A lot of people voted day before yesterday based on their economic concerns, and now the top news is the economic “cliff” we’re about to go over. To understand what’s going on economically, we need more than what’s in the newspaper or on TV. The system’s mouthpieces aren’t going to explain it to you.

But in his 2011 book Sacred Economics Charles Eisenstein does. We need a whole new economic system, Eisenstein says, one that’s the opposite of our current one. Don’t panic: it won’t be as hard as you might think to create it — not only is it based much more securely on who we really are (and have been for most of the life of our species) than what we have today, we’ve already started moving toward it. And the tough economic times ahead will get us the rest of the way, after we get through what Eisenstein thinks will be a short, mild period of chaos.

Sacred Economics is just as valuable for its explanation of our current debt- and interest-based economic system — and why it’s so destructive of people and the planet — as it is for its positive future visioning. This is something you need to understand to see why the current system is falling apart, and to get your head out of the sand if you think it can continue much longer. Fortunately, Eisenstein’s vision of community, equality, justice, and sustainability is right there to console you and urge you on. It even dovetails with the spiritual understandings I hope you’re joining me in — basically, we’re all one; we stand or fall together; and even though She won’t fall if homo sapiens does, we’re one with Nature, too, and with the Divine, however you conceive of it.

If you don’t have access to Sacred Economics, or lack the time to read it, check out my notes under “Resources, non-fiction books” above.