Unfortunately in today's society, power is equated with wealth, but precisely because of the greed that the wealthy (and not so wealthy) citizens of the world have exhibited for the last few centuries, very soon there will come a time, I believe, when power is instead equated with survival, common sense, instincts, knowing the land, being able to work with what you have and making something of it.
Many many people couldn't stomach that. Just look at Facebook- it is nothing more than a scrapbook of "look what I have", "look what I got". For many people, driving anything less than a brand new luxury car is simply unthinkable. When the time comes where that coveted potato is growing up a hill, and the only way you're going to get up that hill and hopefully get that potato to eat before someone else, is by hiking, the types of people in power now aren't going to make it. You have to have the will to live. These types of people don't have the will to live; they have the will to want, the will to accrue, the will to get.
The will to live includes a great many adventures, but not adventures that these types of people think of as adventures. They think adventures are two week vacations in Fiji. That's not an adventure. That is doing precisely what society has told you to do- go work hard for a company that doesn't give a crap about you, take a two week vacation in which you are most likely still tethered to your company via cell phone and/or internet connection, come back, show a few pictures around, work another 50 weeks (nonstop, 70 hour work weeks), and then get 'rewarded' another two weeks vacation. Not really an adventurous life. They are playing right into what society expects of them.
For some reason, and I don't know if it goes back to religious thought (like a Puritan's view) or where it comes from, but it is quite clearly obvious (especially in the Midwest) that if you are not miserable, you are not worthwhile. It blows me away! If you're not struggling to make ends meet, have health problems, are in a job whose insurance benefits don't quite cut the mold, whatever, but unless you can display that in some way you are miserable, you are looked upon as not being worthy. It's very strange. Everybody has problems, that's common sense, but how you deal with those problems is what makes the difference. We have problems, but we're happy. I'm not going to walk around with all my problems drug behind me in a wagon, showing how miserable I am, so I'm looked upon as more worthwhile! It is a very strange, fascinating element of human nature, and I don't know where it comes from, but it's there. Watch for it over the next few days, and you will see it. You can't just be happy- that's not good enough.
Circling back to the initial point though, I really do believe that the people in power in the next century will not be equated with wealth. It will be the people who know how to survive. And the reason for this huge change in socioeconomic status is precisely because of the way the people in power conduct themselves today. They're destroying this planet at warp speed, and when it's taking it's last gasps, they will be nowhere around. And that is probably for the better- all the money in the world is not going to bring back clean oxygen, clean water, non Frankenfood. I don't think they will be able to hack it. If I am still around, I will gladly clean up their disaster. NOT for the power, but because I know that those of us who do, our genepool will be the one populating the next go around of this world!!
