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China will bring us back to basics
This weekend James Vena posted a discussion on his LinkedIn group International Trade and Internet. He was refering to an article in Wall Street Journal on May 16th and announced the possibility of an important financial dip in Q3 of this year, a dip deeper that before.
The post did not come as a surprise to me nor the fact that shortages of raw materials would eventually bring the global speculative economies to a hold. In fact it was very simple to reach that conclusion. You simply have to apply the arithmatic that Dr Bartlett shows in his famous lecture posted on YouTube. If China has a steady anual economic growth of 9% and this extrapolates to a simmilar growth of consumption of raw materials, and doubling time of the exponential consumption is about 7 years of all these figures line up.
China’s growth started when western worlds had already dramatically and irresponsibly consumed their way through the Earth’s resources. Back in the early 70’s the Club of Rome already raised a flag to warn us that we could not continue our consumption rate as the Earth’s resources were limited.
Our global economies based on structural debt demanded growth and more growth to counter the evaporation of capital through interest. The consumer society was expanded world wide until the limits of today. We have reached the end of the line of the unsustainable global approach.
I myself announced that the big crash would occur somewhere before 2015. I still took one doubling time as a margin to fool myself in the hope to have time to contribute still with an alternative, Global Shift, that would be strong enough to become a global promise at the time the obsolete system collapsed. But the doubling time is indeed too far fetched and optimistic.
I never took the trouble to actually calculated the remaining Earth resources and plot them along the line of growing usage. Common sense learns us that the end of that line is nearby. How near has various variables, s.a. the growing pricing, the innovative push to reduce dependency, the reuse of materials that are already in circulation, the consumer reduction effect of crises, etc. But these would only delay the crash with months not with years or longer.
All the huge capital injections of governments were oriented to maintain the old system of consumption and allow for growth to continue without any consideration of its consequences on material consumption and its finite nature. Money is now made on speculation on shortages, keeping survival away and accessible only to the highest bidder. The power game of politicians may have postponed potential war situations but they were acting over the back of the global population without using their power to introduce a parallel system of sustainable progress. They are especially to be blamed for that. They have played the global game for the wealth of just a few and blocked out of individual greed and self interests the evolution of a new human organization based on true values but not money.
Money prevailed, not as a means for the large masses but as a goal for the greedy, supported by policy makers, politicians and executives of multinationals. Soon all the money they accumulated will be worth absolutely nothing, not even to buy a bread. Because to buy a bread someone will have to harvest the wheat, grind it, mix and bake the flour. Soon bread will be more valuable than all euros and dollars together. The true rich people are those who have grown used to be humbly self sufficient in food production, housing and clean drinking water. Back to universal basics will surely become the global issue in the next few months and years. China teaches us but are we willing to learn?
The end of the car
For many this may be a strange and even absurd title. The car has become a part of our life that we cannot imagine eliminated. The car has become a culture on its own, a status symbol and key user item within our daily routines. Why then such provocative title as if the car would disappear? Let us look at some signs and common sense:
Signs:
- The European Commission issued a paper in which the car is banned from any city environment by 2050.
- 80% of our car use is for the short distance. If we live in the city and car use is banned we serious ask ourselves why we would need to possess one if just used for family visites, recreation and travel out of town?
- A paper was issued annoucing plans to introduce CO2 tax on usage of vehicals. For many decades governments have enriched themselves on taxes over fuel and never bothered about CO2 until the global warming started to become an issue. Using tax money to pay for a larger infrastructure now they want to use our CO2 emissions to reduce their deficits. If at the same time they open up their policies for speeded introductions of vehicals on alternative energy forms this taxing may be stimulous for people to consider such car. But what would be next? A tax on fine dust emision of the tires?
- In many large city the space burden of cars is tremendous. Not just a car that is in use and causes pollution, traffic jams and accidents, but also a stationed car that causes spacial problems when not in use, which is most of the time. Parking in those cities has gone up as much as 7 euros per hour, growing steadily to discourage car ownership.
- In villages the luxory of a parking space in the street in front of the house is now seen by government as a service which can be charges as one uses public space that otherwise could be used for other activities, s.a. foodproduction or recreation ground for children en elderly people or space for CO2 reducing and water managing living green. Yearly tarrifs of 3000 euros and more have been seen already in certain municipalities. This, over an average life time of 5 years of a new car in a family, dubbles the cost of ownership.
- Petrol has grown tremendously expensive over de last few years. At the end of the month the traffic jams reduce because people cannot use the car anymore until their next pay check arrives. They stay at home,use public transportation or use alternative facilities like car sharing, the bycicle, etc.
- Less directly visible is the annual cost of pollution and green house effect in cities on human health. It is scientifically estimated that a government can save yearly up to 700 euros per inhabitant if they pay attention to air quality alone (http://www.aireas.com ).
- Also less visible and measurable is the lack of human productivity due to time inefficiencies in private transportation, health issues due to stress and pollution and long term consequences of reduced family quality time on children due to long parental absence during the day.
