Money Pt. 1: Should we stop using money?

Money Pt. 1: Should we stop using money? Very few people ask themselves this question. Tue, 30 Jul 2024 18:46:21 GMT https://healthandfreedom.substack.com/p/money-pt-1-should-we-stop-using-money Very few people ask themselves this question.

“How do I remove money out of my life?”

Most people have the opposite thinking “how do I get more money in life?”

I don’t blame them.

We live in a money ridden society where it is difficult to navigate without.

But does it need to be this way?

Is this the best path forward?

These are questions I have pondered over the last six months after witnessing money cause so much harm to loved ones and society at large.

And the conclusion…

No, it does not need to be this way.

No, money is not the best path forward.

Hear me out…

Why money is not the best path forward In my opinion, a successful society is one that has peace, abundance, and harmony.

Money is more utilized than ever before.

So a fair question to ask to evaluate our money driven society is..

Does our money driven society have peace, abundance, and harmony today?

1. Peace There might be local physical peace within America, but there are serious wars (that America is part of) throughout the world. With industrialization and advancement in weapon technology (partially driven by money), these wars are at larger scale than ever before.

But regardless, to me, peace is less about the physical and more about the mental anyway.

I wrote a Substack earlier on Equanimity which is defined as “mental calmness, composure, and evenness of temper, especially in a difficult situation.”

It is essentially internal peace amidst external chaos.

And today, it is rare to know someone with equanimity.

Even if there is external peace, most of our population seems to have internal chaos.

We see this through the skyrocketing rates of depression, anxiety, and even suicide, especially in our youth.

And if most people lack internal peace than do we live in a society that is peaceful?

❌ Peace

1. Abundance This one is tricky to evaluate because abundance of what?

Abundance of violence is no good. Abundance of sickness is no good. Abundance of Cheerios is no good haha.

So to evaluate it is important to define based the things that matter.

Here are things that I believe most people would agree matter the most:

Love

Life (fertility)

Food

Health

Shelter

I am sure there are others but these are obvious.

Abundance of Love

Let’s start with love.

Is there an abundance of love in our society today?

To me it seems like there is more divide than ever.

To go deeper into the lack of abundance of love let’s further evaluate the forms of love:

Love from self - 20% of U.S. is depressed and another 20% has anxiety. In the 1960s, it is estimated to be below 5% but wasn’t measured because it wasn’t even a thing.

Love from partner - Today, 50% of marriages end in divorce. In the 1960s, only 8% ended in divorce.

Love from others - Today, 61% of adults from 18-25 report feeling chronic loneliness. In the 1960s, less than 20% reported any loneliness.

Beyond these examples of love, arguably the most important form is the love of God, but society has lost touch so badly with this that it would be considered controversial or “unscientific” to include.

Abundance of Life

Although we have more humans today than ever before, we are decaying at an alarming rate.

The way we measure this is through the replacement rate compared to the birth rate.

The replacement rate for birth, also known as the total fertility rate (TFR), is the average number of children a woman gives birth to over her lifetime that would be needed to sustain a population's long-term generational replacement. This rate is 2.1 children per woman , which is based on the assumption that all women survive to childbearing age and that two children born will replace their parents when they die.

In the 1960s the birth rate was 3.7 per women. Today it is 1.6 per women.

1.6 < 2.1

This means that we are dying faster than we are giving birth.

Abundance of Food

Our grocery stores are more filled than ever before.

So do we have an abundance of food?

Let’s dive deeper.

The vast majority of the items in a grocery store are not actually food. They are ultra-processed food that lacks nutrients.

So we might have lots of food but if the food lacks nutrients it is causing more confusion and harm than good.

More specifically it is estimated that even our real food like fruit have 40% less nutrients than it did before industrialized farming.

To go alongside that, industrialized farming also wiped out food sovereignty making people rely on external sources for food. Pre 1900s, 90% of people grew their own food. Today less than 2% do.

Abundance of Health

This poor food quality and lack of food sovereignty has also lead to a decline in health.

Some argue that because of our increase in life expectancy, industrialization and western medicine has improved health.

But this is misunderstood.

What western medicine has gotten good at is keeping sick people alive but not preventing people from getting sick.

This includes infants. There used to be more new born infant deaths which would radically reduce the life expectancy. The truth was that most people lived a healthy life well beyond their 80s.

Need to check this, but if we included abortions as deaths, our life expectancy would be significantly lower today than it was in the 1700s.

Today, most of those who live long enough have dozens of years of suffering before their death. And this suffering is rapidly creeping into the youth.

Here are a few of these alarming statistics:

60% of the US has a chronic disease. Less than 6% did in 1960s

70% of US is overweight. Obesity has tripled since the 1960s

16% of US has autoimmune disease. Less than 3% did in 1960s

Abundance of shelter

We have more homes than ever before. But are they affordable? Do the people own them?

Home ownership for young adults is rapidly decreasing due to burdens of student loans and increasing home prices relative to inflation.

Beyond this, the homes people do live in are architectural failures compared to the ones in the past. If you are lucky to live in a home versus an apartment, they are often made from toxic and ugly plastic materials versus natural and beautiful materials like wood and stone.

❌ Abundance

1. Harmony Let’s define harmony.

Harmony : agreement of ideas, feelings, or actions, or a pleasing combination of different parts

Today there seems to be more political divide than ever before. Radical poles have taken over the conversation.

Sometimes it feels as if we are on the brink of a Civil War. Maybe we are in one but the wars are more digital and internal than physical and external?

The lack of harmony transcend beyond society. People have lost harmony with self and nature. Like the fall of Rome, people now question the most obvious things like their gender, a clear sign of disharmony and confusion within.

Like the story of Cain, industrialization has separated the human from nature to the point where people look at me with 6 eyes when they see me walking barefoot. Most people live in a concrete jungle and have never spelled true fresh air.

❌ Harmony

Summary

No, todays money system does not seem to be leading to peace, abundance, and harmony within society.

So maybe we should question it?

Maybe we should think of an alternative?

Maybe we should shift our priority from money to something else?

Contrary to this more pessimistic outlook on society, I am actually extremely optimistic about the future.

The next generations are rising up rebelling against the downfalls of the past.

I believe radical positive change will occur through my lifetime and beyond.

Money Pt. 2: An alternative path forward In part 2, I will present an alternative path forward.

Until then, I will leave you with a few questions:

What if we prioritized natural beauty over money?

What changes would you have to make if society did not use money?

How would you live if money was not a thing?

With Truth & Love,

Shaughnessy