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Tuesday, January 03, 2012

How to Become Free From Debt II


This essay is from the website, which itself is a clarified revision of my blogpost of October 10, 2010.  It's critical that I re-publish it here.  Banking is not the root of all evil, but it is a manifestation of the root of all evil within our own thinking.  This is about a simultaneous ending of both what's inside us and its outward manifestation.  This is Occupy Your Heart and Occupy Wall Street, simultaneously.  Both must happen, simultaneously.

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To state the obvious: people all over the world are dealing with endless debt, slaves to banks, slaves to their own promises. I get lots of emails from folks wondering what they can do. Debt puts us asleep to reality and blinds us to gratitude, compassion, and abundance.
 

It begins with freeing our minds of debt


Debt is attachment, sense of guilt, grudge, sense of vengeance: otherwise called thought of credit and debt, which physically manifests itself in the world as banking and commerce.  Obviously, I'm saying nothing new here: We can never be forgiven of debt if we cannot forgive others.  We cannot forgive others without simultaneously forgiving ourselves. 

Thus, before reading on, do a mental inventory of everyone you hold a grudge against.  When you can find forgiveness for each and every one of them, when you completely let go,  you've cut this noose around your neck.  Then you can come back and read the rest of this, about banking.  Why?  Because then you will see that banking is unreal, an illusion, and what I say will confirm what you already know.

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We must be responsible.
We naturally have a sense of responsibility to pay our debts.
Banks take advantage of our natural sense of responsibility, and this is how we get under their control.
But if you understand the nature of banks, you understand to whom you are truly responsible.

Are you obligated to pay a bank "back"?

If you asked me for a loan and I wrote you a bad check, would you be obligated to pay me "back"?  
Yeah, let your mind go wild: imagine you asking moneyless me for a loan to buy a house! I then write you a bad check for $200,000 and tell you to not only “pay me back,” but with interest!  Sounds unbelievably absurd, huh?  But this is the very nature of fractional reserve banking and fiat money.  But the absurdity doesn’t stop there.  If you don’t “pay me back,” I get to “re-possess” the house you buy with the “loan.”  Ha!  “Pay me back,” as if I ever lent you anything!  Ha!  “Re-possess,” as if I ever possessed the house in the first place!

Funny how it sounds not only bad, but totally stupid, if I, as an individual, write you a bad check to buy a house, huh?

An individual who counterfeits a few dollars one time is guilty of felony, a federal offense, and will go to prison. An institution that counterfeits billions of dollars every day is called a bank, and its CEO and board members even get to be in the halls of government, as they are this very day!  They get to be the government! 

But this system has been the foundation of our civilization for centuries, so it must be okay, huh?  It's tradition, after all! 

Let's look at simple reality. You never had a debt to me in the first place, and I never gave or even lent you anything but a bad check! Ask yourself this: how can it be moral to even consider paying me “back”?  But you must also consider it was foolish to ask me for a loan in the first place. You must now find out what responsibility and reality is and to whom you’re really supposed to pay back.

We've  known these principles since civilization began

The ancient religions (Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam) and philosophers did not talk about reducing interest. They spoke of abolishing interest! They saw the obvious: making profit on nothing is criminal.  It will invariably evolve into fractional reserve banking, counterfeiting, as is rampant right now. 

Be Responsible

I'm not talking any hidden conspiracy theories here.  Every banker and economist knows, logically, mathematically, that your loan did not come from any bank.  Your loan came from the backs of the working class, from the poor, and it came from your natural environment.  If you erase the illusion of money and simply look at goods and services, this becomes crystal clear.  

Let me state it more simply:
You did not borrow any goods from the bank. You borrowed goods when you purchased goods with the bad check given to you by the bank.  You traded nothing for something.
Thus,  this is your responsibility: you must pay back your loan to those who have less than they need. 

Forget money and banks, which are literally nothing, and simply look at reality:
Anybody in the world who has more stuff than they need is in debt to those who have less than they need.
 

When you accept the reality that you own nothing, then your debt is gone.
This is the Reality:  you are defaulting on the loan you took from real, living beings when you pay anything "back" to a bank.  A bank is not a living being.  It is a fiction and lent you fiction.  How can you default on a "loan" from the bank when the bank lent you absolutely nothing?

Excuse me for stating common sense:
it is totally irresponsible to rob the poor to pay the rich. 
It is totally irresponsible to rob reality to pay illusion. 
This is sacrifice to idols (illusions).

All our ideas to heal the world, our social programs, and our activism are futile, in the bigger picture, if we continue to practice interest banking, either as lender or borrower!  It makes no sense to fight the dragon while secretly feeding him at the same time, unless you enjoy perpetually fighting the dragon.

