I promised in an earlier web article to talk about the silver linings in the cataclysmic financial events unfolding around us now. Here is one, and I'll talk about some others at a later time.
The severe recession, and later on the historical depression that we are heading into, can be compared to a body that is fasting. Though uncomfortable and even painful at times, it is actually a restorative process.
When a human body has gotten bloated, overloaded with toxins, ill, diseased and/or generally polluted, there is nothing like an extended water or juice fast to restore it.
On such a fast the body, using its own inner brilliance and natural guidance, is able to restore, rebalance and rebuild itself. It is able to cast off the burden of its long-accumulated toxins, and remarkably often, regain the birthright of natural health that it had when it was much younger.
A recession and/or depression can be thought of in a similar way. During the "boom" years of an essentially unregulated credit expansion, of which there are many examples in history, many unsupportable debt "toxins" are accumulated in various dimensions of the financial body of society.
As financial bubbles grow to the sky, various projects are funded that are uneconomic and should not be funded. Numerous malinvestments are made, unsupported by economic fundamentals.
Moreover, debt grows everywhere until it reaches a point where it becomes unsustainable, and all facets of society - consumer, business and government - become unduly burdened with it. This is like a body that has become diseased from a long accumulation of toxins.
The recession - or if the preceding bubbles were allowed to grow big enough, the depression - acts like a fast. Just as food is cut off during a fast, so credit is essentially cut off during a recession/depression.
And while that can be exceedingly uncomfortable at times, it also gives the body - whether biological or financial - a chance to restore itself. Unburdened for a time by the accumulation of more and more toxins - or financial leverage - the body or financial body can undertake the deep rebalancing and rebuilding that are so necessary for its long-term health.
Thus, what we think of "negative" is often a "positive" process when viewed in a larger context - though of course it is often difficult to perceive it that way while living through it.
More on silver linings later.
jim sloman, 3.25.09
|
