So much going on in the world. Some things feel good, other things heavy and saddening. It’s easy to get caught up in one or the other — to cave to the negative or revel only in the good. And then I’m reminded that we create our reality with our thoughts and emotions.
I’ve been working (slowly) on a post related to so many of the good things shaping our world. Things like the Degrowth Movement, which is amazing that anyone is even talking about it. Then Yvon Chouinard, the founder of Patagonia who gave away his $3 billion holding in Patagonia to protect the values of the company rather than cashing out. And the 18-year-old climate activist who got elected to his local school board. Or the Great Resignation that spread across the globe.
Things are changing, and not just in the sense of new social fads, but something deeper and more fundamental is taking place. In the past, there have been numerous purpose-oriented brands that cashed out. Ben & Jerry’s, Burt’s Bees, Honest Tea, Whole Foods, Zappos dot com and so on. The lure of tens of millions or even hundreds of millions is too much for most people to resist. So, they take the cash and go live the “good life.” They may redirect their efforts toward philanthropy or making art, but they still sold off to large corporate interests that value the bottom line more than anything else.
Chouinard showed us that it doesn’t have to be that way. The Great Resignation, and its foreign equivalents, are showing us that people want more than the story we’ve been given about chasing money first and foremost.
Disengaging from the story is incredibly challenging. I speak from experience as I was once one of those corporate cogs chasing the almighty dollar who had an epiphany and quit. That was eleven years ago and I’m still deprogramming my thinking. The story has been engrained in us from an early age, reinforced through most of the input we received growing up, continuing through college, and continuing further through the work cultures we find ourselves wrapped up in.
My late father was once a highly successful international businessman. He was a deal guy, an expert at structuring finance together with IP and market potential. And then he declined. A few years ago, Maria and I went to visit him in the assisted living home he was in at the time. Sitting under trees, enjoying a pleasant Los Angeles afternoon he said, “I’m going to get out of here soon.” At that point his memory was shot from years of Alzheimer’s and there would have been no point in explaining to him that he was no longer able to care for himself. So, I entertained him by asking, “Why do you want to get out of here?” He said, “To get back in business.” Then I asked him why, and he held up his hand and rubbed his thumb together with his first two fingers, the universal gesture for money.
Money was his whole life. He chased it relentlessly. He made a ton of it and lost more than most people will ever hope to see in their life. He lost all his moneyed friends at the first sign of decline. He died alone in a skilled nursing facility during COVID lockdown. There was no outpouring for his loss other than two friends and a few close family members. There was no remembrance, no waxing poetic of the life he led. Just a meaningless pursuit of money.
He, like most people, couldn’t break free from the story. Yvon Chouinard broke free, as those of the Quiet Quitting, Laying Flat, and Great Resignation movements are. The young ones, the Gen Zers, they’re not automatically buying into the story from the get-go. They want meaning versus money. They seek the freedom to enjoy life, not servitude to the pursuit of monetary gain.
And so, it’s a beautiful morning as I write these words. There will always be disturbing things taking place in the world. We’re still a couple more generations away from transcending war and enslavement. But we’re heading in the direction of a more beautiful world. The signs are there, the change is upon us.
And we can hasten the change and bring it about with less upheaval by changing our thoughts, by envisioning, by deprogramming our thinking from the narrative that we’ve been handed. We can be the change by holding a space of peace, love, compassion, and joy.
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I just stumbled upon this article after posting the above. Just another example of good things happening in the world. https://www.today.com/parents/jessica-wade-wikipedia-women-scientists-rcna51628
Beautiful Glenn, loved this piece of writing.