The proof has been all around us for centuries: interest banking causes goods to flow from the workers to the non-workers, from the poor to the rich, and is the cause of the bulk of world poverty, debt, environmental degradation, and mental anxiety that you are likely experiencing right now.  Just your own mental anxiety is proof enough, if you don't have eyes to see the world system. 

Is It Okay to Break Our Promises?


I’m a strong believer in keeping our word. This is why I don’t believe in making promises, because making promises is a guarantee that we will break our word and become liars. Making promises is boasting for tomorrow, the work of ego. When we make any kind of promise we put ourselves in debt.
 
However, if we do make promises, we must keep them if it’s in our power. But sometimes we simply cannot keep our promises.

Are there situations in which it is not only okay, but mandatory, to break our promises?
Let’s use an extreme example to drive home a point. Sometimes people make promises in an irrational fit of vengeance to do something horrendous, like a mafioso or gangster swearing vengeance upon somebody in a blood oath. If you promise to kill somebody, is it a “sin” to break your promise?

We in modern culture are making promises in an irrational fit of faithless anxiety and fear, faithlessness that everything we need is not in the present.  We are making promises to a Mafia. 
 
Both the "conservative" and "liberal" American public are finally waking up and seeing this, after years of being pitted against each other by this very Mafia that doesn't give a gnat's ass about liberal and conservative, religious or non-religious.  The profiteer cares not where profit comes from.    

In Sum: Steps to Becoming Debt Free

1. We must establish that it was bad judgment to take out a loan in the first place. We lost faith that everything we needed was available in the present, as it has been for zillions of years in nature's balance.
2. We must acknowledge that we made a promise to pay back what we borrowed, and we want to be responsible and keep our promise.
3. We must also acknowledge that our promise was more than a simple “yes” and “no," because we signed a contract promising we would pay back our debt. We must realize that going beyond a simple yes or no comes from a corrupt mind and reasoning. A lie is a lie, and to sign a contract is to water down truth.  How is telling a lie "under oath" any different than telling a lie not "under oath?"  Both the mind that requires us to sign a contract and the mind that signs the contract are equally corrupt: both are lost in faulty, irrational thinking.  Now that we've acknowledged this error, we forgive ourselves and move on.
4. We must now ask ourselves where our loan came from so we can pay it back. Again, every banker and economist knows that a bank does not lend us what belongs to the bank. The bank wants you to think it is lending to you from its own reserves, but it is lending nothing.  Not only that, the bank has the audacity to charge you interest on nothing, creating more illusion of something from nothing. Every banker knowingly practices this deception. But every bank justifies itself, not because it does not know that what it is doing is deception, but because what it does is tradition, and all of commercial civilization depends on this tradition! The bank, however, does deceive both itself and us into thinking life will end if it does not practice this deception.  Faithlessness is belief that everything real will fall apart unless you practice a lie.  Faith is belief that everything real will succeed if you are completely real, totally true.  Faithlessness is pretense.  Faith is sincerity.

It is true that everything that is false, the bulk of commercial civilization, would collapse without interest banking.  And it must collapse if we and other living beings are to survive.
5. On realizing we have entered into a knowingly-deceptive contract, our contract is invalidated, freeing us from any responsibility to the contract. The fact that most all the world uses deceptive contracts does not validate any of those contracts. It is, in fact, irresponsible to hold to a corrupt contract in the same way it is irresponsible for a mafioso or gangster to hold to a blood oath to his peers!
6. We must not stray from our integrity, from our responsibility to pay back our debt! Thus we must ask ourselves where our loan truly came from!   When you erase the illusion of money and simply look at goods and services, reality becomes clear.  In the greater world economy, we see, obviously, that goods and services flow from workers to non-workers, from the poor to the rich, from the creative to the non-creative, from the productive to those who produce only illusion, from the givers to the moochers.  The bankers take, and do not borrow, from the world’s workers and creators, and they pay nothing back. By doing any business with the bank, you have become an accomplice to theft and you must reconcile it. You have taken an illusion, fiat money, from the bank, and used it to trade for actual goods created by the world’s poor, causing goods to flow from the poor to the rich, from those who need to those who do not need.
The bank may turn you over to a collection agency. But if you have already returned your stolen goods, the bank has no more power over you.  Perhaps in many countries the bank can jail you.  This is where you must have faith in the Power of Truth, giving you joyful power to shine through Persecution, as Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and Jesus demonstrated.

There is talk of getting banks to forgive debts.

We could talk about regulating crime, reforming crime, or we could talk about ending crime altogether, refusing to do any business whatsoever with crime. 
Some people in the world are talking about reviving the ancient concept of Jubilee.  Jubilee is a concept in the Torah, where Israelites would forgive each other's debts every seven years and every  49 years.

