LOW MAINTENANCE LIFESTYLES
ii.
iii.
iv.
v.
We are realising that we are not immune to these realities, that we were fed an illusion of security in order to make us buy. This dream-state is rapidly turning into a nightmare. Now it is starting to become very real to us that, just like the ancients, we too must survive the future.
This is the broad background to the long history of low maintenance lifestyles.
In the modern world there are several possibilities available to us that were unavailable to the ancients:
Use the collective energy as focused through government to provide the basic essentials for your daily survival.
Seek to maximise Being as opposed to Doing and Having.
Organise the communal use of tools to maximise utility and to minimise waste.
The essence of a Low Maintenance Lifestyle is: Buy Less Goods
The cycle we are on now is that we must buy ever increasing numbers of goods to keep everyone employed so that they are able to buy ever increasing numbers of goods and so on ad infinitum.
The final product is of course everyone owning everything on a concrete planet and feeling totally miserable.
Madness! Yet that is the future we are facing. The politicians call endlessly for "More growth. More growth." But we can already see and feel what is growing all aound us. We already feel sick of this modern world with its stress, greed, criminality and selfishness. Do we want another 5,000 million years of that?
The marketing men want to fill you with the obsession to have. They want you to be filled with longing for their products. They want you to be endessly dissatisfied with what you already have. They want you to be in a state of constant longing for satiation and to never achieve it.
Keep in mind:
Most of the true happiness you ever find has little to do with possession.
Most true happiness is gained by useful co-operation with others.
Points ii, iii & iv would begin to weaken the hypnosis of the mass marketers:
iii.
iv.
v.
A planetary community
Element ii. is easiest to achieve - but it would need to be constant and deeply integrated into every area of government policy - from education to conditions of work.
Elements iii., iv. & v. are the essence of how the future can be survived.
The largest change involves a move to a "citizenīs entitlement grant".
I believe every citizen deserves the basic wherewithall to live a decent life. The only agency available to control such a task is government. We all know that the resources are now available on this planet to do it. At the moment almost all the resources are devoted to wrecking the place!
In outline, my idea is that when an individual is born an interest bearing account is set up automatically. The amount would be sufficient to cover the basic essentials of life such as: food, medical treatment, decent, warm and weather-proof housing, education and enough left over to build a decent life.
How would such a costly exercise be funded?
That is where point iv. comes in - resource release. In a long transfer process (changing horses, very tricky!) once citizens have the resources to live automatically supplied, then government can start to close all its offices dealing with unemployment benefit, health and social security and many many other departments.
Jobs have almost always been pretty soul destoying - we need to change our whole focus from having and doing (producing and having) to being. So, the grant would mean you didnīt have to work. If you wanted to work you would still receive the grant - this leaves the incentive to those still addicted to having in the future. (The rest of us would perhaps look on from our loungers and smile pityingly as they continued their mad dash to oblivion!)
The theory doesnīt even sound easy in outline does it?! But this is only a very rough outline. It wouldnīt be at all easy and there would be lots of problems like : What about the people who donīt use the money for the necessities but spend it all on booze or drugs? Thatīs one of the toughest ones - itīs possible to visualise a perfect system but usually the people within it have to be perfect too!
But something needs to change. At the moment we are on the road to hell (link to Chris Rea here! :-)
v. A planetary community. This is a vision for a better future planet-wide. Winning a decent life for all people. Resource planning & redirecting ( not the communist way) The whole world focussed on being and playfully communicating - sharing ideas, songs, dance, stories, experiences - a harmony of being. Pie in the Sky. Yes, but "old" ideas such as compassion, love and mutual respect are about all that can save us now.... Connection, communication and cooperation.
We are all here together. On this beautiful island world.
Maybe we should begin to Be that way.
Maybe we should start to work together for a future with less work, less money, less stuff - but more LIFE...
;-)
(: "Minimum is Maximum - Reduce to the Max!
" :)
`To Have or to Be?ī by Erich Fromm (ISBN 0-553-23100-6)
`Nature, Man and Womanī by Alan W. Watts (ISBN 0-679-73233-0)
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