How to Catalyze a Paradigm Shift to a Collaborative World

The world currently produces enough food to feed 11 billion people, we are only 7.4 billion on the planet so why do 3 million children die from hunger every year? What can we do to end this nonsense?

Spread the news!

The paradigm we live in today is mostly defined by the beliefs that we hold. That means that in order to change the paradigm we live in we must spread certain concepts. Informing others about certain key facts, and then demonstrating them to be true by acting accordingly, is precisely how we will change people's behavior and therefore the world we live in.

There is no need for people to comprehend these concepts immediately, it often takes time and multiple exposures to information before we can assimilate it properly. Entering in a debate almost always creates conflict and paralyzes communication. Exposing people to the ideas lightly and enjoyably and then moving on truly does have a deep lasting effect although it may not be visible at first. After the seed of an idea sprouts and starts to grow in our mind, the balance of the scale starts to shift and suddenly tides turn. What we are inclined to do is now different.

People love to talk about 'human nature' as if humans have always behaved the same and always will. Completely ignoring the existence of culture and how it effects people is a great cop-out. We can consider mankind a stupid animal, incapable of taking conscious intelligent decisions required for the survival of its species, but why would we want to do that other than to justify apathy and domination? If you wish to join the fun and exciting game of thinking mankind can turn this world in to a second garden of Eden, here is a list of facts that will lead people to greatness. Have fun sharing them with everyone!

1. Now everybody can live a life of prosperity.

The truth to the matter is that most people still believe that there are too many of us on the planet for us all to live luxuriously. The malthusian myth, that there must be poor people for there to be rich people, has lived on strong in our minds. It's very practical in a sense for it excuses the existence of poverty, relieving us from any responsibility to do anything about it. Of course we are lazy in actually looking in to the fact that Malthus's theory was proven wrong many years ago. That would end our 'blissful ignorance' and we might feel morally obliged to care for those who have it worse off. Either way, throughout history, the rich (monetary or spiritual) have never been able to ignore the poor forever, so we might as well roll our sleeves up and care for them sooner than later. Together we can help ourselves out of poverty. The sooner we do, the sooner we can relax.

We have nothing to lose, nothing to be afraid of because in fact, thanks to modern automation, we can now produce an access abundance for EVERYBODY. Nobody has to be worse off for others to be better off. Sharing doesn't mean we will have less ourselves. Quite on the contrary, hoarding is precisely what makes things scarce. Whether or not Malthus's theory could have made sense in the past, mankind is very ingenious and we are constantly making advances in our abilities to manipulate the world around us. Throughout history, population pressure has always been one of the forces that has most driven human ingenuity. Now invention has advanced so much that once we apply the best technology to the benefit of all, every single human being will live more luxuriously than the super rich do today.

The sooner we realize that thanks to automation, we can all be rich, the sooner we will all be rich, the sooner we will live even more fulfilling and enjoyable lives. If everyday we inform one person that now EVERYBODY can live a live of prosperity, everyone will soon know the good news and no one will be able to excuse the callousness that allows people to starve when there actually is plenty of food.

1. Every single one of us changes the world.

We often wish to have more influence on the way things are. We actually do, all we have to do is speak. Theory and studies point to the probability that everybody on the planet can be connected by a sequence of six contacts. Word to mouth reaches everybody. The math clearly allows this to be possible. Say we each know a hundred people, a hundred to the power of six amounts to one trillion people.

Say that we tell ten people that now everybody can live a life of luxury, and asked them to pass on the message to ten more people as well, etc. In only ten steps, the message will reach ten billion people, more than the population of the earth.

If everyone who receives the chain message hasn't received it already, and everyone passes it on to ten more, in just a week the whole world could know that now we all can live like kings. Of course in practice there are errors to count in. Some people will already have heard the news and others won't tell anybody at all. On the other hand, it's just as easy to tell twenty people such a short sentence, that now everybody can live a life of luxury, instead of ten. If we decide to step up and put a minuscule amount of effort into the task of spreading the news, it might take more than a week, or more than a month, but sooner than later, everyone will know that now we can all be rich.

1. Who could sell an orange if all the streets had orange trees?

“Money is the root of all evil”. For centuries money has been what assigned who got what and what projects people worked on. Sure, centralized currency, fractional reserve banking and quantitative easing have facilitated global exchange. Does that mean we can't move on to a better method? Fiat currency doesn't represent any thing real at all. It doesn't represent any natural resource. It doesn't represent true costs, neither ecological, societal or of human effort. With our capacity to analyze, be aware of and observe the earth, it's resources and our needs, surely we can distribute goods in a more straight forward, relevant and intelligent manner.

The supply and demand curves that establish prices, lead to a dangerous situation in which the more scarce something is, the more profit its supplier will get. That means it is in economic interest for there to be shortages of supply for basic needs such as food, water and air. Let that sink in. The less available food and water are for the population, the more money will be made from their sale.

