I have a confession to make.
I want millions of people to read my novel Waking Up: A Journey Towards a New Dawn for Humanity. I want it to reach mainstream media, become the subject of discussions and debates around the world, and hopefully even become a major motion picture with the message eventually reaching hundreds of millions of people.
That might sound like hubris. Or perhaps you think I simply want to sell a lot of books.
Probably a little bit of both.
Yes, I would love to sell a lot of books. I’m not going to pretend otherwise.
But there is something far more important behind my ambition.
I genuinely, honestly, and deeply want to see change in this world.
Not just another political reform. Not another government promising to fix what the previous government failed to fix. Not just another redistribution of wealth that leaves the detrimental structures of civilization untouched.
I want humanity to begin questioning the very foundations upon which our civilization has been built.
Because I truly believe that many of our greatest problems have a common denominator:
a system based on money, trading, and ownership of the resources upon which everyone depends.
And I believe there is another way.
What If We Could Actually Do This?
Imagine a world where nobody has to worry about having enough money to survive. Where food, housing, healthcare, education, transportation, and everything else people need are available through cooperation and intelligent resource management assisted by AI.
Imagine a world where ownership has been replaced by stewardship. Where the resources of our planet are no longer treated primarily as commodities to be bought, sold, accumulated, and exploited, but as a shared inheritance to be cared for and managed for the benefit of everyone.
Imagine a civilization where advanced technology, artificial intelligence, robotics, and automation are used to liberate humanity from unnecessary labor rather than simply to increase profits for those who own the technology.
A world where people are free to contribute according to their interests, talents, and passions, rather than being forced to sell their time simply to have a life.
A world where humanity cooperates to create abundance, restore nature, eliminate poverty, and make life on Earth as wonderful as possible for everyone.
Does that sound impossible?
Perhaps it does.
But what if it isn’t?
the greatest obstacle
What if the greatest obstacle isn’t a lack of resources, technology, or intelligence, but our inability to imagine organizing civilization differently?
What if money, trading, and ownership are the very culprits of our problems and not indispensable foundations of civilization, but rather human inventions that have served their purposes and are now increasingly standing in the way of what humanity could become?
What if we could actually create a world that works for everyone?
A Novel, Not a Manifesto
This is why I wrote Waking Up.
Not as a political manifesto. Not as an economic textbook. And certainly not as a detailed blueprint for a new civilization.
It’s a novel.
A story about the bewildered billionaire Benjamin Michaels, a contemporary man who wakes up a hundred years into the future and discovers that humanity has created a civilization completely beyond his imagination.
Money has disappeared. Trading has become obsolete. Ownership has been replaced by stewardship. Humanity has learned to organize its resources cooperatively, guided by advanced artificial intelligence and a fundamentally different understanding of what civilization is supposed to accomplish.
Through Benjamin’s eyes, readers discover this world gradually, along with its history, its technologies, its relationships, its challenges, and its extraordinary possibilities.
And, of course, not everyone is happy with the new world. There is an antagonist who would prefer to return to the old system.
Because Waking Up is, first and foremost, a story.
But behind that story is an invitation.
An invitation to imagine something different.
I don’t expect readers to agree with everything in the book. I don’t expect them to believe that every technological or social development I describe will become reality.
What I hope is that, somewhere along the journey, readers might begin to think:
Wait a minute. This could actually work.
And perhaps, by the time they finish the book, they might find themselves thinking:
This is the world I want to live in. This is the future I want for my children.
That is the seed I want to plant.
When an Idea Takes Root
I believe true and lasting change begins with an idea.
And mind you, this is not my idea. I didn’t wake up one morning with a sudden eureka moment, realizing that money, trading, and ownership were at the root of so many of humanity’s problems. No, throughout my life, I had a growing feeling that something was fundamentally wrong with the way our civilization was organized. I felt that humanity could do so much better, but I couldn’t quite see how. That changed in 2008, when I discovered The Venus Project and its vision of a global resource-based economy. Suddenly, so many things fell into place. It gave shape to something I had felt for years but hadn’t been able to articulate. That discovery eventually inspired me to write Waking Up, a novel that I now genuinely believe could help change the world if enough people read it. Not because I have invented some revolutionary new idea, but because I hope to help an existing idea take root in the minds and hearts of humanity.
Not just any idea, but an idea that makes sense to people. An idea that offers a genuinely desirable alternative to something they previously considered impossible.
At first, a world without money, trading, and ownership probably seem absurd.
People might laugh at the suggestion.
They might say that human nature makes it impossible. That people are too selfish. That nobody would contribute without financial incentives. That civilization would collapse without prices, wages, profits, and ownership.
