Focus on Life™

How can you set-up a society like ours in case you want to repeat the current model from scratch? The instructions are very simple but do not expect people free willingly to align with your system.

Give people an illusion of control but take away their power. Centralise decision-making power away from local level where it would be most useful, effective, and also transparent. The further away and more consolidated the power the easier it is to make decisions that impact and possibly harm a large amount of people, and at the same time make people feel powerless and not capable of being in control and in charge of their own matters.

Release people from their own responsibility and tell them what they can and cannot do. This can be practiced by the powers and centralisation put in place. Most of the people are just relieved if the can obey rules and have a false sense of security where someone else is thinking and protecting their lives—in essence from themselves and their choices.

Control key resources. One of the most effective ways of control is to secure a permanent and exclusive privilege to be in charge of the means for indirect exchange. This instrument allows to manipulate, allocate, and define the direction of the society. One of the benefits of the monopoly is the right to create claims for resources without contributing anything back to the society. Using as a means of exchange something intangible or practically worthless in other usage enables to fabricate money out of thin air. This is very useful way to reallocate wealth in society.

Remove individuals’ means to protect themselves. Practical way to make people passive is to offer them physical protection and in return they are not allowed to use any other means to protect and seek justice. By monopolising justice it is possible to use the system’s resources against the very people it is supposed to protect. There is no objectivity and equality anymore when the asymmetry has been put in place: a private party against the system that is in practise defining its own rules and using coercion as a final means to execute it.

Make people dependent on your system. Create programs and schemes that distribute resources among the members of the public so that the system is acting as a middleman. Offering goods and services for ‘free’ or based on some arbitrary criteria remove the individual’s incentives to excel and support oneself. Direct employment by the system is the most natural way to tie people and resources as an integral part of the system. The more extensive the distribution of wealth the larger the impact and more integrated the system becomes to the society. One of the most effective ways to create dependence is taxation and other schemes that confiscate the financial resources from individuals. In some cases it is enough to keep intact the ‘ownership’ (or the claim for the resources) but centralise the control of the assets, for example by forced savings to dedicated funds.

Create a closed system that keeps people busy and turns them against each other. Imposed fear and lack are ways to produce an atmosphere of rivalry and controversy. Artificial lack can be fabricated by using a monetary system that has an inherit fault in it: there is never enough money to settle all accounts. This forces people to fight for resources and to protect their existing wealth by producing more economic activity out of scarce and limited resources. In short, perpetual growth is needed to keep the system going. By (re)distribution of resources via the system as stated above emphasises the fear once people are made dependent and passive for the ‘benefits’ given to them. They will turn against each other in order to protect their personal sources of dependency.

Remove personal responsibility and liability. In order to make the system work seamlessly it is beneficial to introduce a double-standard moral code where the system is not accountable for its actions in the same manner as individuals are, would they conduct the same deed. This enables central decision-making by selected members of the society without them being personally liable of the consequences of their actions. The system itself starts to live outside of its own rules and principals but is still run by the members of the society. People can only blame themselves—they have carried out all the actions.

Keep away from the limelight. At the end of the day it is not necessary to be a public figure and still influence the system. There are always people available that are willing to do the dirty work, and they can be replaced. Special privileges can be bought and the system manipulated when you have the financial resources for it. Some members of the society have a greater incentive to seek benefits for themselves and for their own advancement than to protect and cooperate with their fellow citizens. They are more than happy to make the decisions that harm the environment, people, pollute the planet, and destroy the future of the society. And in most of the cases they are not even aware of the consequences and do their acts in good faith or out of ignorance. The urge to tell others what they are supposed to do and save people from themselves appeals to many. And after all—who’s there to blame in a system like this?

“Politics is not about public interest but someone’s special (economic) interest.”

“Life is about giving, and the rest is taken care of.”

“Nothing has any meaning except the one we give to it— everything simply is.”

“Humbleness is all it takes.”

“The impossible happens when the possible is ignored.”

“If you don’t know what to do, meditate.”

“The (future) wealth is in the people, the past is in the tangible assets.”

“Skills, knowledge, and experience build the future.”

“Life is simple—thinking is complicated.”

“Only two things: the ones you think are important, and those that are.”

“Happiness is a continuous flow of life.”

“Nothing to say, everything to realise.”

“You are what you think, say, and do.”

