Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ

Originally started out life as a musician, then verrrry slowly discovered that maybe I wasn’t going to make a living doing that � a fact which, to this day, still sticks in my craw. (That’s an Irish way of saying hard to swallow!)

Born in Dublin, Ireland in the sixties, I spent my entire childhood immersed in music, playing, listening, composing. I thought I was pretty good at it too! After many attempts to break into a fickle music business in the eighties, I eventuallyÌýsettled forÌýanother reasonably convenient way to make money through music: recording, where I worked at as a professional music producer for many years.

Still scoring no major success in that area, I had to settle for other ways to make money â€� which, while successful, were perpetually dragging me further and further from what I wanted to do. Being quite the thinker and problem solver, it didn’t take much for my inquisitive mind to start seeing how absurd the whole business of ‘making a livingâ€� was. It comes down to this: whatever you’reÌýinterested in, if no-one wants that, then you starve â€� unless you submit to doing something you’re not interested in.

A few years ago, I dropped out of life for a while and began to explore. The banking crash of 2008 had brought to public awarenessÌýjust how fragile and wobbly the financial system is â€� ÌýaÌýsystemÌýupon which we placed so much trust. I think many people, like me, began to question things then: How canÌýbanks lose billions and then get bailed out? Why don’t banks just fail like any other business? Where did all the money go? What is money anyway?

Of course, it didn’t take long for all those questions to converge on the one spot: Money. Do we actually need it? All things considered, do the benefits of using money outweigh the shortcomings? On the face of it, you could be forgiven for thinking that the benefitsÌýdo outweigh the shortcomings. Yes, we have lots of poverty, but we have great prosperity too â€� and much less abject poverty than before. But when you start to factorÌýinto that mental calculation the forgotten dreams of millions like me, the immeasurable financial stress visited on billions of struggling families, the crazed destruction of the environment for profit’s sake, the inefficiencies and waste caused by maintaining monopolistic empires, climate change, the dwindling of biodiversity, the drug industry incentivized to cure symptoms rather than find cures, the dead rivers, the destruction of forests, it starts to look like a very different equation. Also, technological advances that created prosperity somehow got mixed up with capitalism â€� to the point that we attribute progress to capitalism and not just getting smarter.

I, for one, refuse to tolerate a society that is blind to the ill-effects of the way it operates. I know now that human society really has just one implicit modus operandi: â€�do as we did before.â€� This is both good and bad. Good, in that it shows our strength as a social species in the deep desire to be accepted andÌýcopy one another, and bad in that we tend toÌýcontinue the same mistakes uncorrected too. We copy each other even when it is no longer beneficial to us. So some of us have to start breaking that cycle and introducing new behaviour patterns.

I hope to be one of those. What seems impossible now � a world without any money or exchange � will seem absolutely normal once everyone else is doing it. It’s really that simple. Looking forward to interacting with you on this site.

I haven’t always been an activist, until recently I haven’t even been particularly socially aware and I certainly haven’t always been anti-capitalist…or even been sure of what that meant. My evolution, so far, has been a very organic process with some hard learned lessons along the way.

As the only child on both sides of a large and relatively financially stable family for the first few years of my life, I started off as a rather over privileged little brat, but I was intelligent enough and I had no strong urge to rebel. First life lesson came at age seven along with three brothers and a sister in quick succession after my folks decided to go their separate ways.

While I was appearing to toe the line and everyone else was distracted with building new lives I was diverted from my inevitable path towards; a nice boyfriend, a degree, an average (or at best, good) career, a few holidays a year and a tidy pension plan…towards something quite different.

Before anyone really knew what was going on I’d discovered that it was pretty easy to break the rules and get away with it and promiscuity, drugs and music that I’d never heard on Top of the Pops was a lot more fun than I’d been lead to believe. I had started the rebellion…but it wasn’t really for the greater good! However, at the grand old age of 17, my right to make selfish lifestyle choices was rescinded, with the news that I was going to be a mother. I was livid…but there you go.