But let's go back to me "lending" you a bad check to buy a house.  Now how can we talk about me forgiving your debt? It’s like asking a rapist to forgive the victim.  It's like talk of getting banks to blow themselves up. 

Jubilee was created for families, friends, and neighbors.  People lend to family, friends, and neighbors with zero profit motivation.  But the very nature of a lending institution is profit from nothing.  A lending institution simply cannot be moral and simply cannot look out for the good of the borrower, despite appearances.  It cannot forgive and cannot be forgiven, not in this life or any life to come. A bank runs on unforgiveable sin (debt).  Its very nature and lifeblood is willful sin (debt).  To end willful debt is to end banking. 

43 comments:

  1. hello mister suelo,
    a comment not at all on topic.
    i' m belgian, and have been reading your website faqs, etc, the last few days.

    the content of faq 27 is missing. i was really looking forward to it though. is it possible to restore this? "i want to live moneyless, but what if i have family and children"

    thank you for sharing!

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  2. @jelle -
    I'm not sure what happened, but faq 27 is now restored. Thanks for bringing it to my attention!

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  3. A 'really fantastic' essay! So good to be reading something sensible about money.
    Thank you.

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  4. I have to admit you lost me here.

    If you wrote a bad check to loan me money to buy a house then, when the check bounced the person I bought it back from would be very upset and come kick me out, reclaiming their house.

    As it should be.

    But banks don't do that. They write checks that clear and the original owner gets that money and I get the house and then it's between me and the bank. The reason I didn't pay cash is because I didn't have the cash, and the reason the original owner didn't float the loan himself is because he wants the cash now for other things.

    So the bank is an intermediary in this case, providing the cash so the transaction can take place (how and where they got it is irrelevant). Interest is their fee for doing this and it's not personal, simply business.

    Continued...

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  5. The problem I have with banks is the high-up people have no ethics about them. They think it's perfectly all right to NOT pay back bank debts (as evidenced by bail outs in recent years) yet expect to be paid back themselves.

    Therefore, if I fall upon hard times and cannot pay them back (even if I have a contract), I don't feel morally obligated at all. It's simply a business decision, a restructuring of the personal "corporation" that is me that, to put it in banking terms "is necessary because it will put us on solid footing for the future."

    Screw everyone short term so we can survive in the long term.

    That's the problem with banks. Not the system itself because it can and does help people get things they otherwise couldn't get but this idea that they don't have to be responsible for their own debts.

    My solution... I just don't do business with them.

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  6. @Maria: check out the video 'Money As Debt'(linked in the website) or google "fractional reserve". The very nature of banking is writing bad checks! Banks do not lend you what exists in their reserves. Okay, they can lend you bad checks deposited from other banks, which are bad checks from other banks, in a round of mind-boggling confusion. Ask any economist (except that economists bury it in lingo so complicated nobody can see the obvious). But, unlike individuals writing bad checks, banks are sanctioned by government and society, so are unpunished. But no lie remains hidden, and bad checks eventually bounce, bankers get caught with pants down, as we now witness! Isn't this the very bail-out you speak of, bailing out billions in bouncing checks???

    This isn't something new: today's seeds were planted long ago when banking was invented. What banking system in history did not get caught in this deception? Even the ancient Biblical prophets speak of it. That's what the Great Depression was about! That's why central banks and the Federal Reserve formed: Individual banks fail quickly, so bankers united & centralized to protect each others' deceptions, forming a cartel to bail out bad checks with bad checks with bad checks ad infinitum. Today's cartel is the Federal Reserve.

    But you can only bail out bad checks with bad checks for so long before the whole thing bounces, as we witness right now.

    And, yes, the bank system "can and does help people get things they otherwise couldn't get." And somebody else loses so we can get what we want. Somebody always gets stuck with the bad check! Most, if not all, world poverty is from this age-old system.

    Why must we get everything we want right now? Does it make us happier?

    Here you hit the nail on the head: "...it's not personal, simply business." This continual mantra, meant to justify business, baffles me. What isn't personal isn't fit for persons. Now you get the whole point of this blog.

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  7. "Here you hit the nail on the head: "...it's not personal, simply business." This continual mantra, meant to justify business, baffles me. What isn't personal isn't fit for persons. Now you get the whole point of this blog." --Suelo

    I agree with the whole point of this blog.
    Oh, how I do agree.

    Thank you for putting it here.

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  8. Hi Daniel! Long time no talk... oh, how I wish I could be with you live in person discussing these things!

    My 18 years of brainwashing makes it so hard for me to understand what you're saying here, but I did experience a hopeful glimmer of comprehension with this most recent reading that excites and inspires me.

