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Shaping in progress. More content is coming over the next weeks and months.

In the meantime, you can take a look at this: Rethinking Business Practices

EXCLUSIVE PREVIEW

book 3/1, shaping, will be published on 28 November 2024 and can be purchase on the Charlie Alice Raya website.

Bing sighed. ‘We need to be careful. We have to find every flaw in our business models and deal with them. That’s the only way. The moment we get smug about our businesses is the moment we lose.’
Kojo nodded. ‘This reminds me of the organic town ideas, how nature is always in motion, always moving in cycles. And I just realise that this could be applied to our economic system, too. Constant growth doesn’t make sense. But a cycle does.’
‘What would a cycle look like?’ Graham challenged.
Bass shrugged. ‘It definitely doesn’t include filling our planet with more rubbish.’
Rafael nodded. ‘True, our economies are built on producing ever more. But if you look at nature, it’s sort of the same mass of life. Life takes different forms, but it rarely increases so long as the natural balance between hunter and hunted is maintained. And global competition doesn’t reflect that because there are too few players, and those simply ransack the planet. There is no balance. There is no working ecosystem in our global economy.’
‘Again: What would a cycle look like?’ Graham repeated.
Kojo straightened in his seat. ‘I’ll give it a go. Nature works with a cycle so that everything comes to an end, whereas humans have made a habit of creating things, that are difficult to get rid of. Plus humans are fixated on a few products and still use monocultures because of their misguided believe in efficiency. Nature works best where biodiversity is intact because biodiversity makes natural cycles in an ecosystem possible. Take away the bee and you won’t have a crucial pollinator. Take away the earthworm and you won’t have the soil you need for growing foods. This is directly translatable to our economies. The fewer brands, the fewer players, the sicker and the more unbalanced the economies and our societies. But if we stopped our obsession with brands, status symbols and making quick money, and instead asked what does this father or this teacher or this farmer need, and find a way to provide the needs and some treats, then we would naturally return to a much greater variety of businesses. And those businesses could keep each other in check, but they could also profit from each other via cooperations or via using the same services, provided by a framework like the one dot.international provides. And here is another thing. We don’t need brands because contrary to what social media and advertising suggest, we actually like to be who we are and not a copy of someone else. We like to make individual choices.’ Kojo chuckled, seeing Graham’s raised eyebrows. ‘I’m getting to the cycles now. Once we get away from plastics, forever chemicals and everything else that cannot be composted or reintroduced into another product cycle, we can create active and attractive cycles, like the one suggested by the book stations team where a reader takes unused books to the book station and the recycled paper is used for the new books.’
‘These cycles already exist,’ Graham said. ‘What would be new about our cycles?’
Bass nodded. ‘I’ll give it a try. We make cycles possible, because everything we produce is designed and composed in a way that it is part of a cycle and doesn’t end up in a landfill. It’s the decision not to use anything in our products that will add to blockages in the natural cycles of our planet but will integrate.’
Rafael put his head to one side. ‘There is more to our cycles. Though, I can’t really pinpoint it. It’s something about nurturing what comes next. Instead of hyping one kind of product, we are curious what else we can create, and because we can recycle everything, the recycled is the basis for our new creations — just like in nature where the fallen leaf nurtures the soil and with that the next blackberry bush.’
Graham smiled. ‘I didn’t expect to hear something that would convince me. It’s a truly interesting thought.’
Tom nodded.
‘Thank you,’ Rafael said. ‘And we extend this nurturing by making sure that everyone can partake in the creative processes because we create a culture of curiosity which gives room to many voices not just a few. And with this we create more balance because we will have rid ourselves of competition, exchanging it for diversity and the richness that is in all of us.’
Bing frowned. ‘There is something else we should consider. I don’t think we should replicate the abundance nature produces. While I agree that cycles are the way forward and that we need to stop producing rubbish, I think, at this point in time, we also need ways to produce and consume less, and that in a way that allows our economies to flourish.’
Kojo nodded and smiled. ‘And we can do that by mimicking nature. Nature works best when an ecosystem has a fitting level of biodiversity. We translate this to working with millions of dwarf enterprises, like we do at dot., with dot. providing the framework and the guardianship to make sure that every dwarf, designers, suppliers and workshops, has everything they need, and that all products are accessible around the globe. And at this point, we can deviate from nature. While nature needs the hunter and the hunted, the fruits and those who eat the fruits, humans don’t. We don’t need to cut each other down, we don’t need to compete or kill. We have, by now, the tools to figure out how to create balances without killing each other, without competing, fighting, outsmarting. All we need is to think it through, to make the calculations, to use simulations, to find the ideal sizes for businesses and production. Not for the maximum profit but for the maximum benefit.’
‘And we will reach a maximum benefit,’ Rafael said, ‘once we accept that the planet is our home and that the other humans are our fellow humans, that empowerment beats competition every day, that we can shape our world in a way that heals our societies and reconnects us to each other and to the environment. And that will allow us to restore our planet. A restored planet is the basis for unrivalled prosperity.’

Coming in the next weeks and months.

If we tell people what is what, then What will always remain What and never evolve.

I am an explorer who loves to pick up any What and give it a good spin in my playground: the easy town story.

I am a creator who loves to dig deeper and who creates visions of ideas we could test, ideas with the potential of giving us the kind of boosts which would allow us to thrive.

I am an author who has dedicated their work to humanity and the planet. Not for some altruistic reasons, I just don’t like getting angry about the abysmal state of our societies and our habitat. And everything is connected. To work for humanity makes a lot more sense than to work for a single group. Whether we like it or not, we are in this together and the best way out of our mess is to use our wonderfully squishy brains and come together.

I am Charlie Alice Raya, born in Berlin in 1972, and finally ready to share my work and to be of service.

A good place to get an overview of all the things I’m up to will be my new website: www.charlie-alice-raya.org. Presently, it’s under construction, but it will steadily fill up over the next weeks and months – as will this website.

You can find the easy town books which are both the source and the playground for many business ideas on the easy town books website.

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