It is there that the first big change came. When I first held the child that had caused me precisely 9 months of misery and 17.5 hours of intense agony I finally understand what it really meant to put someone before yourself…and the joy that it can bring. It took some years (around 15-20 to be as precise as I can be) for me to extend that consideration from just those lucky enough to have me as a mother (a grand total of two human beings) to the entirety of humanity…but I am there now!

The next stage in the transition was when, after a series of unplanned and unpredictible events encompassing; two very long term relationships, a career in IT, another running nightclubs, a car accident that broke my back, an unfortunate 3 year adventure in the depths of the Costa Del Sol and weight gain of almost 105lbs…I found my calling as a Probation Officer.

I’m not quite sure how we found each other but my path had lead me to a job in which I was forced to address every negative aspect of my own behaviour if I was to expect the people I now worked with, those labelled as the lowest in society, to address their own. I had to face every bit of pain that I had inflicted on others and learn that I wasn’t so different from the people I was working with. That made me view every person that had done me wrong differently too. Forgiveness was hard, holding on to hate is so natural, forgiving myself was hardest. Coincidentally (although I have far less faith in the concept of coincidence the older I get) it was a requirement of my course for me to study politics for the first time and that, coupled with the growing amount of information available on the internet, started opening my eyes to the harsh realities of the society we blindly accept. So, my sudden growth in empathy and the concept of forgiveness coincided exactly with the time I needed it the most…bitterness would have been understandable.

This was about ten years ago, and I had a long way to go. This was a woman who scoffed at feminism, thought organic farming was a load of twaddle, that meditation was for pretentious idiots with more time than sense, oh, and the idea of giving up meat?? Or dairy?? Are you crazy???

Here’s the thing with having your eyes opened. It’s like when you clean that one tile in the kitchen because you splashed ketchup on it…now you need to clean the one next to that, and the next one, and the next one…and you can’t stop until the kitchen could pass one of Gordon Ramsey’s most agitated inspections.

So here I am. Unemployed (the Probation Service and I had differing opinions on what made a good Probation Officer…I was right of course, but I’m sure I’ll go into that in future blogs), vegan, feminist, anti-capitalist and now intentionally homeless…but still fun at parties! I’m not sure that I have ever been happier or more at peace. This is going to be really hard to understand for people that are striving for what I have had…people who will consider me to be ungrateful. Good, because I am. Very ungrateful. Striving for and achieving those things did not bring me the happiness that letting them go did. We’ve been lied to.

So now I want to try something a little new. I always have done things differently really, but always within the guidelines set out for me by society’s expectations of us all. Now I want to prove to myself the theory that all humans just want to be good really. That we all want quite simple things, to learn, to create, to strive, to achieve, to love and to be loved. I think we’ve just got a bit lost along the way. I know that I’m not the only one who thinks like this, so part of my mission is to meet those who have started thinking and living a little differently (find those I’m already in touch with here) and maybe opening some minds that are currently closed to the idea. There is more information about what I am planning on the project page, this was just a little bit to explain how I got here.

I now have no regrets and there is nothing that I would change in my life. The diversions from what I have tried to achieve over the years have given me the lessons that I’m going to need if I am going to make any sort of difference. Making a positive difference for those two people that started me on my journey to giving a crap about humanity is still my driving force. So I’ll take this chance to say thank you to my kids, Caius and Amber, they each saved at least one life before they even opened their eyes to this world…and with any luck they won’t have read down this far so I’ll get away with it being too slushy.

Don’t let yourselves down humanity…the buck stops here. x

The Freeworlder.org network, blog and forum site wasÌýclosed on August 31st 2016. All the Freeworlder blogs have been moved here to our new site Freeworlder.com â€� a dedicated blogging and informational site. Browse our articlesÌý.

We will be launching a brand new network for Free World Charter members in 2017.

The long-awaited debut novel from Irish musician and seasoned social activist Colin R. Turner, F-Day: The Second Dawn Of ManÌýis now available in paperback and Kindle on . F-Day follows the dramatic adventures of Karl Drayton, a successful young businessman whose increasing disillusionment with the world leads him to question the very modus operandi of society itself â€� money.