    Thank you so much for having this blog. Truly, your philosophy has influenced mine so greatly and I am so much happier as a result. I lived moneyless in Asheville for a month and found it to be such a joyful time in my life. I was constantly amazed at people's generosity. I walked and rode my bike everywhere, slept with Occupiers on the sidewalk, and ate what people offered freely. Life was vibrant, home was everywhere, everyone was my friend, and I felt real.

    Now, I am living with my boyfriend far out of the city and struggle to remain true to myself. Living moneyless is one thing when I'm alone. Now I'm not alone. We live in a house that needs heat, electricity, and internet. We'd love to turn off the propane heat, but we can only turn the thermostat down to 50 so the pipes don't freeze. We burn free, renewable wood in the wood stove to heat a small side room where we spend most of our time. (wood costs time and effort, not money) We didn't have a garden this past year, so we buy food. He drives me to the nearest bus stop on his way to work and I pay $1 to ride the bus into town. Then I plug my computer into an outlet at the anarchist cafe. It's a worker owned vegan cafe, so there are no bosses and they're super aware and educated. They say anyone can hang out there without buying anything, although I do sometimes because I want to support them. I use their electricity to power my computer in order to stay connected with friends and do work for the Occupy movement.

    I feel like there are so many conflicts in my life that I want to resolve. However, there will always be conflicts in my life, so I must embrace them and welcome the struggle to overcome them as a way to grow as a person and stay real.

    I strive to continuously review myself and my life to make sure my actions are in alignment with my values. I must make sure I only do business with human beings, not banks or corporations. I want to minimize my wants to a need level. I want to grow lots of food and share it freely with others. I want to protect forests to be able to have wood for fire for warmth. I want a world where human beings interact face-to-face, not by computer.

    Basically, I want to live a lifestyle that does no harm to any other human being on the planet. Right now, I'm not living that lifestyle and that is where the inner conflict comes from. Yet, to resolve all the conflicts by living 100% according to my values would mean sacrificing a lot of what is necessary in this society right now - driving from our remote home where we can have land and a food garden into town in order to participate in Occupy Asheville (ahhh, the irony) and internet and electricity for my computer to connect with Occupy and make change happen.

    I think I babbled on a bit there... just wanted to share my thoughts, feelings, and constantly changing experiences with you and your readers. :)

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  9. Suelo, another concise, brilliant response. Thanks Maria for helping to make it happen. Best thing I've heard this year. : )

    Fit to be hand painted on a sign, photographed with the Holder/Occupier giving their best deadpan face.

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  10. "the bulk of commercial civilization, would collapse without interest banking. And it must collapse if we and other living beings are to survive. "

    This is so true. Derrick Jensen says much the same thing, but he doesn't focus specifically on the banking system, but the banking system is quite at the root, as are many things such as agriculture and cities, without which we'd probably need no banking system.

    If I had a large debt, like for a house or education, I would pay my debt, even to a bank. Then I would never borrow again. In fact, that is how I've lived my life. I still work and get paid, I still use a credit card (the only one I have ever had), I am not outside the money system. When I am old and can no longer work, if all the money I have saved is gone, your blog gives me hope that it'll all work out.

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  11. Most people in the world with large debts can NEVER pay them in their lifetime, making it a moot point to say "I'll never borrow again." And banks know this. And banks run on people's programmed sense of "responsibility". This "responsibility" makes world poverty & the earth's devastation inevitable. Nothing will ever change until we end our sense of responsibility to creditors and realize true responsibility, which is actually MEANINGFUL. We can choose responsibility to a fiction or responsibility to Life. We can't choose both. Most radical activists aren't touching what I'm saying here with a 10-foot pole, because even they are bound by this religious dogma of debt, greater than any fundamentalist dogma. No oppressive or destructive system has ever ended by cooperating with it.

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  12. Just sayin', I haven't been in debt for decades and own my home free and clear.

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  13. Another thought provoking and insightful post. Thanks Suelo. I have distributed the post to several people and the responses has been diverse. Most people I am associated with hate it, but that is not surprising as I am a banker and so are many of my friends. However, there are a few folks that I have had discussion with that get it. I don't have a solution to fix the banking system, but we as people/consumers need to look within ourselves and do an inventory of our true needs and wants and find true balance. Banking flourishes and expands its control over us because it offers a service that people need in order to progress in the system. IF you want to buy a house or a car or start a business than credit is usually the only option and it can be helpful if used correctly within the system, but most over borrow, over spend, and mismanage credit to the point of slavery. I wish I had more solutions to the epidemic that is creating so much anger and frustration in most of our lives. Easy solutions like don't ever borrow or use banks or buy anything from a corporation is asking a lot of too many people so they don't even try despite it being such a good cure if done. I still maintain that banks and corporations and even government can co-exist with people and nature, but we must all find moderation/balance and overcome selfishness. It is true that money in America is based on no true commodity besides faith and common aggreement of value; however, it is the only way to get stuff so it isn't going anywhere...we just need to use it more wisely.

