may want to change but cannot. Whenever you propose something new they all expect still money. Despite the expectation of creation of unprecedented values the people and organizations involved want to see cash. It’s a culture. There is only one way around that. Negotiate without money.

I have the game, the focus and the challenge. Others need to supply the money, the innovations and the authority if they want to share the values too. I do not hunt for a budget, I hunt for talent to create value.

At first I just gathered people like me, with vision, without money. All entrepreneurial people that wanted a different world. When they teamed up they started making a business plan with a money driven justification, to find start up capital somewhere. They made it all work around money again, creating more of the old same. When it went again about money the fights and distrust started, breaking up any venture before it could become alive and working, let alone successful.

It became clear to me that I should not work with the “same of a kind” (just business, just governance, just civilians) because it does not work due to competition or singularity in attitude. I created diversity in the team by setting up multidisciplinary ventures (business, civilians, science, government). With different interests people may join forces better as there is no competition.

With a “poker hand” one only wins through speculation and a large cut for each. That is why we see G7, G20, EU etc come up with constant measure of more power, money, tax, etc, without solving anything. They are all government and think in terms of control and bureaucracy, not value creation. Business with business just want cost elimination and profit sharing, etc.

With a straight flush the key is to keep the differences complete and produce winning progress together.

Mission impossible
Even when the name of the game is known, with the abstract objective, even the multidisciplinary team to do it, it still needs a mission impossible to tackle. As gamechanger I tried it all and always found impediments. Persistence is key, not just banging the head against the same walls but by adjusting, experimenting and trying again. Finally the most unexpected puzzle pieces fall together. That’s when we got to set up AiREAS, a complex venture to co-create healthy cities. The rest is known. We are playing now at society level.

The game changed from chains of dependencies to ventures of shared responsibility