Defining Conscious Economics
Today’s economic science has become very uneconomic.
Fulfillment, even greater than today’s, is possible with fewer things, and simpler lifestyles. Yet it requires new understandings of self and new modes of conduct, particularly intuition-in-conversation, trust, cooperation and compassion.
Conscious economics is a meditation on what human economy would look like if it were based on self-realization, “involution,” rather than self assertion, “evolution.”
In more common terms, Conscious Economics is an ecological economics built around a humanism of mindfulness practices, depth- and transpersonal psychology. The model of the economic agent — “homo economicus” — is dynamic, not static. This means that the human being develops psycho-emotively and spiritually in its lifetime. Its "production" and "consumption" propensities evolve. In other words, in its lifetime, the human's motivations for work and lifestyle change.
Furthermore, personal growth is contingent on the person’s engagement with the world, particularly his/her fellow humans and the more-than-human biophysical world. There is a mutual informing of self and its field, which over time generates language, "knowledge," institutions and ego/eco self identity. Yet distinct from all these is awareness, self reflection, an "observer within."
The radical dynamism of mutuality and transcendental self-reflection change the individual’s as well as the collective’s potential economy. It is overlooked and contrary to mainstream economic thought.
Mainstream economic thought holds — unconsciously — that there is a fixed, objective economic reality including human being. Not only is this not true (and rather an ideological consensus reality), but it restricts other possible economies from arising. The bigger source of the restriction lies not in the manifest content of economic knowledge, but in its self understanding and methodology as a social science. Putting it crudely, professional economists and everyone's "inner economist" are not aware of the group consensus and collective intentionality behind their economic knowingness and action. Due to this blindness and unconsciousness, there is, ironically, a tremendous opportunity cost in the vision of prevailing economic science.
The key to opening to greater economy is self reflection, the observer within, presence, intuition. These are all aspects of, what is also called non-dual, integral, unitary, heart-based, participatory consciousness. By cultivating these aspects in greater proportion (than currently) throughout the day in the ordinary business of living, and the human species through the individual can change, not the gross forms of matter and energy, but its alignment to them.
Through mindfulness and depth, the human community may discover greater instrumental and interpersonal capacities that can lead to diminished material throughput, less physical transformation of the biosphere and reduced financial stratification of community.