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Musings Report 2022-9 2-26-22 Control What You Can
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For those who are new to the Musings reports: they're a glimpse into my notebook, the unfiltered swamp where I organize future themes, sort through the dozens of stories and links submitted by readers, refine my own research and start connecting dots which appear later in the blog or in my books. As always, I hope the Musings spark new appraisals and insights. Thank you for supporting the site and for inviting me into your circle of correspondents.
Thank You, Patrons and Contributors!
Thank you longtime stalwart subscribers and welcome new patrons / subscribers Thomas S. and Robert M.--thank you very much!
Control What You Can
Though I've been writing about tumultuous stages in long cycles finally coming due, the consequences and human suffering still make me sick at heart.
Understanding that cycles turn and S-Curves roll over from stagnation to decline doesn't make the suffering of others any easier to bear.
So what's our personal strategy for navigating tumultuous times? I've long advocated controlling as much as you can. We don't control the availability of fuel and food from far away, or the government's policies. But that doesn't mean we're powerless to affect our destiny.
From the point of view of systems, the way to understand control is to examine each chain of dependency in our lives: how many links are there between you and the source of what you need?
The greater the number of links, the greater the vulnerability of the chain, as once one link is broken, the entire chain fails.
The ideal is complete control of the source of essentials: there is no dependency chain at all. This self-sufficiency is incomplete due to our dependence on globalized industrial manufacturing, but reducing our needs to a bare minimum greatly reduces our dependency and increases our control.
In other words, the other measure of control is reducing how much we need. If we only need a small amount of money and essentials, then it's inherently easier to obtain a little rather than have to acquire a lot just to survive.
Consider fresh water as an analogy. The water flowing out of your tap comes from far away and requires an immense dependency chain of wells, reservoirs, pipes, pumps, filters, etc. all of which depends on 24/7 electrical power.
If we collect rainwater off our roof and filter / store it, the dependency chain is reduced to the weather providing rain.
If we reduce water consumption, that also reduces our dependence.
If water is cheap and easy to access, we waste it. If we have to carry all our water in buckets several hundred meters, we're much more careful about how the water is consumed. If we have to carry it a few kilometers, we're extremely careful.
How much we waste is completely within our control.
Shortening the dependency chain is at least partially within our control. If we walk to a true farmer's market (i.e. one in which the actual growers bring their produce to sell directly to consumers), this greatly reduces the number of links in the dependency chain compared to air freight from other continents.
If we grow some of our own food in our yard or a community garden, this eliminates the entire dependency chain (with the understanding that all produce requires fresh water, compost and fertilizer).
We also control our exposure to toxic situations and people--situations and individuals who add corrosive, unproductive friction, waste and dysfunction to our lives. Reducing or eliminating our exposure to these energy sinks lightens the load on our energy and time and reduces our stress.
Chronic stress puts a strain on our physical and mental health, impairing our immune system and reducing the energy available to deal with pressing issues. Eliminating or limiting sources of chronic stress is extremely positive to our well-being.
Reducing how much money and resources we need reduces one source of stress. For example, consider the difference between owning property in a high-property tax state and one with low property taxes.
In a high-property state, property taxes might be $16,000 a year. (Been there and done that.) This requires someone earning $20,000 to 24,000 a year and paying taxes on that income to net the $16,000 required to pay property taxes.
$24,000 might not seem like a lot of money to high earners, but over time it adds up. Ten years of $16,000 a year and having to earn $24,000 (and pay $8,000 of that in federal and state income taxes) is startling: $160,000 in property taxes, $240,000 in earnings required to pay the property tax and $80,000 paid in income taxes on this $240,000.
Should the household income decline sharply in a recession, that $24,000 a year just to pay property taxes might become consequential.
If our property taxes are $1,600 a year, it requires much less labor and anxiety to pay the property tax.
If the state collects income and sales tax, the household that earns less and spends less pays a lower tax burden. So reducing our spending and consumption further reduces our tax burden, enabling us to earn less, which also reduces our tax burden.
Many of these elements of control are subject to what I call a Devil's Pact: we make trade-offs which we think are beneficial but we have grossly undervalued what we've traded away and grossly overvalued what we're getting by sacrificing what is truly valuable.
If we trade away control of our lives and accept toxic sources of stress, we've traded away the most valuable things we have: our agency (control of our lives) and our health.
In the classic Devil's Pact, the person trades their soul to the Devil in exchange for some earthly benefit. At first blush, the benefit seems extraordinarily valuable and the soul of little value.
We tolerate abusive situations where we've ceded power to sociopaths because the gains appear so valuable. But we're trading our health and life for chimeras of security that can vanish overnight.
Only when the person is trapped and powerless do they recognize too late that they traded what was irreplaceable for a chimera of value.
Our control is what's irreplaceable. Wealth, status and the illusory security of dependency chains cannot replace control.
Highlights of the Blog
Geopolitics and Degrowth 2/25/22
Our Financial System Is Optimized for Sociopaths and Exploitation 2/23/22
Our Leaders Made a Pact with the Devil, and Now the Devil Wants His Due 2/21/22
Best Thing That Happened To Me This Week
Started removing lawn for a new garden, the first step in more homegrown food to enjoy and share.
From Left Field
NOTE TO NEW READERS: This list is not comprised of articles I agree with or that I judge to be correct or of the highest quality. It is representative of the content I find interesting as reflections of the current zeitgeist. The list is intended to be perused with an open, critical, occasionally amused mind.
The Cold War and Its Aftermath (Zbigniew Brzezinski Fall 1992) -- insightful context from 30 years ago....
"In brief, victory would have been defined largely as an accommodation in some respects consistent with the Western understanding of the Yalta agreement: de facto acceptance of a somewhat benign Soviet sphere of influence in central Europe, in return for Soviet acceptance of America’s ties to Western Europe (and also to Japan and South Korea)."
Welcome to the end of democracy: A rising tide of money and administrative power defines the rising autocracy--Joel Kotkin (via BrandonRox10)
41 Inconvenient Truths on the "New Energy Economy"
Volcanologists warn world is unprepared for next major eruption
A Practical Exercise Suggestion for Peak Oil Sceptics
It's the end of politics as we know it
Look around you. The way we live explains why we are increasingly polarized
No Mobile Phone Signal -- film clips in which no mobile signal is a plot point...
Web3 -- concentration of ownership of crypto and NFTs
5 Lessons From Hunter S. Thompson
An Open Letter to Bill Gates About his Wyoming Atomic Reactor
Why isn’t capitalism evolving? An antique, myopic, mindless capital structure can’t survive what’s coming
Covid Drove Workers to Quit. Here’s Why From the Person Who Saw It Coming.
The life-affirming moment Keith Richards fell out of a tree
"There are only two tragedies in life: one is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it." Oscar Wilde
Thanks for reading--
charles |
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