“Your senses know nothing, they merely register movement.”

“Only when you have done enough, you can be.”

“Complexity is easy, simplicity requires mastery.”

“Society is persons.”

“Separate money from politics and you find very little interest on public matters.”

“Poverty is a relative term. Don’t expect it to disappear from the lexicon any time soon. One can be poor or rich—it’s just a matter of definition.”

“Enjoy the moment. That’s all there is.”

“Our legal tender is based on a threat of violence, and nothing else.”

We like to have our freedom. It is great and fun to explore and extend our boundaries. We love to take the credit for our actions, but only selectively. Positive consequences are naturally ours to claim but what about the not so desired effects?

Freedom and responsibility go hand-in-hand—the greater the freedom the greater the responsibility as well. Our current society does not encourage personal freedom. In practice we are sanctioned, monitored, and restrained in almost all aspects of life. We have learned to behave obediently and not to question the behaviour patterns or norms of the society. Like Goethe once said: “None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.”

We have created an artificial layer that is expected to protect individuals from harms and consequences of their personal actions. This has created a culture where people have become accustomed (or learned) to be passive and not to take action themselves. We expect someone else to tell us what to do or help us out of our own problems. This has come so far that we even regard we have the right and the others’ the moral obligation to unilaterally support us. We have isolated ourselves from the effects of our actions.

Our personal initiatives and responsibility are very limited, but so is our freedom as well. We have given up our rights in order to gain something for nothing. We prefer to have it easy and let others to bear the consequences for us. Unfortunately this is a zero-sum game in an aggregate level and as a result everybody is worse off. There are no free lunches—there is always someone paying the bill.

Isolating individuals from their actions’ consequences is a double-edged sword. It creates an illusion of safety and protection but at the same time it removes the control from the very person. And this creates uncertainty, fear, and self-esteem issues among others. Simply we do not feel anymore that the life is in our own hands: we are on top of the issues and have the solutions available for us. Confidence and security build from experience and the knowledge that we have the tools and the means to cope with our circumstances.

It requires practice and experience to become good at something. This means that we have learned something by experimenting and sometimes even making wrong choices that have guided us to do something differently in the future. In other words we have the motivation to keep going and get better. All this requires responsibility. Responsibility is the feedback mechanism that shows us how we are performing and the results of our pursuits. Mastery is only possible for those who are aware of their actions and their consequences.

Look around you—how much responsibility are we taking for our actions?

This is a very compact but complete system of ethics. It is very simple, brief, and yet powerful based on the following:

The Guiding Principal

All (human) beings are born equal and remain equal every day of their lives.

The below Principals are only sub-principals for the first one

2) Person is the measure of all accounts.

3) Everyone is free to pursue their own happiness and the results of their pursuit and obliged to respect everyone else’s equal freedom without limiting anyone else’s freedom.

Freedom

Freedom is the most powerful concept there is. Unfortunately it has not been properly understood and applied to this day.

Everything starts with a personal freedom and also ends to it. This is clearly stated in the first Guiding Principal: ”All (human) beings are born equal and remain equal every day of their lives.”

When we are born we are all purely naked and have nothing except our being (existence). All the rest is either learned, assumed, assimilated, or gained by some means (voluntary or involuntary). And this latter process can happen only together with other people.

It is not possible to alienate a person from his/her freedom. There are only ways to suppress or give up degrees of personal freedom voluntarily either consciously or by ignorance.

The level of power other people can have for a person is in direct proportion to the level the person has surrendered his/her freedom in any given moment. Like suppression the voluntary surrender needs to be exercised continuously over time. In the first case the person can once again exercise freely his/her freedom when the suppression stops and in the latter case one can do it immediately upon personal decision or when becoming aware of it.

Responsibility

Responsibility is the other side of the coin with freedom. All the actions (including non-actions) and their consequences are born by the person carrying them out. The object(s) of the actions are not relevant in respect to the responsibility.

Full responsibility (and full freedom) means that the person does not even have to be aware of all the implications of his/her actions. Ignorance is merely poor perception and lack of understanding from the actor’s perspective (e.g. bad choice).

The Second Principal states that all the responsibilities can be originated to persons. Like freedom the responsibility cannot be alienated from a person. The person can make voluntary agreements but these agreements cannot remove the final responsibility.

