The Key Ingredient of a Healthy Society
And boy, are we missing it.
Whatever our personal views might be, I think we can all agree on some basics of what makes a society healthy. A healthy society is one in which everyone is as happy and healthy as possible, where everyone feels fulfilled and able to meet their needs, and where people live in relative peace and harmony with each other and the natural world.
An unhealthy society, then, is one with astronomical disparities in health and happiness, where most people lack what they need to thrive, with regular social unrest, miserable, sick people, and rampant ecological destruction.
The United States is, of course, an unhealthy society. It’s not alone in this; most societies around the world are wildly unhealthy. Whether it’s an oligarchy or a republic, whether it relies on private ownership or state ownership of resources, nearly every society on the planet lacks the one key ingredient that produces the kind of healthy society we outlined above.
That ingredient is authenticity — but not in the way you might think.
We typically think of authenticity as a personal or relational issue alone. We worry about being authentic with friends and family, or practice being honest with ourselves about what we feel or want. When we think of inauthenticity, we…
