The challenge of this reality is that our human way of operating, which is to relate to humans and human needs as our primary, if not sole priority, is that we have significantly negatively impacted the life support systems on the planet born of billions of years of coevolution with all other species.
In a simple manner of speaking, we think we're alone on the planet, when in reality all life is one organism. The analogy of a cancer cell is often used, yet I feel a caterpillar who is eating her host to near death is more apropos.
We are ready to become butterflies, a collective bodhisattva metamorphosis as it were.
I feel that the notion of moving from the anthropocene to a new era based on cooperation with eachother, and all life is a great contribution from the article "Exiting the Anthropocene and Entering the Symbiocene" by Glenn Aalbrecht.
He states: "In The Symbiocene, human action, culture and enterprise will be exemplified by those cumulative types of relationships and attributes nurtured by humans that enhance mutual interdependence and mutual benefit for all living beings (desirable), all species (essential) and the health of all ecosystems (mandatory). Human development will consist of creative actions that use the very best of biomimicry together with other eco-industrial, eco-technological, eco-agricultural and eco-cultural innovation."
Further, in order to create this new epoch, we must adopt new strategies, new paradigms, and essentially redefine what it means to be human. For this redefinition to come about, we must fundamentally change the very manner in which we think, relate and emote.
Leading neuroscientists such as Richie Davidson and others are harnessing the tools of wisdom traditions and modern science to literally show the path for humanity to rewire our brains so we can evolve as a species.
Once we collectively embrace the recognition that connection, cooperation and compassion are the pathways for our greatest success, survival and thriving as a species, we will recognize that such traits and ways of being are the VERY strategies which may have gotten life to succeed and get humanity to this point. In effect we must listen, and learn, from the patterns of life developed around us for the past 4 billion years, and mimic nature's strategies for the next wave of human evolution.
One of the leading efforts to intentionally evolve humanity through cooperation and addressing the root causes of human suffering is called Leap Forward. Leap forward shares the recognition that:
"for the first time in human history, we have the knowledge and technology to intentionally evolve toward an eco-centered humanity. We can rewire our competitive nature by creating new systems that reward compassion and cooperation. We are ONE human family living on this ONE planet. We need to take care of each other and our home."
This notion of mimicry is known as "biomimicry" and defined by the Biomimicry Institute as "Biomimicry is an approach to innovation that seeks sustainable solutions to human challenges by emulating nature’s time-tested patterns and strategies."
Yet on a collective scale, on the level of epoch shifting memes and strategies, Aalbrech feels that we must move beyond biomimcry to this larger recognition highlighted by Leap Forward.
He shares:
"beyond biomimicry we must also have symbiomimicry. Many simply think it is enough to copy the shapes and form of life, but they make no connection to life’s processes. We don’t just copy the form of life, we replicate in all types of human creativity, the processes of life that make the mutually beneficial associations between different life forms strong and healthy. Examples such as the ‘wood-wide-web’ suggest to me that organising resources and processes so that the young, weak and vulnerable get their fair share in order that the totality has the greatest chance of survival and flourishing is fundamental to life. Symbiomimicry in human enterprise will both generate and distribute resources such that, in nurturing all humans, we nurture the life support system on which we all depend."This notion of learning from and applying nature's strategies over time is the basis of the ideas I am advancing with my clients and our initiatives. We aim to inspire solutions for the greatest challenges in finance and economics by architecting novel financial intermediation strategies to create whole systems solutions for humanity to literally invest in the creation of the new humanity, in a symbiotic relationship with the biosphere region by region. We apply what we call "eco-systemic biomimicry" to develop new funding models which meet the needs of the investor and set living economy projects up for success and scale.
Our core focus is through a bioregional framework working with cooperative circles of inquiry to develop novel investment strategies in harmony with the regions around the world.
Our work has only begun, building on the cumulative knowledge of decades of efforts and successes of those in the field known as "impact investing."
We have adopted some guiding principles:
Systemic: we take a whole systems approach creating sustainable systems that integrate the needs of society with the integrity of nature
Biomimcry: we take inspiration from natural processes in developing resilient financial and economic strategies
Regenerative: we design strategies that restore, renew or revitalize the regions and natural resources in which they work
Cooperative: we believe in working in deep partnership to allow new symbiotic forms that will support multiple stakeholders to emergeIt is our core belief that a new economy born out of the vision of symbiosis with the biosphere will take a transformation in every way that we currently work in the economy today. And the transmutation from one form to another must be born out of the material of the old - just as a caterpillar shifts into a butterfly. In the same manner we aim to shift the caterpillar of banking, finance and investments into a new reality for humanity and all of life to thrive for many epochs to come.