Inspired by a growing undercurrent of movements who envision a better world without money, Karl creates an ‘F-Day Clock�, counting down the minutes and seconds to Free Day, then soon finds himself hurled into the international arena as spokesman for a whole new way of living � an Open Economy of free access and collaboration.

His radical alternative vision takes him on a journey across the world, meeting like-minds, and finally to the one place on Earth where his new philosophy might have a chance � Iceland.

Narrowly averting their own domestic catastrophe, Icelanders, with their pioneering spirit and self-sufficiency, eventually become the first nation to adopt the open economic system, becoming a template for the world to follow�

F-Day: The Second Dawn Of Man charts the countdown of events from the beginning of Karl’s journey, to F-Day � or ‘Free Day� � the day the world’s greatest economic powers embrace freedom as a natural right.

Within a week of its release, F-Day: The Second Dawn Of Man immediately entered the Kindle Top 100, reaching #49, and the book has already received consistent five star reviews from customers. (comments below)

Author describes the book as a ‘mainstream political thriller loaded with a powerful message.� Having spent over three years working on the book, Colin believes the time has never been more ripe for this story.

He explains, “It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that we’re doing a lot of things wrong in our society. Everywhere you look � greed, corruption, crime, poverty, financial stress, our health system, climate change � all of it links back to the way we do business on this planet. This simply must change.

“The existing political structure is too slow to catch up with the rising waves of change that are coming. Almost everyone you speak to today senses that big changes are coming to our way of life. You only have to dip into social media for a few minutes to see how the tide is turning.

“The old control systems like religion and media are being abandoned as people are becoming more educated and connected. The same will happen with nations and Governments too. Unless the people who have influence today radically adapt, they too will be washed away, and rightfully so.�

“I chose Iceland as the setting for the book because I believe Iceland’s history of doing things differently and their peaceful spirit is a shining example to the rest of the world. They have no standing army. They are almost energy self-sufficient. The Open Economy I described in the book is a very real possibility there. Having lived there some years ago, there is something strongly magnetic about the place and the people. It pulls you in.�

Colin is no stranger within the global Open Economic movement. He is the founder of � an online document that defines ten basic principles for operating a better, more sustainable society, and which has almost 55,000 members worldwide. He is also the founder of � an open awards and appreciation network, and, in 2013, Colin was the subject of a and story regarding his attempt to travel the world without using money.

Colin concludes, “Will we ever see a real F-Day? Most definitely. In fact, the F-Day Clock already , and we have set the countdown to July 2040. It’s a moveable date, which we hope to make more accurate as time goes on.

“The world can change in a heartbeat. The system proposed in F-Day: The Second Dawn Of Man can work today. It only requires the slightest shift in priorities to create the more compassionate and abundant society where no-one gets left behind. There’s no technology required. It’s just a decision away.�

What people are saying about F-Day: The Second Dawn Of Man:

What Amazon readers are saying about F-Day:

“A great read, amazing simple ideas that could transform our reality �

“a source of so much inspiration and hope. �

“you find yourself in a world you never want to leave �

�..you close the book and sigh, If only� �

“Brilliantly written, deep and rich. Reading it, you find yourself in a world you never want to leave.�

�..if we can embrace other possibilities, then there’s always a hope that we can change the world. And change it we can.�

FOR PUBLICITY AND MEDIA PLEASE CONTACT:ÌýROB WILKINSON, UKÌýMob: 07909916770, UKÌýTel: 0113 3910259,Ìý[email protected]

Open Economy is the formal name given to a society that operates on the fundamentals of freedom, sharing and respect. Such a society is enlightened to a point where traditional constraints such as law, money, trade and borders no longer apply.

The principles and ideas of an Open Economy are the subject of a forthcoming book by entitled �Into The Open Economy�, which is due for release in Autumn 2016. Further details will be added to this page soon.

[image error]

The most important act of transition we can take to an is to begin the practice of sharing and cooperating in our daily lives today. A Community Sharing Circle is a perfect way of enacting a moneyless,Ìýcooperative system on a local level, creating prosperity, efficiency, and cementing community bonds.

The idea is very simple: Invite people in your community to join a ‘Sharing Circle� where each member agrees to freely share and cooperate with other members. Members of the Circle can then gift and receive goods and services freely among other members.