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    1. Hi Chris,
      Glad that you being a banker endorse the ideas atleast partially...

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  14. Oh and by the way...Suelo...I love your comments on the phrase "It's just business so don't take it personal" I hate that phrase because it makes no sense. When dealing with people it is always personal at some point along the way. Just because something is a "business" decision does not mean someone will not be affected. I have always made better business decisions when I remember the people that might be affected. Ethics is less of a grey area when we remember people. Thanks again for all your insight and for stirring us up to a rememberance of how things need to be.

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  15. @Chris - it's refreshing reading your open-minded comments & insights. Yes, it could be too overwhelming to think about not doing business with banks & corporations, & maybe turn them off to this. On the other hand, I have to speak my heart & basic cause-and-effect laws that I see, not calculate public opinion & compromises like a politician must do. You are right, it isn't so easy.

    I have a nice example: I once lived in an Ecuadorean village high in the Andes where anybody could build a house from mud, with no money, no banks, and it wouldn't burn down, would withstand earthquakes, highly insulated. Yet it wouldn't pass building codes here, not because of concerns for safety, but due to lumber & developer lobbyists. Most anybody could have a house, without debt. It's our banking and corporate system that prevents people from having homes. It doesn't facilitate it, as we think. Am I wrong in saying the majority of Americans do not own a home? Banks own them. Pygmies in the Congo have homes. Most Americans do not.

    @ Carolyn: thanks. Very encouraging.

    @Michael: I'm fascinated by your lattice theories.

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    1. Indeed. My ex partner and I built a 'to code' house that was small (850 sq ft) environmentally responsible, etc. on 11 acres without a mortgage. The house was solar, gravity fed spring water and beautifully built - the ex was a meticulous carpenter. When I went to sell the completed house to a young couple who had to have a mortgage, the bak told them that the house had "to little square footage for the amount of acreage." BUT if they borrowed another $50,000 and added a master suite (the house did have two bedrooms)with an additional bath, they would give them the mortgage. Which is what they did, along with running electric in. The addition totally spoiled the look and efficiency of the house but the bank was happy. I had another friend who ran into the same problem when she tried to sell her house. Not enough square footage to make the bank happy. Things are soooo out of balance.

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  16. If I had a penny for how fascinated everyone is of my lattice theories I could buy everyone a home.

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  17. There is still something unsettling to me about your post, as I read it to mean you suggest people simply refuse to repay debt they willingly agreed to on the grounds that the loan was made with a bad check. Has nothing to do with morals or ethics either. Just seems to me to be promoting irresponsibility as some people might take it to mean "go buy stuff on credit then skip town claiming that you don't owe the bank anything." I'm still mulling it over.

    I did however want to clarify my statement "it's not personal, simply business."

    It is not meant to justify business or anything else. Businesses, even banks, are more personal than people realize and let’s remember that no corporation or government could exist without people, each with their own very personal agendas.

    What I meant is that businesses and banks operate on a set of rules and they don't change the rules or make a point to attack or ruin anyone on a personal level. So if John Smith defaults on his loan and the bank forecloses on his house it's because he broke the agreement he signed, not because the bank hates John Smith and wants to see him living under a bridge.

    Even then I've seen situations where banks have bent over backward to try to help John Smith, allowing payments to get farther behind, accepting modified payment plans, and even lowering interest rates to try to help John out. But ultimately if he can't come up with something they will foreclose. Again, not because it's personal but because they can only go so far within their operating parameters.

    Unfortunately, many people live with a victim mentality, blaming banks, government, the "system" or whatever on their own inability to live responsibly. In other words... they take it personally.

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    1. I wish more people will think and act like Suelo. Perhaps you did not get exactly what he is trying to convey. But you seem to be the type of person banks and corporations love. We need drastic/warlike measures to stop these corporations getting away with it every time.

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  18. I was thinking along those same lines. Suelo is a great human being, just don't ask him for financial advice.

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  19. How could it not be unsettling to question what we've been told as true our whole lives?

    Any truth spoken will be abused. Does this mean I should not speak truth? Those who are irresponsible will be irresponsible whether or not I give them "permission" to default on loans.

    Judge for yourself what I say about true responsibility. Study banking for yourself if you’re not convinced. I've mulled over this true responsibility thing for 2 decades before I was convinced. It's totally clear to me now.

    The irresponsible, greedy types won’t want to default because it will ruin their credit rating. Those who irresponsibly run up debt & skip town don’t do it because someone gives them permission, but because they have addictive disorder, or they fall on hard times. No irresponsible type will consciously default, being unwilling to stand & face consequences of a bad credit rating & banks coming after them to repossess. The responsible one doesn't care about stuff and credit ratings.

