'Recessionary Creativity' & 'Consumption-Fasting'

In the last week, several people have asked about a post I wrote a couple of years ago, highlighting a 'consumption-fasting' challenge a wise mentored assigned to me. It was quite the eye-opening adventure.

Now, even more than a few years ago, the topic seems ever more timely, when 'creative resourcefulness' and fear-reducing practices are pretty relevant.

At my neighborhood cafe this morning, in a chat with a friend whose small-business it is, the topic came up yet again, tucked into a larger conversation about the state of the economy, her observation that many people coming into the cafe were 'digging deep' (as in, in the couch cushions) for spare change and using change and dollar bills rather than the $20 bills more typical of a carefree economy. As with hair salons, local coffee cafes are a wellspring of on-the-spot insights about how 'national issues' are lived locally.

We got talking about some of the more esoteric insights about 'why money stops flowing', as well as personal practices of creativity, resourcefulness, mindset/heartset-awareness (aka choosing something other than fear, anxiety, and panic as your default setting), and other infinitely practical issues that help us choose and cultivate quality of life regardless of transient circumstances.

So given the interest in such things (and Ivy Sea Online is rich with resources related to these topics), here is the link for my previous 'consumption fast & conscious consuming' post .

And here's another article about a creatively resourceful idea that came to my attention yesterday, from Tom Atlee's email on 'heartening tidbits'. In Estonia, people have established a 'Bank of Happiness' -- a creative service exchange crossed with a type of local currency -- as one creative response to cultivating community, wellbeing, and expression-exchange when there is a recession in the 'traditional economy'. It's an idea worth duplicating here in the U.S. (and perhaps elsewhere, if people resonate).

Times of change and challenge can be opportunities for renewal, creativity, resourcefulness, visioning-anew, and reaching out to cultivate community and new ways of exchange and getting needs met while sharing one's own gifts and services. Not to mention taking back our authority that we've delegated to 'the System'. Sounds like a pretty good idea to me.

Blessings and Good Juju on the Way,
Jamie