The Sharing Circle is not a barter or time exchange system. It is unconditional sharing, where no accounts or tallies are kept, but with the important proviso that Circle members are not obligated to offer free goods and services to other members. It is simply encouraged as an act of community.

How it works

Members join the Circle by signing an annual pledge (). The pledge sets out explicitly what is expected of Circle members and binds them in trust.

It is recommended to renew pledges annually to keep members active and information current.

fig. 2: A window sticker for businesses

On signing the pledge, members notify the organiser(s) of any special skills, attributes or useful resources they may have, if they are able-bodied, and/or if there are any specific activities that they cannotÌýparticipate in.

A directory of this information is then made available to all members including members� contact details. Members can then use this directory to request assistance or anything else they may need.

Each member receives a membership card (eg. top of page) and window disc sticker (fig 2) to show that they have taken the pledge and are participating in the scheme.

It is recommended to ask all new and returning members to ‘seal� their membership by requesting a service or resource from other members. Past experience has shown that people are quicker to offer than they are to receive, so this is a way to offset that and get people into the habit of receiving.

If desired, the organiser can request a small membership fee to cover material costs.

Advantages

Everyone can participate, regardless of wealth, status, resources or skills.
It encourages socialisation and community bonding.
It is free to operate.
It doesn’t require any accounting, regulation or oversight.
It demonstrates the unconditional generosity of the human spirit.
High activity encourages growth in membership.
As a pilot program, this can be tried for a limited period with little or no time or cost investment.

[image error]

Resources:

Ìý

1. It’s Feasible

Because technology can � and already does � most of the hard work for us now.

Producing all of life’s necessities like food, clothing and building is already many times easier today than forty years ago, and it’s only going to get easier. Automated vertical farming, advanced cultivating techniques and 3D printed clothing and homes are already here.

The same level of technology and mechanisation is also being applied to produce luxury goods like cars, phones, computers, household appliances and furniture. Creating all the things we need has never been easier.

2. It’s Better

Because everyone can access what they need, and we don’t need to compete, trash the planet or go to war for profit.

Imagine no hunger, no stress, no debt, no forced to work long hours to pay for what you need? Who wouldn’t want that for themselves and others?

Also, once we eliminate the need for profit, and ‘cost� is no longer an issue, we can produce things much more sustainably and responsibly, thereby using less resources.

3. It’s Possible

Because we are a social species that naturally prefer cooperation once our basic needs are met.

We compete and hoard only because of scarcity. That’s just our survival instinct. But once our basic needs are met, we naturally gravitate into teams. groups, bands who like working and socialising together for the same ends.

4. It’s Inevitable

Because technology is killing paid labour, and global debts can mathematically never be repaid.

The same technology that can free us is already killing the labour market. Cashiers and menial jobs are being automated. Receptionists have been replaced by robot operators. And it’s not going to stop there. The human labour market is being eroded and unemployment will continue to rise and rise. Since our entire market system depends on human employment to function, soon it will cease to work.

Aside from that, our banking system operates almost entirely on credit � money for which no cash exists to repay and interest is constantly accruing. The money system runs entirely on confidence and our shared belief in its value. Once we lose confidence in it, we lose money.

is a proposal of ten basic principles to realign human values back to nature and the physical world, and away from imaginary, harmful constructs such as money, trade and borders.

Ìý

1. It's Feasible

Because technology can - and already does - most of the hard work for us now.

Producing all of life's necessities like food, clothing and building is already many times easier today than forty years ago, and it's only going to get easier. Automated vertical farming, advanced cultivating techniques and 3D printed clothing and homes are already here.

The same level of technology and mechanisation is also being applied to produce luxury goods like cars, phones, computers, household appliances and furniture. Creating all the things we need has never been easier.

Ìý

2. It's Better

Because everyone can access what they need, and we don’t need to compete, trash the planet or go to war for profit.

Imagine no hunger, no stress, no debt, no forced to work long hours to pay for what you need? Who wouldn't want that for themselves and others?