    Curiously, it is absolutely no loss to the bank if an irresponsibly chronic debtor can't pay their debt. Why? The bank loaned them NOTHING!

    Banks only care that you are bound by the illusion that you MUST pay all your debt, not that you CAN pay it all! MOST people CAN'T pay their debt! Again, this sense of “responsibility” keeps us under banks’ power! Why else do banks lend to poor countries unable to pay their debts in a million years?

    Yeah, my financial advice surely won't make you rich. You can ask the experts, who have financial self interest. They’ve done a wonderful job so far, huh?

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  22. I'm having a tough time unraveling these double negative contrapositives. I realize you're turning the tables to make a point about assumptions but can you rephrase this?

    "Those who irresponsibly run up debt & skip town don’t do it because someone gives them permission, but because they have addictive disorder, or they fall on hard times."

    Here's my interpretation without the upside down phrasing. Do I have it right?

    Those so called "responsible people" who don't run up debt & skip town do so because they have been tricked or willfully addicted to materialism, not because someone told them to be responsible. If they are not materialistic many will label them as fallen, irresponsible or lazy.

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  23. lol. I like Suelo's comments. I find them funny but also true. I think whoever decides to default on a loan is also going to have to accept that they are going to live with the consequences, meaning a ruined credit score and also not being able to accumulate large assets due to the risk of then being repossessed by the banks. Because of that, defaulting on loans has inbuilt checks and balances. It basically ensures that the individual is commiting themselves to a more simplistic life style.

    @anon Maybe there should be a warning when you enter Suelo's blog saying "warning: the following content is a danger to your wealth!" Haha.

    I also agree that many loans are made with the understanding that people will keep making payments indefinitely. Maybe that's the bending over backwards Maria was talking about. If they can't get the full amount, then they'll squeeze as many pennies as they can out of you, all the while you'll never be able to keep up the payments, and then repossess the house or whatever it is they loaned you the money for. That way they still get as many payments as they can PLUS they keep the asset. Maybe that's not so much charity as it is standard business practice i.e. maximize profits.

    I also think it should be distinguished that taking out mortgages for something like a house and then defaulting is something quite different from maxing out a credit card and then defaulting. In the former, you DO pay back the loan by means of forfeiting the asset, in the latter you basically take the money and run. It's a risk the banks and credit cards companies take knowing that most people want to keep a good credit score if they want to continue being obedient consumers.

    Basically what I see Suelo saying is that there is no shame in defaulting on loans as long as people accept the consequences. I can live with that. Screw the credit score! I want my life back! Lol

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  24. Oh yeah, I wanted to compare defaulting on a loan for conscience reasons to defecting from the military for conscience reasons. Conscientious objectors are often incarcerated, and dishonorably discharged. However, it takes great courage for those who joined the military not quite understanding what they were getting themselves into to actually defect. They accept the consequences and are an example to the rest of society. I think not paying back loans can be similar. Sometimes we make bad decisions not fully understanding what we got ourselves into. Rather than feeling guilted in continuing something you feel is immoral, better just suck it up and take the punches.

    I'm glad there are true revolutionaries like Suelo out there who have the courage to make such statements.

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  25. You would be hard pressed to find someone who questions more than I do. That's why I question even you :)

    I'm sure your ideas about true responsibility are crystal clear to you - it's just that your post didn't make them crystal clear to me so I have to think about it.

    I'm glad that you speak your truth. Just hope you understand that truth isn't absolute, but rather a current conclusion based on information, experience and understanding up to this point.

    Truth is fluid, and undoubtedly given more time and experience you'll come up with greater levels of understanding and more refined versions in the future. I know I do all the time.

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  26. @Raj: thanks, you totally clarify what I want to say!

    @Michael: Hmm, my statement was confusing. I'm basically agreeing with Maria that it is irresponsible to run up a debt on a credit card & skip town. People who do that aren't conscientiously objecting to a bank but simply trying to save their ass from consequences of greed or addictive disorder or bad thinking. Somebody will do that whether I give them permission to default or not.

    @Maria: yeah, I see you're not here to argue but to get to the bottom of what's the right way, and I need to be questioned for my sake & yours. Believe me, I've been asking myself the same questions you are for many years. Years ago, I talked about this default idea with some friends, & they asked me why I didn't publish it. I told them I wasn't certain enough about it, that I didn't want to encourage people to be irresponsible, to not keep their word.

    There are laws of cause and effect that don't change. Truth is absolute. It's our perception of truth that is relative, changing & fallible. My perception needs constant challenge to be refined. In other words, I am grateful to you for questioning me, Maria.