Consider that again in other words: Adam Smith's invisible hand of the market thrives best in a mad max world. The worse off the people are, the more money the banks will make. The less common good there is, more powerful are those who have goods. In a certain sense, it's not that there have to be poor for there to be rich, but the more poor people there are, the more servants the money rich have.

Instead of basing our economy on money, we can transcend to a Resource Based Economy, in which we share. We simply give food to the hungry and give medicine to the sick. It's as simple as that. Let's forget making profit and focus on facilitating access to what people need, such as roofs, education, contraception, healthcare, transportation, etc. Some people imagine this is complicated but it isn't at all. It's actually a lot simpler than what we do now.

We won't need to agree collectively for most decisions. We don't need an all powerful government such as socialism wants. Remember, now a days there is plenty for all. We just give food to the hungry, house to the homeless, healthcare to the sick, and that is that. Of course who ever has the goods can choose who to give them too, as long as people don't hoard much it doesn't matter. We can establish our own ways to choose who gets access to our medical attention, our mathematics abilities, our handy skills, or who's garden we help tend. We will at last be free to choose where and how we give our time and goods once we let go of monetary nonsense. Accounting (of our contribution) is boring and laborious anyway, it never really felt right all along.

1. Collaboration is as important for evolution as is competition.

The phrase “survival of the fittest” is often used as an excuse for being a shortsighted ass, as if 'fit' meant 'brute'. People pretend that Darwin demonstrated that it's a dog eat dog world, although he never did such a thing. A conflictive mentality of duality makes us think “us vs them”, and that we must be uncaring competitive sharks fighting dirty in a never ending game of bloody king of the hill. Thankfully it's all in our head. Being altruistic, caring for others, is often a great investment in one's own well being. Collaboration implies a win-win situation. That is exactly why we are social animals. Company, love and care are basic needs for us humans. We don't even survive infancy if all we are given is food and water. Lack of connection as adults is an underlying cause of many illnesses, particularly depression and addiction.

For example, Lynn Margulis demonstrated that mitochondria are a completely separate organism living within our cells, without which our cells wouldn't be able to breathe. Our basic biology is founded on symbiosis. Our body is a giant colony of trillions of cells that reproduce individually, working together, sharing everything. For our body to funcion properly, it depends on many different colonies of microorganisms that live within it. Why forget that and think that we can't take care of the less competent (different) for fear that it will harm our evolution? What kind of ignorance does such an attitude represent if it's not just another cop-out?

1. Where we at first see conflict, there is also complementation.

Sadly, the dualistic mentality of conflict pervades every aspect of our lives. We have been “divided and conquered” in every single aspect. Although we are all human and therefore all have more in common than differences, we have been constantly butting heads, always stressed by stubbornly “fighting the forces of evil”. Whether it's left against right, pro-choice against pro-life, reason against ignorance, tolerance against bigotry or capitalism against communism. Instead of acting out such a simplistic vision of the world as a battle of good against evil, we can expand our mind and realize that we are all living beings on this planet together and if we focus on finding common goals to work on, we can advance together.

Such as the universe is fractal, even with in ourselves we are constantly battling an imaginary evil version of ourselves, “the animal impulse to be repressed”. It's if we were infected by a dangerous enemy that could turn us in to everything we don't want to be, lazy, greedy, selfish and stupid. Instead we can raise our consciousness, comprehend our complexity and see that the drive to be lazy is also what pushed us to invent the wheel, that our greed is just ambition that has lost perspective, that our selfishness is what makes us take care of ourselves, and our stupidity is just an echo of ignorance that has been replaced with wisdom.

We can overcome a dualistic vision of conflict by accepting that, although it may be difficult at times to see how, opposites always complement each other in some way. We learn to see how by stubbornly looking for how they complement each other. We learn to practice appreciative inquiry instead of fault correction. This exercise completely transforms our life.

1. Doing is believing.

It's real easy to intellectualize and pretend to be real smart, as if we had all the answers, but it's not very fulfilling. We talk the talk and then walk the walk. We put excitement in our lives by acting on what we feel, on what we think, towards what we want. It is especially exciting when it leads us to new situations and behaviors. It's part of being alive to show anger at injustice, although we don't act in anger, and to cry when we are sad, although we don't act out of despair. If we really want to change the world, don't we have to act differently than we have until now? Isn't insanity doing the same things and expecting different results? Still, it's best not change everything at once, little steps are easier to adjust to.

No one is to be ashamed of being wrong or not being ready to make a fool of themselves to save the lives of strangers. Remember, that is what this is about, tens of thousands of children are dying of hunger every day although we have plenty of food for everyone. While considering such tragedy and insanity, it's logical to act out somewhat, but in order to be part of the solution, we must remember what is happening and also enjoy our lives. The tragic, terrifying world we live in was created by acting out of fear, anger and despair. We can only create a more beautiful world by acting out of beautiful emotions such as joy, confidence and love.

To be convincing we teach by example. We interiorize the reality of abundance by demonstrating it, by giving freely. As we stop hoarding, we truly find there to be plenty for all of us. We speak what we think, we think what we feel, we feel what we do and we do what we want. We experience the transformation. As within, so without.