Is there abundance in the Universe or scarcity?

To me, this is a very fundamental question. The answer to it determines how we approach the issues of our times including climate change, wars, water crisis et el.

I experience abundance in the Universe. This could be because of my privilege and experiences. When I see trees flowering, they flower with such joy. When I see fireflies in some valley or a field full of crop, my heart goes “wow!”.

And the most unlimited resource we have is imagination. Our capacity to be resilient in difficult times is remarkable. In the last ice age, we not only survived but also anatomically developed into our modern form.

With technology and the wisdom that is present in pockets of humanity, I feel confident about our capacity to respond to climate change and then do whatever we can to halt it. Adapting is the most human thing to do and we are adapting already.

As things get worse, more people will wake up to these issues and start taking action. Unfortunately, that seems to be the only way we are going to meet climate change and its associated challenges. varna koi nai sunta.

On the other hand, just because there is abundance, it doesn’t mean we go on a binge. It is not a license to gluttony In fact, quite the opposite, it provides an opportunity for restraint. It provides me a chance to pull back and be mindful of my limits. It is a slow and ongoing journey to living with lesser — not because of anything else but as my own practice.

And that is perhaps, where we can solve this paradox in the short run….to distinguish between our needs and greeds, and systematically reigning in our needs, our senses.

Deep beneath the drive to consume is generations of fear, lack and competition for resources. It has been hard to survive for most of our previous generations and we carry that evolutionary baggage. So we still behave like hungry kids rather than letting the realisation sink in that those times are behind us. That’s over, done. We’re in a world of enoughness now.

So relishing and cherishing whatever little or plenty we have, we can build the capacity to deeply enjoy the human experience. Inequality, that is of so much bother becomes much lesser of a pain because where you’re located too, life is beautiful.

That doesn’t mean we abandon our ask for equality. All it means is we see life through many different lenses. We look at equality and inequality in terms of not only money or resources but in our capacity to make meaning of life, in our ability to translate suffering to insight and in our emotional, social and time wealth.

One of the best ways to create the future we want is to live into it already. To birth it in this local place called you. And in my future, it is a future of abundance and enough-ness combined with voluntary simplicity.

What is your vision for the future for us all? And how can you start living it today to whatever extent you can? One of the ways we can really move into the future might just be creating it locally in our own lives and starting to link into each other to create it in ever-expanding spaces.