    We have no more time to wait: our culture, our values, our mental health, our environment (plants, animals, water, air) are being crushed before our eyes. It isn't going to stop by sitting back & waiting for a magic messiah or new age awakening. I'm talking basic cause and effect. We and our thinking are the lifeblood of banks & corporations. The ONLY way to end the effect is to end the cause. Banks and corporations and politicians, like cancer, never say, "OK, we have enough now, let's quit!" That's against their innate nature. You can't work with cancer, you simply stop it or you die.

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  27. "What I meant is that businesses and banks operate on a set of rules and they don't change the rules or make a point to attack or ruin anyone on a personal level. So if John Smith defaults on his loan and the bank forecloses on his house it's because he broke the agreement he signed, not because the bank hates John Smith and wants to see him living under a bridge." --Maria

    Exactly.
    But the rules are written by the "haves" to apply to the "have-nots" for, as we have seen in recent history, when the "haves" draw the short straw society at large must rush to their rescue lest the numbers in their accounts see a direly punitive decrease, whether that decrease would necessitate a "lifestyle change" for them or not.

    The rules are written so that, if you aren't wealthy, profit most definitely comes before people. But that axiom is handily reversed when the wealthy sense that their bank accounts might be adversely affected by "market conditions" and their interests come before raw profitability based on the rules they themselves have made up to apply to the "rest of us".

    "It's just business" only applies when business is being done with common folk. These rules, along with all kinds of others, are promptly suspended for the "entitled class" and nobody seems to bat an eyelash over this "fact".

    Suelo is right, this economy is a cancer eating all of us up, even those who think they are being benefited by it. Economies grow and so does cancer, but neither benefit beings upon whom they grow and neither ever will.

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  28. Spot on, Anon!

    The day banks & corporations can be worked with is the day they can say, "We have enough now!" Then they'd not be banks & corporations, they'd be human communities; and cancer wouldn't be cancer anymore. I had an epiphany last night that cancer itself is a manifestation of our thinking, meant to teach us. A cancer only regards its own needs, at the expense of its host body (thus, actually against its own needs!).

    Every person (every living creature) in the universe can forgive & be forgiven. But non-persons ("not personal") cannot forgive or be forgiven, cannot feel remorse, even if the Supreme Court declares them "persons." The Supreme court cannot declare a rose not a rose or cancer not cancer.

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  29. Wow, another brilliant analogy! I like what your doing Suelo trying to get people to truly understand the nature of banking, politics etc... and stop relying on them. What's your next step in getting this done?

    People I've come in contact with that get big projects done often pursue multiple tracks to achieve the same goal. The reason is that obstacles will be met on all tracks and you're in a better position to handle each one with multiple tracks. Actually I think this is a common point many coaches make. You might try to integrate or work in my semi-lattice angle too. Right now I think you're kind of passing it off as just fascinating. By pursuing multiple tracks you're creating a semi-lattice like pathway. I'm wondering if the ol' neo-cortex is limiting these other possibilities because it's an overwhelming number of variables to fathom on a few blog threads. So there's the real possibility that your excellent ideas are being limited by this tendency to reduce. This can likely be mapped as hierarchical.

    Maybe a way to embrace the semi-lattice and integrate the ideas is to give me some feedback on my 60 Minutes analysis. I want to contact them directly. Also you could start commenting on other major news network blogs. I've seen what could be argued as subversive ideas spread this way in regards to the traditional realist painting skills being revived. Skilled realist painters criticize and link to their own work or other recommended alternatives on LA Times conceptual art reporting. Call it a kind of intellectual Flash Mobbing. They have successfully drawn some attention away from the easy to fake conceptual/abstract scene.

    It may be coincidence or zeitgeist but I've seen my ideas pop up in best selling books years after I've posted them on major news networks sites.

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  30. Dude, are you still living in a cave? Because you rock.

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  31. Thanks Daniel, this makes perfect sense.

    However having stated this I am actually in the process of getting a loan from a bank to travel to India and visit my in-laws. I can't see any other way to make this trip without a loan. How would faith help in this instance do you think ?

    Health and Happiness for 2012!

    Brian

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  32. I was just at the Washington County, UT ecomonic summit in St. George, UT. All the business, financial, and some political leaders were present from the area including Governor Herbert. There were presentations on the outlook of the economy here in Utah, nationally, and abroad. I saw all the graphs that depict the history of many financial indicators and such leading up to today. It is interesting to note the willingness of many of our business leaders to get right back into the bubble that just burst that sent the national and international economy into a tailspin. I don't think many of the folks who "are in charge" got the message or learned the lessons from the latest recession. There was a comment made by the keynote speaker..."trillion is the new billion". I have to say that I am a little nervous about the future if trillions of dollars in debt is the new billions of dollars of debt. I don't see a good ending to this situation unless, as individuals, we take some responsibility and get our lives in order. The dependance on banks and credit needs to end because not only with every swipe of a credit card does our personal debt increase, but it increases the national debt as well which will only serve to raise taxes and increase inflation until there is no value in anything we have. Look at the euro zone...There won't always be a bailout or cash injection to save us. I took a lot away from this summit, but that was something I thought I would share with the group.