Also, once we eliminate the need for profit, and 'cost' is no longer an issue, we can produce things much more sustainably and responsibly, thereby using less resources.

Ìý

Ìý

3. It's Possible

Because we are a social species that naturally prefer cooperation once our basic needs are met.

We compete and hoard only because of scarcity. That's just our survival instinct. But once our basic needs are met, we naturally gravitate into teams. groups, bands who like working and socialising together for the same ends.

Ìý

4. It's Inevitable

Because technology is killing paid labour, and global debts can mathematically never be repaid.

The same technology that can free us is already killing the labour market. Cashiers and menial jobs are being automated. Receptionists have been replaced by robot operators. And it's not going to stop there. The human labour market is being eroded and unemployment will continue to rise and rise. Since our entire market system depends on human employment to function, soon it will cease to work.

Aside from that, our banking system operates almost entirely on credit � money for which no cash exists to repay and interest is constantly accruing. The money system runs entirely on confidence and our shared belief in its value. Once we lose confidence in it, we lose money.

Ìý

The Free World Charter is a proposal of ten basic principles to realign human values back to nature and the physical world, and away from imaginary, harmful constructs such as money, trade and borders.

Colin Turner

Robert Schram, coordinator of the COM21 (Conference of the Movements, December 5-6 2015, Paris) is now one of the coordinators of the UN United Earth Conference of Parties (COP21) in Paris.

The COM21 originated as The Free World Charter (Colin Turner) came into contact more often with other movements of the same direction and scope. In response, they have established collaboration with The Free Movement and Our United Earth (Justin Furuta). Robert and his team are working towards a major paradigm shift. They believe real change is possible if Movements find consensus to unite.

After inviting Al Gore to the COM21-event, Robert was pleasantly surprised that he received an invite back to attend the Climate Reality Leadership Corps training in Iowa.

Robert did not have to think twice, "Of course it's an honor to see the man behind the groundbreaking documentary film 'An Inconvenient Truth' which started a huge Climate discussion in 2006/2007. At least someone who was a public figure in politics finally picked up the tab, and I admire that," Robert states. "In the end we all have the same goal, which is navigating humanity towards a more sustainable way of living, keeping a healthy balance between humans basic needs and nature, with happiness for all.

Therefore, United Earth is negotiating with all kinds of Movements, big or small, in many fields, to send a representative to the COM21-event, so we can unite by forming an Alliance. During the COM21 and COP21 a Global Shift Manifesto will be presented to the United Nations. "Unified action on Earth would greatly help solve today's urgent security, poverty and environmental problems."

The Climate Reality Project, founded and chaired by former U.S. Vice President and Nobel Laureate Al Gore, is dedicated to unleashing a global cultural movement demanding action on the climate crisis. It employs cutting-edge communications and grassroots engagement tools to break the dam of inaction and raise the profile of the climate crisis to its proper state of urgency. With a global movement more than 5 million strong and a grassroots network of Climate Leaders trained by Chairman Al Gore, the Climate Reality team stands up to denial, presses for solutions, and spreads the truth about climate change to empower leaders to solve the climate crisis.

Robert Schram recently attended the training by Al Gore in Cedar Rapids, Iowa and now joins over 7,500other Climate Leaders from 125 countries in presenting new information on climate change to the public. Robert was accompanied by over 300 delegates in Cedar Rapids from May 5-6-7, 2015 to receive training from Mr. Gore and the Climate Reality team and develop the necessary skills to bring an understanding of the climate crisis to the world. Robert was very pleased with the opportunity to see Mr. Gore, stating, “The audience was thrilled by Mr. Gore’s enthusiasm and motivational words, it was a great experience to listen to someone who is inspiring people to do more to win the conversation on climate change. We are looking forward to our cooperation with Al Gore towards a better world and excited to see him during the COM21 on 5/6 December in Paris.�

The Climate Reality Project is leading a global revolution that’s 3.5 million strong � and growing. Robert and fellow Climate Leaders across the globe are available to present Al Gore’s Climate Reality message in their local communities by requesting a presentation through the Climate Reality website ().

For more info on the COM21 event visit:

or

Ìý

Ìý

Ìý

Ìý

Ìý