But then perhaps they read a story that makes them reconsider.
Perhaps they begin to see how such a civilization might function.
And suddenly, the impossible becomes a question.
Could this actually work?
That question is enormously important.
Because once people begin asking whether something is possible, they can start exploring how to make it possible.
And when enough people begin to believe that a different civilization is not only possible but desirable, something extraordinary can happen.
The idea Takes root
After all, new ideas often seem to pass through three stages, as described in a famous saying commonly attributed to the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer:
- First, they are ridiculed as absurd or impossible.
- Then, as they gain traction and begin challenging established beliefs, they face fierce opposition from those defending the status quo.
- Finally, they become accepted as self-evident, as though everyone had known the truth all along. The attribution to Schopenhauer is disputed, but the observation is compelling. And perhaps the idea of a world without money, trading, and ownership is following a similar path.
It spreads from person to person. From conversations between friends to discussions in families, schools, universities, workplaces, and communities.
Scientists begin considering the technological possibilities. Engineers begin exploring practical solutions.
Economists question old assumptions. Communities experiment with new forms of cooperation. Artificial intelligence helps people develop and evaluate ideas that might previously have been beyond their reach.
And eventually, the conversation changes.
Instead of asking why a different world cannot work, people begin asking:
How can we get from here to there?
That is when real change begins.
Revolution by Force
There is, however, something absolutely fundamental about how this transformation must happen.
It cannot be imposed from above.
Humanity has already experienced revolutions in which one ruling elite was overthrown, only to be replaced by another.
Consider the Russian Revolution more than a hundred years ago.
It emerged from profound dissatisfaction with inequality, exploitation, and the concentration of power. Many of those who supported it genuinely believed they were helping create a fairer society.
But the Soviet system that followed eventually developed its own powerful ruling elite, with enormous authority concentrated in the hands of relatively few people.
Whatever the original intentions, the promised liberation did not unfold as many had hoped.
I don’t want humanity to repeat that mistake.
I don’t want a new revolutionary leadership taking power and deciding how everyone else should live.
I don’t want another ideology imposed through coercion, fear, or violence.
And I certainly don’t want a new elite claiming ownership of a world that is supposed to be based on sharing and stewardship.
That would defeat the entire purpose.
We cannot force humanity into a better world. We must inspire humanity to want to create one together.
And that is precisely why the idea must spread as far and wide as possible.
It must take deep roots in the minds and hearts of humanity, not merely among a handful of intellectuals, politicians, or visionaries.
It must become something people understand, believe in, and genuinely want.
Not because somebody has told them what to think, but because they have considered the possibilities for themselves.
Only then can a transformation of this magnitude become something fundamentally different from the revolutions of the past.
Not a struggle for control of a new system.
But a collective decision to create something better.
A Transformation of Human Understanding
Ultimately, what I envision is not merely an economic transformation.
It is a transformation of human understanding itself.
For thousands of years, humanity has organized much of its civilization around competition for resources, territorial control, ownership, trading, and the accumulation of wealth.
These arrangements have become so deeply embedded in our thinking that many people regard them as natural and unavoidable.
But they are not laws of nature.
They are human arrangements based on ideas.
Unfortunately these ideas has led to a lot of suffering.
But human arrangements can change based on new ideas.
What if people began to understand that the purpose of civilization is not to generate profits, accumulate wealth, or maintain economic growth for its own sake?
What if the purpose of civilization were simply to make life as good as possible for everyone, while caring for the planet that makes life possible?
That would change the questions humanity asks.
Instead of asking whether there is enough money to feed everyone, we would ask whether there is enough food, land, water, technology, and productive capacity.
Instead of asking whether healthcare is profitable, we would ask how to make the best possible healthcare available to everyone.
Instead of asking how many jobs automation might eliminate, we would ask how much unnecessary labor it could relieve humanity of.
Instead of asking who can afford a home, we would ask how to provide good homes for everyone who needs one.
And instead of asking how to compete more effectively against other nations, we could begin asking how to cooperate more effectively across the entire planet.
The possibilities are enormous.
But to recognize them, we first have to change how we think.
The Intelligence Within
I don’t claim to have all the answers.
Far from it.
I believe the answers are already embedded in humanity itself.
In billions of minds. In our accumulated knowledge, our scientific discoveries, our creativity, our compassion, our curiosity, and our extraordinary ability to solve problems together.
No single person could possibly design an entirely new civilization.
Nor should anyone attempt to dictate one.
What I envision would have to emerge through collaboration, communication, experimentation, and the collective intelligence of humanity.
And I believe this requires something more than the short-sighted intelligence of the ego.