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  33. @Taylor - yeah, I still live in a cave, though I'm house-sitting now. Are you the Taylor I met in SLC?

    @Brian - If it's meant to be, it will happen without manipulation, without compromise. Faith isn't about making anything happen, but being in tune with what naturally must happen. And only what naturally will happen is always the perfect magical way.

    @Chris - thanks for the report & your eye-opening insight.

    @Michael - Again, it all must come naturally, by inspiration, in its season. If it's meant to be, I'll sit down, study your ideas & be inspired. Fruit must first be ripe to easily pull off the tree & enjoyably eat. I spent most my life wondering if the ideas in me were meaningless to everyone but me. That's the universe's way of keeping us humble.

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  34. I would be willing to post your idea's on other blogs to give these ideas and prose the attention they deserve. It's time for a team of rebel rousers. You're ready! If you wrote these comments in one sitting:

    "... What isn't personal isn't fit for persons."

    "Every person (every living creature) in the universe can forgive & be forgiven. But non-persons ("not personal") cannot forgive or be forgiven, cannot feel remorse, even if the Supreme Court declares them "persons." The Supreme court cannot declare a rose not a rose or cancer not cancer."

    ...then you have it. You're ripe and ready! The chapter "The Resistance" in Seth Godin's book Linchpin clarifies what I mean.

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  35. @chris. Wow, amazing report! What a shame so many people are so willing to get back into the same old mess. It's just unbelievable so many would be so blind to the obvious, though I guess they see no alternative.

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  36. I've been reading your blog for years now, and i get you. I want to thank you for posting...your always an inspiration to me, and when i read your posts it really feels as close to what most people describe as "a religious experience" as i have ever felt through words. I am not living free as you are, but your example is always in my mind, and i hope to grow enough spiritually to one day be free myself. For now, i pay child support, and this is really the one thing that i feel obligated to use money for. The court orders it and they will inprison me if i do not comply...and although i feel i can make a much better contribution to my children's life than giving money to their mother, and i do these things for them when i can in addition to the money, I still feel like giving them the money is the way to go in this situation, if at all possible. What are your thoughts on this? Also, i'd really like to meet you sometime, although i live in beaumont, tx, i do sometimes travel to the four corners area.

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  37. @psunami, I hope you don't mind me saying something as I had this already on my mind from a comment someone else made before. I think people have to do what they think is right. However, I think a lot of people tend to think, if I do no harm then I'm doing right by default. Like, if I don't do this or that if I don't use money, have a bank account, drive an SUV etc.

    There's a funny skit Chris Rock has where people brag about things they aren't supposed to do, like bragging about "I've never killed anybody." When in fact, that's not what they were supposed to be doing anyway! I think it's not enough to not do evil, we have to do good. Put something back into the world. Put love into the atmosphere. As long as we're doing that, I think the "do not's" will sort themselves out. Some people will have more do not's than others, but in the end I think it'll balance itself out. I think there is a saying which goes "love covers a multitude of sins". I think we're all guilty of participating in this corrupt society, whether on an economic, environmental or spiritual level.

    Jesus was against the pharisees, or religious leaders of his day, because they were obsessed with the do not's to the point where they totally missed Jesus concept of love.

    It's not enough to try and stop participating, we have to make up for lost time! That's my two cents anyway.

    I had the thought because there are a lot of people out there who do something which they feel guilty about on one level, but they would also feel guilty about not doing those things as well. In the end, I just have to ask myself why I'm doing those things, and if I'm doing them because of love, or simply because I can't be bothered to stop.

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  38. @ psunami - excuse my delay. I feel grateful for your words.
    If I were in your shoes I would pay the child support, make your child your priority. This is what I told a dude who came to join me once, and then I learned he had a child. To fully accept what we can't ethically change is to find our peace - there's no other way.

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  39. Sometimes we can feel like we're in chains can't we? psunami, I wouldn't feel right telling you to start living without money now given the fact that you need to support a child, because I think everyone's situation is a little different. In some cases for example, the "support" which one is entitled to pay may not be all that necessary because the person being "supported" may have other means of income (I'm not saying this is the case in your situation).

    I guess we all just need to find little ways in our lives to live more simply, and I think in time we will find that it gets easier and easier to break away from the chains.

    I also think Raj made a very good point about how sometimes what we DON'T do can be just as bad (if not worse) than the things we DO.

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