We currently find ourselves in the midst of one of the greatest crises in our modern, industrialized world. We find ourselves at a time and place in which almost everyone around the world is experiencing feelings of betrayal, abandonment, uncertainty, mistrust and fear—be it from political and business leaders, religious institutions, or even family, friends and loved ones.

If we measure the health and wellness of a culture or society based on the individuals who comprise it, there is no denying that things are vastly off track and need to be addressed from a macro-cultural perspective if we are going to survive and thrive as a culture going forward. You know things are bad when the leading cause of death for individuals under 50 years old is drug overdose, followed closely by suicide. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic started last year we were already the most depressed, anxious, addicted and suicidal society in the history of the world. That statistic alone should be cause for concern for us all. Similar to the canary in the coal mine dying, the skyrocketing rates of depression, anxiety, addiction, suicide, mass shootings and divorce among our youth should terrify us all and force us to take a sober look in the mirror as to what is really going on to drive all of this.

As with any living organism it exists in a complex system. It is inextricably intertwined with the environment in which the organism functions. Whether we recognize it or not, the environment has a massive influencing effect on how we all function and behave through powerful, indirect forces shaping our behavior over time. As we become increasingly shackled to the system in which we function, our free will and individual choice become more and more an illusion. We are conditioned to believe and value certain things and behave in certain ways. One of the most dangerous and destructive influencing factors in our modern society and world is the way in which we practice what we call Capitalism—which has been morphed into an unlevel playing field. Regulation is unevenly applied, we follow an unsustainable paradigm of infinite growth, and pure greed and materialism have overcome the original value of efficiently transporting resources to where they are needed most. It is an unseen cancer which is slowly destroying our lives and our planet.

We have unwittingly created a culture that celebrates materialism, competition, and winning, no matter the cost. The results are skyrocketing rates of depression, addiction, and suicide — as well as the destruction of our planet and natural resources by creating huge industries of cheap-but-irresponsibly made products often made in inhumane conditions. These objects provide us with momentary happiness, like a drug, distracting us from our inner sadness, loneliness, and emptiness. And then, like addicts, we get bored with our old purchases and seek the next ones in a never-ending dance of distraction to avoid really living and being fully present with life.

The flaws of our socioeconomic system hide behind a few buzzwords that all of us rally behind: freedom, independence, and capitalism. While we might cherish these principles in theory, they have been manipulated in ways that have led to extreme damage for the environment and our psyches. Let’s take the “free market” for example. It’s easy to say that market forces and the principles of supply and demand create equal opportunities through competition. However, even a cursory look into our system shows this simply isn’t the case. We live in a world where a sparse collection of corporations and individuals control the world’s prosperity, while the masses struggle to keep above water — even in the United States. According to the Credit Suisse Global Wealth Report, the world’s richest 1% (those with more than $1 million) own 44% of the world’s wealth. Furthermore, their data indicate that adults with less than $10,000 comprise 56.6% of the world’s population but only 2% of global wealth. Things have been made even worse during the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused a worldwide economic shutdown. Estimates show that during the last 9 months of 2020 (from March through December), global billionaire wealth increased by $3.9 trillion, whereas global workers’ combined earnings fell by $3.7 trillion. We might think we live in a free world where we have the ability to succeed or fail, but this is much more of an illusion than it should be. Like most corrupt societies that have preceded our own, the rich are getting richer, the masses are struggling, and the middle class is eroding.

The current political, economic, medical, and religious power structures continue to “win” on a daily basis while keeping the masses scared, ignorant, and helpless. Most of us work long hours in jobs we hate for insufficient money, poor health benefits, and a dismal quality of life. In the United States, for example, the average CEO now makes 500 to 1000x times what the average worker makes. Imagine roughly $29 million per year, compared to $58,000 per year. Compare that to 1978, when the average CEO made roughly 30x the average worker’s salary. Ironically, while most of us demand freedom and independence as fundamental human rights, we give up our power to a terribly unbalanced socioeconomic system. Are there any leaders left among us who are able to stand up to these unseen forces? Leaders who are not controlled by the desire for profit and power, but by their morality and ethics to serve the people they represent? When will we see a return of leaders who serve in a way that models respect, communication, cooperation, and compromise?

GREED AS A CANCER

Greed is used as a way to justify the pillaging of our planet’s natural resources at an alarming rate. Look no further than our devices, our agricultural and our clothing industries. Our civilization purposefully produces cheaply-made products, which are intentionally designed to last a short time. This is done so consumers keep coming back for more, like drug addicts seeking the temporary high that new purchases give us. Once the artificial excitement of novelty wears off, we are back where we started — feeling insecure about ourselves and wanting the next new shiny thing to boost our self-esteem.

Greed also creates a selfish, back-stabbing system where people will lie, cheat, cut corners, or do whatever it takes to get ahead and “win” — whatever winning looks like in their eyes. Exploiting developing countries for their natural resources and keeping them in a perpetual state of conflict? No problem. Using child labor and taking advantage of impoverished workers who are forced to work long hours in toxic environments? What’s wrong with that? Most of us complicity go along with these awful practices because we have no idea what’s really going on behind the scenes of the products we buy on a daily basis.

We need to reverse the promotion of greed and the idea that “more is better.” The truth is greed hurts everyone involved — even the people who seem to be benefiting from it. If we accept that greed is a psychological cancer that infects the spirit of a person and drives them into selfishness, we can break our addiction to materialism and the idea that more things will make us happier. We need to redefine our notions of self-worth — not by physical objects, but by our actions and the communities that we build.