I see every activity as an act of giving or taking. This is how my internal and external environments reconcile.
Every person has an internal and external environment, so does every business, community and country.
We see transactions only in terms of money. But, right now, I am consuming electricity, using a laptop that was design, made, assembled, packed, shipping and serviced by an army that I do not see.
A bottle of water that we are quick to discard costed hundreds of people a small portion of their life.
The world is not going to let go of this debt. I have to pay it by contributing back to the world.
This is where hippies go wrong. They think they are not dependent on the world but that is not true. They just take way more than they give back.
Most of us do. That is why the world, which includes our family, our peers, our colleagues, our countrymen control so much of our lives.
We are dependent because we are taking more than giving.
You can go to a commune, an off-the-grid place, do whatever you want, but you cannot escape the fact that you owe this world.
It will be recovered in some way. Common way is to fill you with fear so that you keep working all your life (commonly known as a rat race). But it could also be in various other ways. Taxes are the most visible form. Your relationships asking for your time and love is one.
Anywhere you are using resources from outside, you have to pay for it. There is a reason why my phone and Facebook and YouTube are free. But, we all know, they aren’t.
We are not just selling our data, they are manipulating our minds by micro-dosing us with dopamine.
The only way is to become absolutely self-sufficient – mind and body. Or to give more than we consume. The money scorecard is just half the picture.