The Third Principal underlines a person’s responsibility first of all towards his/herself but more importantly towards everything else.

Cooperation

Interaction between people can happen either voluntarily or involuntarily. Forms of suppression and acts of violence or threats of actions of violence are not discussed here at all. Humanity has enough evidence of its use already available.

Voluntary cooperation is based on the free will of people to interact with each other. This can happen between two or more people for any period of time. The cooperation is based on trust, and the level of trust defines the ways of cooperation and the means to accomplish the desired actions. A low level of trust between individuals focuses a great amount of effort to secure the parties in the cooperation and thus making the interaction less efficient. This consumes time, effort and energy with increasing complexity the longer the time span of the intended cooperation extends to the future.

High level of trust makes the interaction more organised, forward-orientated, and allows more complex relationship and cooperation forms to emerge. High level of specialisation can only happen when people are trustful among each other and can focus on their specific areas of interest and needs. A highly sophisticated society is dependent on trust among its members.

Agreements

Voluntary cooperation is based on trust, which can be reflected either in tacit or tangible forms of agreements. Agreements can incorporate two or more parties for any period of time. Agreements are ways to stipulate the desired actions (and non-actions) among the voluntary parties of the agreements and also a way to record the stated matters.

Agreements are only the means for carrying out the will of the people incorporated for the action. Therefore the agreements are expressions of freedom between the participants, and full responsibilities of the actions (and non-actions) lay among the parties of the agreements as indicated in the third Guiding Principal.

Society Is Persons

The second Guiding Principal states that “Person is the measure of all accounts.” No person, structure or concept can be above any person living. Human based actions and their consequences are always borne by the persons involved, and these responsibilities cannot be alienated. The Guiding Principals clearly describe the nature of voluntary action of any individual in respect to every other being.

A society or any collective entity or cooperation between persons is always only a mutual expression of each and every individual incorporated for the action(s). No collective or structure can be compared to a living person. They can only act on behalf of the people incorporated with the entity, and thus representing expressions of these people.

Self-Defence

Freedom consists of two things: positive and negative freedom. The positive stipulates that the person can engage to something, and the negative that the person can restrain of engaging to something.

The latter case states that the person cannot be involved in something against his/her permission and thus restrain the person’s freedom (under the third Guiding Principal). Shall this be the case the person needs to have a right to protect his/her freedom in order to be capable of exercising his/her expressions freely.

The self-defence does not remove the responsibility of the actions (and non-actions) carried out. Therefore any action in excess of protecting one’s freedom is a direct breach of the (third) Guiding Principal(s).

This site focuses on life. You will find inspirational, thoughtful, mind-provoking, insightful and sometimes artful writings, ideas, visions, and practical knowledge covering various aspects of life based on freedom and pursuit of happiness.

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We focus on growth—it’s everything. Our current economy is based on the ever-expanding growth paradigm. It does not work without it. Our monetary base grows every year. Valuations need to grow, as well as profits and revenues. The society is driven by this growth mania.

And how do we do this? By producing and consuming more, or should I say evermore, ever-expanding. And by consuming more we feed more needs to expand the business and acquire new resources to fulfil the needs of the growth. And so the cycle goes on and on—but not forever. Sole expansion is not natural, it pairs with contraction, in nature that is.

Seldom we start to question the basis of the assumptions and thinking underneath. What is the purpose of the growth and why is it needed? Some would say that it is because of money. And in many ways they are right. The fiat money system is built upon a hypothesis of ever-expanding promises of debt that are not paid back but rolled over. It requires more units of money to survive. As a result of this there are only raising prices and continuous inflation (expansion). For example US dollar has lost over 95% of its value since 1913 when the Federal Reserve was established. Does this create wealth for all the citizens using the legal tender?

But coming back to the question why the growth and what’s the purpose of it. More money does not answer the question; it only explains the way the current system is working. Actually money has nothing do with the real issue—it’s only a poor middleman that is often misunderstood to be the purpose when it can only be the means for something else. Money is used to obtain goods, services, or intangible needs such as security. We would not consume more simply because our monetary system requires so. There is something else underneath that feeds the requirements and keeps the wheels turning. And once again we are getting back to each and every one of us, individually. No company consume, buy, sell, manufacture, or invest—only people do. Structures are mere tools and vehicles for our purposes, ignore them long enough and they disappear. There is no one to blame but us. It’s not the economy, stupid—it’s us, the people!

