28 main essays across the four layers, each working through one practical question. Newest first, with more reflective pieces under More writing below. Follow by RSS.
Caring about the far future is one of the most serious commitments a person can make. But much of the work is organised around fear. What if the most durable thing we could build for the future is trust in the present?
Many founders have rejected growth at all costs. The harder question is what to aim at instead, if not just slower growth.
Most workplace wellbeing works on conditions: perks, recognition, programmes. Conditions change. What would a workplace look like if it worked on the kind of happiness that doesn’t?
Climate work has a target for emissions, but no target for demand. What would change if “enough” were part of the plan?
Engagement became the default measure of a good product because it is easy to count. What would we count instead if we cared whether people left better off?
Alignment research asks how to make a system do what we intend. The harder question underneath is what we should intend at all.
We sleep, take weekends off, go on holiday, and still come back tired. Madhyasth Darshan says the body’s rest and a human being’s rest are different things, and that the second comes only from resolution. Here is what that means, and how to find it.
Competition is everywhere: in schools, markets, workplaces, families. So is envy. Madhyasth Darshan draws a sharp line between the two, and adds what to do when we are ahead of someone too. Here is how to strive without envy.
No one wants to be exploited, yet most of us take part in it somewhere without meaning to. Madhyasth Darshan gives a one-line test for telling nourishing from exploiting. Here it is, applied to relationships, work and the earth.
Most of our effort goes into managing conflicts once they start. Madhyasth Darshan names exactly five roots of all strife, from a family quarrel to a war, and five settled tendencies that replace them. Here they are, with a way to find and work on the root in any conflict.
We think hard about how to earn, and much less about how to spend. Madhyasth Darshan says spending well is the whole purpose of earning, and that waste is the only real loss. Here are its three good uses of what we have, what it calls waste, and a way to plan with both.
Most decisions stop at three questions: do I like it, is it good for me, will I gain? Madhyasth Darshan names six ways of seeing, and says the first three keep changing while the last three don’t. Here is how to use all six.
Many places hold several communities side by side, tolerating each other at best. Madhyasth Darshan names what divides people, what everyone shares, and why it says a community is not yet a society. Here is a way to build one society from many communities.
We use the words mother, teacher, colleague and friend every day, often without asking what each relationship is for. Madhyasth Darshan describes seven human relationships, what each person in them hopes for, and the values that hold them. Here they are, with a way to use them.
One side says: claim your rights. The other says: do your duty first. Madhyasth Darshan treats rights, responsibility and duty as three parts of one way of living. Here is how they fit, and how to put them together at home and at work.
We usually think of safety as protection from other people: locks, walls, guards. Madhyasth Darshan defines it the other way round: safety is what people give each other. Here is how a community can build it, in six steps.
Many celebrations today are measured by how much is spent. Madhyasth Darshan describes celebrations that mark real steps in a life: a birth, a name, a year lived, the start and the end of education, the seasons, and a village’s own progress. Here is how to celebrate that way.
“Everyone needs justice, not a verdict.” Madhyasth Darshan defines justice as both people ending satisfied, and describes how to settle disputes close to home. Here is a way to do it, in six steps.
Many villages today sell their raw produce cheaply and buy back almost everything they use. Madhyasth Darshan says a village of around a hundred families can produce most of its ordinary needs itself. Here is how to work out what yours can make, and where to start.
Most of what we buy is made to be replaced. Madhyasth Darshan describes the opposite: good use keeps needs steady, surplus tools pass from one generation to the next, and each generation needs less time to meet its needs. Here is how to start.
Most debates about the planet argue over how fast to cut back. Madhyasth Darshan gives a clearer rule: take in proportion to what the earth produces, help it produce, and leave what is inside the earth inside. Here is how to apply it.
Today a price mostly reflects scarcity, real or manufactured. Madhyasth Darshan says value comes from the labour that makes a thing useful and beautiful. Here is what pricing on that basis could look like.
Madhyasth Darshan contains a detailed, practical plan for organising a village from its families upward: a survey, representatives, five committees, and an exchange fund in place of profit. Here it is, step by step.
What a school is for decides everything else about it. Most are designed around exams and jobs. Here is what Madhyasth Darshan says education is for, how it pairs every subject with understanding, how a village could run its own school, and six design choices, with two schools that are trying them.
Every day, farmers, factories, families and governments decide what gets made. Most decide by what will sell. Here are five questions that decide by what is needed, and what nature can take back.
Most businesses measure success by profit and growth, so they get more of both, whatever it costs. Here are five measures a business can actually keep, and what changes when it does.
Enough can be calculated. Not as one number for everyone, but as a figure your family can write down, check and live by. Here is a method in six steps.
The next great achievement of humanity may not be discovering another habitable planet. It may be learning how eight billion people can live on this one, together. Here is a direction, built from families upward, and how to test it.
“I work 16 hours a day. Is that a problem?” The answer depends on what we count as work, and on who is doing it: the body, or the self. Here is a way to decide how much is right.
We call nature a resource when we have already decided the relationship is one-way. Here is how to treat it as the other half of a relationship, at home, on the land and at work.
The measure of progress is not what humanity possesses, but the quality of human beings and relationships it produces. What would it look like to measure that?
We have extraordinary technology, growing economies and global institutions, and no shared answer to what any of it is for. A shared purpose can’t be imposed. It can be found, because every human already wants the same few things.
Pleasure depends on conditions, so it never stays. Happiness depends on resolution within, and that is something we can work on. Here is how, in four steps.
Until we can answer that question, no amount of money can settle the question of prosperity. So why is it so hard to answer?
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Shorter reflections on how we think and see: noticing our assumptions, seeing people rather than our picture of them, welcoming the counterexample, and a reading of a film. They don’t answer one practical question the way the main essays do, but several of them underlie all the rest. They are not leftovers.
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