- The entire world economy is under pressure due to the intense speculation with money of banks, governments, multinationals, etc. The crises follow each other up rapidly each with a strong national but also potentially global character. It becomes more and more difficult to have and to keep a job while social securities, pensions and insurances are also under pressure due to mismanagement of funds. While our individual financial securities show a decreasing line the cost of our traditional life style is rocketing sky high with the end not yet in sight. More and more people are seriously looking at their quality of life all together and feel forced to start considering important modifications. The untouchable luxury of the car is slowly becoming touchable.
- that using a vehicle with a weight of more than 1000 kg to transport a human body of 80 kg is a serious waste of energy in times that this becoming very scarce and expensive.
- that the booming growth of vehicles in use in the world, from 150 million 40 years ago to 130 billion now, is bound to reach limits in every aspect of its existence if not modified along the way. As the car today in essence is the same as a car 100 years ago we see all kinds of difficulties appearing in usage of resources, space, etc.
- for many decades the car has been a significant part of any nation’s economy through huge taxation on ownership and usage, as well as all the labor it produced in the manufacturing processes, services and expansion of infrastructures. This has caused these same governments to push for growth in the sector and become reluctant to stimulate innovations in this field.
- changing the entire automotive panaroma requires a lot of time and effort now and this has not very much to do just with the car itself or all surrounding factors but with our own human mentality and culture around the ownership and availability of a vehicle. People are still willing to eat less or with reduced quality to maintain their luxus of a car that is not used 80% of the time.
- no one abandons freely the car if this is not compensated with alternative ways for getting from A to B that are at least as easy and comfortable in use as the car. The investment to make alternatives available and the effects of such alternatives on our surroundings is tremendous. Right now many governments are reluctant to take one this transformation due to their economic dependence on the old complex mobility but soon they will have no choice. When that occurs a whole new perspective opens up for business and social innovation but not without a serious dip in economic stability of the region. Organic transformation to a new system in parallel with the reduction of the old system would have been the best choice but for that it seems too late. A compulsory transformation pushed by crises will be more likely to happen now. The sooner it occurs the better it will be for the individual and sustainable potential of the entire region.
The art of letting go
In my daily activities I find my self in a happy situation of meeting many people who all wish to contribute to a better world. What strikes me is that all are very much attached to particular elements of the old world that they try to change. This is not at all strange because this old world is still very dominantly present in our daily routines. One of the toughest issues that people need to learn to cope with is the art of letting go.
The very process starts with the development of personal awareness that things need to change and that this change comes about by taking personal responsibility. This insight has an origin that nearly always has to do with some kind of personal chaos that arises after some traumatic experiences. The reason that gave rise to this situation of chaos can be very diverse. I have seen people come in chaos after a marriage break up, the loss of a job, the death of a loved one, a burn-out situation, etc. etc. The emotional or financial sense of security that may have been present before the chaos has disappeared getting people to find themselves without any stable foothold to stand on.
The pain of insecurity, lack of balance and personal chaos illuminates the mind and sole to find new opportunities, a sense of purpose and renewed drive to progress. In this process one confronts experiences of the past with idealism how things should be. If in the past moral complexities were not taken in consideration these now come intensified into the picture.
The process of letting go is as complex as the one to restructures one’s life an commitment to fullfilment. Memories are still very vivid around those elements that provided securities in the past and which one is temped to revive when one searches new securities. The past is gone for ever and living back what once was is only creating a mental dependence that blocks the potential of the future to present itself in its widest diversity.
Another issue that requires letting go is the pain that is felt in the past when things happened that caused suffering. One is tempted to avoid or condition new actions in fear for pain to happen again. People tend to enter new relationships as if they were the cause of ancient wounds instead of giving them the change to develop. Letting go is fundamental to give the past a position were it belongs and offer the future the opportunity to start from scratch. The future cannot be blamed for the past and the past may not block personal organization after enlightenment. Letting go is a way of getting peace with whatever happened and addressing the future with strength and self confidence.
The last thing that condition people in their evolution to true wealth is the mental attachment to material possessions. When a person gets into a situation of personal chaos this often goes together with the loss of material means. Even when insight and enlightenment comes one still tends to refer to all those things that one once had. When communicating in such way it is tempting for the listener to judge the person for what he or she has lost. It is a serious issue to let go also of possessions that have been lost. They cannot be recovered by longing to them and they lack importance. The real importance resides in the process of enlightenment that one undergoes and that feeds the sole to a richer personal identity. They relativety of possessions becomes clear only when one lets go an concentrates on what one is, not on what one has or used to have.
After the complex process of letting go securities, pains and possessions of the past one feels the exiting freedom of limitless existence. This is important to grow in a new role without the limitation of mental, physical, emotional or spiritual dependence. When one has let go one does not expect anything from anyone anymore, does not wait for anyone anymore and only relies on one’s personal existence, self esteem and confidence. One encounters then true leadership over personal existence that provides the strong sense of human equality that is needed for powerful human interaction in a sustainable way.
The art of letting go is the same as giving yourself room and freedom to expand on all levels of human complexity and organize yourself without expectations, limitations or influences from outside. Letting go you get hold of …yourself.