We have bought the idea and assume that more is better. More money means something better, more consumption provides with something more and so on. Having more is the key and this having is the cause of the ever-expansion in our needs. But if you never consider why you need to have more you will never approach the real issue, you simply will act to gain more of something—forever and ever more.

Wanting is easy. Also having more is relatively easy, even though it takes its toll. But being happy has nothing to do with wanting or having. Confucius once said: “they must often change who would be constant in happiness or wisdom.” It looks that buying happiness does not seem to work despite all the consumption and material well-being. Maybe it is time to reconsider our assumptions and beliefs that define our current growth paradigm, individually?

There are only net tax payers and net receivers in any given society where government coercion is practised. See why, explained by Murray Rothbard.

An interesting article about Jean-Baptiste Say by Amadeus Gabriel:

Thus, society could work without government management if people carried out their business and let other people carry out their business at the same time. Say underlines his position by giving some historical examples. Writing in 1819, he observes that at times during the previous thirty years, France had found itself in a situation in which all the authorities were suddenly halted. In these critical moments, no government was at all existent. And what does Say observe? During these periods, the essential functions of the social body could not have been carried out in a better way: everything worked, better than would have normally been the case. Say states that the worst occurred in times when people were too much governed.

A society is decaying when it is interested in only of the effects and not in the causes. What happens when the ‘needs’ are of most importance and the ways to satisfy them are despised? A moral decline.

Who does not have any needs? We all do. Newspapers are full of ‘needs’ to be fulfilled. They are very urgent and thus must be satisfied at any cost. But whose needs are more important than anyone else’s?  Why should others fulfil someone else’s needs? In short, what is the justification for the underlying assumption that everybody else except the person itself should be responsible for satisfying one’s own needs? This is to say that it is fine and noble to receive without one’s own effort and let the others even work for it. To close the circle the ones who are working for the ‘needs’ of others are morally despised by the others because they are making an effort and thus at least are getting something done. They are called selfish and greedy. It is socially acceptable to receive benefits in due cause solely because one needs them but it is low and almost criminal to mind one’s own business and stand firmly on one’s own two feet. Their needs are of no importance since they are capable of taking care of themselves. Thus it is OK to discriminate against the ones with capabilities and virtue—“they have it all” as it is often said. It is the ones who do not have are more important exactly because they lack something. And because they have deficiencies their ‘needs’ have to be fulfilled. In another words, ability and hard work are less valued than ignorance and vices. Not doing and trying are achievement themselves whereas making an effort and working for one’s success are self-evident and of no importance whatsoever—they are sacrificial.

It is socially acceptable to care for others’ well-being, often even in general terms without being able to define the others specifically (i.e. ‘public good’, welfare of the state, general good or welfare), and to do something that is non-profit and thus ‘not selfish’. This means that everyone minds everyone else’s business but no one is allowed to mind one’s own. A socially acceptable and morally just society is one where no one is selfish and thus not focusing at all for one’s own needs and well being. In addition, it is socially acceptable to receive if one has needs but if everyone is just to receive from where is it all then coming from? And how can the others know exactly what are the most important needs for everybody else? Or is it so that there is a more general standard which defines what others are supposed to need and in what proportions? Or is it just called the welfare state and democracy by majority rule?

The economy is based on the productivity of us, the people. If we are taken off the equitation, nothing gets done either. We live by our efforts and abilities. Everything in our society is based on the efforts of someone, and his or her capabilities. If you need bread you get it from someone who has produced it. Nothing is created out of thin air. We are dependent on each other, and our intellectual capabilities. Some are having more brainpower than others but nevertheless we all are in the same boat. All the work is needed; otherwise the system would not function. If there is no bread how to get the rest done?

There are only two basic ways to work: voluntarily or by force. The first is based on freedom and the second on fear and threat of violence. You can enslave people to work manually (i.e. mechanically) but it seldom works for tasks requiring innovation and creativity. Intellect cannot be forced—it is an act based on voluntary free choice. Therefore any society will first lose the efforts of its most capable and able, its prime motor—the future potential. This minority does not make much noise about itself. It acts like any individual who knows one’s worth and value. They merely walk away and find a place where they are appreciated or simply just stop creating altogether. Why bother and for what?