The ego tends to ask: What’s in it for me? How can I win? How can I gain more power, wealth, or control?
That way of thinking has influenced human civilization for a very long time.
Another Kind of Intelligence
But there is another kind of intelligence available to us.
An intelligence rooted in love, understanding, empathy, curiosity, and the recognition that the well-being of others matters just as much as our own.
An intelligence that asks:
What can we create together?
How can we make life better for everyone?
How can we care for this extraordinary planet and all the beings living upon it?
I believe this deeper intelligence exists within every human being.
And perhaps the greatest challenge facing humanity is not developing more powerful technology, but learning to use our intelligence and technology together, guided by wisdom rather than fear, competition, and the desire for control.
That is how I envision real and lasting change.
Not through domination.
Not through violence.
But through love, understanding, curiosity, and cooperation.
All the Answers
I Don’t Have All the Answers. Humanity Does.
This is also why I don’t consider Waking Up a finished proposal for how civilization should function.
It’s a starting point. An inspiration.
A glimpse of a possible future
I have spent many years thinking about these ideas, and I have tried to imagine what that civilization based on sharing, stewardship, and intelligent resource management might look like.
But I am only one person.
There are countless questions I haven’t answered. Countless challenges I haven’t considered. Countless solutions that other people might discover.
And that’s exactly the point.
The purpose of the book is not to provide every answer.
It is to inspire people to start asking different questions.
Because once enough people genuinely want to create a world that works for everyone, humanity can begin directing its collective intelligence toward that goal.
Not following one person’s blueprint.
Not obeying a new political elite.
But collaborating to discover the best ways forward.
Different communities might experiment with different approaches. Some ideas would work. Others would fail and need to be reconsidered. New technologies would open new possibilities. New insights would emerge.
And gradually, through learning and cooperation, something extraordinary might take shape.
What humanity needs is an idea powerful enough to inspire people to start finding those answers together.
Why I’m Asking You to Share This
So now, perhaps you understand why I want my book to reach as many people as possible.
Why I hope it will attract the attention of mainstream media.
Why I would love to see it become a major motion picture, reaching audiences around the world.
And why I keep asking people to share my articles and recommend Waking Up to their friends.
Yes, I want to sell books.
Of course I do.
But if selling books were my primary motivation, I should probably have written something entirely different.
I wrote Waking Up because I genuinely believe humanity can create a much better world than the one we have today.
A world without poverty, without economic exploitation, without the constant struggle for money, and without the enormous waste of human potential and resources that our current arrangements produce.
A world where people are free to live meaningful lives, contribute according to their interests and abilities, and enjoy the extraordinary possibilities that science, technology, and human cooperation can offer.
Our Shared Home
A world where humanity finally begins treating planet Earth as a shared home rather than a collection of territories and resources to be owned, exploited, and fought over.
And I believe the first step toward such a world is for enough people to begin imagining it.
To genuinely want it.
To believe that it might be possible.
Because when an idea takes root deeply enough in humanity, it can become much more powerful than any individual who first expressed it.
Think of ideas like democracy, the abolition of slavery, women’s rights, and universal human rights. All challenged deeply rooted beliefs about how society should function. They spread, inspired people, and gradually transformed the world. What once seemed impossible eventually became something billions of people considered self-evident.
It can become a shared vision.
And a shared vision will inspire collective action.
That is why I am asking you to help spread the word.
Not because I want everyone to agree with me.
Not because I want people to follow me.
But because I want the idea to grow beyond me, beyond my book, and beyond anything I could possibly accomplish on my own.
I want people to question it, challenge it, improve it, and make it their own.
I want it to take root so deeply and spread so widely that no individual, organization, government, or elite can ever claim ownership of it.
Because the future of humanity should belong to humanity.
Do You Really Want to See Change?
If so, imagine a fundamental transformation of civilization itself.
Imagine humanity finally realizing that it doesn’t have to continue organizing life around competition, trading, ownership, and money for survival.
Imagine billions of people beginning to ask how to create a world that truly works for everyone.
And imagine what might happen when they start collaborating to make it real.
I don’t know exactly how that future will unfold.
Nobody does.
But I believe it can begin with something remarkably simple.
An idea.
An idea that inspires people.
An idea that people believe in.
An idea that takes root.
An idea who’s time has come.
Benjamin Michaels wakes up to a new world. I want humanity to wake up to the possibility of creating one.
That is why I wrote Waking Up.
And that is why, if you’ve read the book and enjoyed it, I hope you’ll recommend it to others. And if this article resonates with you, I hope you will share it too.
I thank you from the depth of my heart.
Not merely to help me sell more books.
But to help an idea take root in the world.
