Reflections on Sacred Economics

Here are some short notes I took while reading Sacred Economics by Charles Eisenstein

Sacred Investing

Invest — to vest one’s money, to clothe it.

Gift Consciousness

Infuse your use of money with gift consciousness.
Once you give a gift, it is as good as reciprocated in terms of the universe.
Trust that the reciprocity is already there.
It could come back in a different form.

Innate Gratitude and Generosity in Us All

We all want to give our sacred, unique gifts to the world.
Recognize that that lives in each and every one of us; appeal to that part of people.
Trust that the universe shall present you opportunities to prove you are serious about this transition from Mother Earth to Lover Earth.
Be gentle with yourself; don’t force it, don’t be ego-driven with it.
Do what feels good in terms of aligning oneself with the new story of money.

Sacred Work

In the new Sacred Economy, there won’t be jobs that one does for money, but rather ones people love and give as gifts. We offer our gifts to the community and don’t work for payment in money. This gift we give creates a tie between us and the recipient, and community is made up of the network of these ties to each other — a web of gratitude and generosity blooms.

We trust that whatever we give will come back in some other form. It is a story of trust rather than a story of fear, a story of interconnectedness rather than a story of separateness. Only the separate self can live in a story of fear and hoard. A recognition of interconnectedness brings an automatic generosity, because in the new story, more for me is more for you, and more for you is more for me.

We must align our money with this new story.

Gifts and Giving

A gift is a tie — a relationship.
We all have unique gifts we bring to the table. A sacred economy supports people in offering their unique gifts and connecting those who give to those who need.

Degrowth

A degrowth economy allows gift culture to exist so the debtor doesn’t need to create new money and allows the local economy to exist. Since they don’t need to make more money, they don’t need to rely on the global economy or convert more of the commons into the money realm. It also allows people to give gifts back to circulate in the community rather than being forced to sell them for money to pay back the loan.