To stay alive - A method

I’ve just received a message from my dear friend who returned to Iran a few days ago. “The situation here is unbelievable” he writes during a brief internet connection. “Everything is so calm now, as if nothing ever happened. But the memories I hear of those days are unbelievable.” After reading the message from my friend, I return to my laptop screen. I have an open tab with a text by Michel Houellebecq. I’m not an enormous fan of him as a person. In fact, I’ve not been keen to read any of his works, his being not appealing to me at all. However, one brief text has gone through my radar and I’m openly stealing the title of that essay to become the title of this text - ‘To stay alive - A method’. Houellebecq's text is about how to write, as a poet and it starts with the statement: The world is suffering unfolded. 

“The world is suffering unfolded. At its origin it is a node of suffering. All existence is an expansion, and a crushing. All things suffer into existence. Nothingness vibrates with pain until it arrives at being, in an abject paroxysm.”

- Michel Houellebecq

This dark outlook of existence might not be for everyone. I’m rather hoping that it is not. Yet, the suffering unfolded both seems and feels like a current state for many of us and our fellow living beings. I read text upon text about this very topic. I read new ones on social media platforms. I read old ones in books. The ideas spiral, loop and rephrase themselves in eternity. Be generous, embrace your kin, find meaning, love until you can’t love anymore. It’s easy to feel depleted, where and when does any change occur? 

Outside my window, another dear friend flies by on his fast bike. And I’m pulled back from open ended ponderings to my lukewarm coffee in my hand. How do we stay alive? We need a method. This morning I suggest a the one below. Tomorrow might hold another.  

From competition to collaboration

Europe has for many years been advancing the parole of competitiveness. Through strong championships we are to position ourselves in a safe state of wellbeing, innovation and growth. I’ve long struggled with this idea, that to compete with others will give you meaning and a thriving life. In fact, I teach my children the complete opposite and maybe it is time for nations to do the same. Last autumn EIT Culture & Creativity held a conference with the title “Beyond Competitiveness”. Yes, what lies beyond it? With the uncertainty of the world, polarisation and geopolitical madness, I would argue that working closely together is our only option. Competition never was.  

Funding peacebuilding in the same scale as funding warfare

According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, global military spending during 2024 reached a staggering $2,7 trillion. I often feel like this size of numbers make me indifferent, so to clarify how much this is, here is an example. If you spent $1 per second, it would take you 85,000 years to spend $2.7 trillion.

Global spending on peacebuilding is extremely low compared to the costs of conflict, often less than 1% or 2%. How did it come to this? The economy is a strong bet, military defence engages businesses, creates jobs, supports billionaires and in the long run, makes wars profitable. The question to ask is maybe, how do we make peacebuilding a profitable business model? Modern Europe should spend an equal amount on peacebuilding as on military. Defence can be done without arms. 

Warm leadership 

This leads me to the act of caring and trust, of what I have earlier framed as mothering through for example Mothering Economy. We lack warm leadership, brave voices stating what we all feel and think, but rarely see expressed within political structures. The systems are fragile and the tendency of political leaders to step carefully to stay safe has been a reality we need to move beyond. Many citizens are asking for warmer leadership, they require ideas that take into account a generous wellbeing for all. The future is not for some, but needs to become an equal space for everyone. We could look into the social structures of the Nordic countries during the 1960s to find great inspiration for systems that not only have been tried and tested, but that also worked. 

My lukewarm coffee is cold, it needs a refill. With that refill, more thoughts will arise. Unnecessary ones. Weird ones. Ones that might spark inspiration. But most importantly, ones that are both useless and useful, in an infinite random perspective. I think of my friends, and remember why it is not meaningless at all.