I
was sitting outside one evening last week with an impromptu gathering
of neighbours. We had all started out going for a walk around the
block, but ended up congregating at one neighbour's house (he was
getting opinions on a new wine he was importing, so it didn't take a
lot of arm-twisting). When we started talking about jobs, half of the
group lamented that, because they worked for assholes at dysfunctional
(mostly foreign-owned and neglected) companies, they longed to start
their own companies. The other half, who are entrepreneurs who do own
their own companies, lamented the high stress, long hours and sometimes
unreasonable customers of their companies, and fondly recalled when
they could go home at 5:30pm and leave all their cares at the office
until the next day. The grass, as they say, is always greener on the
other side.
It occurred to me that this tension between living
in thrall to corporatists, and living with the great responsibilities
and uncertainties of entrepreneurship, extends to all the critical
decisions we make in life between a 'traditional' conformist lifestyle,
addicted to consumption and debt, and one of Living On the Edge.
Here's
how this tension plays out, a struggle between gravitational force
luring us inwards and centrifugal force hurling us outwards. Those in
the middle band in the graphic above feel those forces most equally,
and it is for them that this tension is strongest:
| When Deciding: | What Attracts Us to the Centre | What Attracts Us to the Edge | | How to make a living | Working for Corporatists:
- the carrot of being very well paid if you reach the executive level
- it's easier than entrepreneurship (E)
- it's less stressful than entrepreneurship
| Creating your own Natural Enterprise:
- meaningful, joyful work (F)
- no asshole bosses
| | What to buy | Buying Chinese 'free' trade crap at Wal-Mart:
- it's cheaper, at least in the short-run
- it's easier (E)
- shopping for non-essentials is fun (F) (?)
| Buying local, organic, quality, fairly-priced products:
- it's socially and environmentally more responsible
- it's better value-for-money in the long run
| | How to be healthy | Relying completely on doctors & synthetic drug-makers:
- you get fast results
- it's easier, requiring little time or energy investment (E)
- it's cheaper, if you're insured
| Self-directed, largely self-diagnosed and self-treated, prevention-focused, natural holistic health care:
- you're sick less often (F)
- you're more self-sufficient
- you get better diagnosis & treatment
- if you're not insured, it's your only option
| | How to be educated | Relying on the public or private education system:
- it's cheaper (public system) (C)
- it's easier (E)
- corporatist employment demands it
| Self-educating / home-schooling:
- you learn more critical life skills
- it's a better learning environment
- you're more self-sufficient (F)
- it's more fun
| | What community to live in | Living in a suburban subdivision on the grid:
- it's easier (E)
- it's less commitment
- it offers more privacy
| Living in an intentional community powered by renewable energy:
- it's less expensive (shared costs) (C)
- it's healthier (more socialization, more love) (F)
- it offers more community support
- it's less vulnerable to the End of Oil
- it's socially & environmentally more responsible
| | How to get around | Driving a gas-guzzler everywhere:
- it's easier (E)
- it's faster (?)
- it's more fun (F) (?)
- it's necessary if you live in the suburbs
| Walking, cycling, using alternative-fuel vehicles:
- it's less expensive (C)
- it's healthier
- it's less vulnerable to the End of Oil
- it's socially & environmentally more responsible
|
I
think most of us, like my neighbours, will have to admit that the
choices are not cut and dried. But neither is it a choice between
comfort (in the centre) and discomfort (at the Edge) -- the decision is
more complex than that, and many of us come down close to the tipping
point between going one way and the other. And some of the factors
(marked with question marks on the chart) are dubious: Shopping for
non-essentials is only 'fun', and an essential part of your social
life, if you lack the imagination to find healthier fun and (arguably)
live a pretty socially impoverished life. Driving a gas-guzzler is only
faster if your home, work, shopping and recreation are long distances
apart -- and there are ways to bring them together. And driving a
gas-guzzler is no fun in traffic jams and grinding daily commutes.
I've
said before that, in making important life decisions, we do what we
must, then we do what's easy, and then we do what's fun. In the chart
above, I've marked the easier choice with an (E), the more fun choice
with an (F), and the cheaper choice with a (C). (In the decisions on
What to buy and How to be healthy, the cheaper choice depends on your
circumstances and perspective, so neither is marked (C)).
Not
surprisingly, the easier choices (E) are all at the centre, while most
of the fun choices (F) are at the Edge. So as long as we do what's easy
before we do what's fun, we're going to be prone to make traditional
choices (how to make a living, how to be healthy, how to be educated,
and what community to live in). Why do we make such choices? I would
argue that we're too busy and too tired to do otherwise -- if we have
no time and no energy, we're going to choose what's easy over what's
fun. And that's exactly what the corporatists are counting on. I would
bet that the proportion of people living at the Edge is inversely
proportional to the length and stress of the average work-week
(including commuting). As more and more of us learn to value our time
more highly, and seize back more of it for ourselves (even if that
requires lowering our material wealth and consumption), we will start
to choose what's fun over what's easy, and slide over to the Edge.
The
decisions what to buy and how to get around are more complex, and
they're the two that will prevent a lot of us from moving to the Edge.
We may know that locally made, organic, fairly-priced products are
better quality and better for us, and in the long run (because they
last longer) will cost less. But the more expensive products cost us
more now, and no matter how
conscientious we may be that's tough to swallow (perhaps impossible if
you're on a fixed income). Besides, there are plenty of discouraging
examples of locally-made crap, too.
Similarly, the decision
how to get around isn't entirely ours to make if we live more than
walking or cycling distance from work, shopping and recreation. In
this, those who live in revitalized downtown cores are wise and
blessed, but that lifestyle is not for everyone.
For the most part, however, we do
have a choice, and there are encouraging signs that more and more of us
are choosing to wean ourselves off our addiction to consumption, debt,
and being too busy and too tired for our own good. Out at the Edge,
it's getting more comfortable, more fun, and even a bit more crowded
all the time. |
8:46:46 PM 
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MADE IN CANADA
trust your
instincts 
