One of the most effective things we can do

Little time? Jump to the Summary & Call to Action

 

I have been deprioritizing the direct work towards my personal success lately…

…because the things I would like to move and achieve will be much more difficult in case we lose the stability of our liberal democracies, as well as the hard-won freedom and peace in Europe and many other parts of the world. In the worst case, some of my ideas could even become impossible to execute successfully in the way that they can create the desired positive impact.

Tip: Read what interests you most by clicking on the link in the table of contents. This blogpost now contains much more information than I was planning, but there were simply many connected topics, which I didn’t want to leave uncommented.

Contents:

Introduction

The risks we are facing

Some ways how to evaluate effective actions

Risk evaluation & mitigation

Effective impact framework

Quantitative evaluation in terms of government spendings

Qualitative evaluation based on requirements

How to foster hope and motivation

How to vote consciously

More ideas for actions to protect liberal democracies

Feedback & Discussion

Summary & Call to Action

Introduction

I never wanted to write a blogpost like this, and I still hate that I feel the need to do so because it’s one of the most important topics for our world right now. I’ve been writing this blogpost to structure my thoughts, to share this summary of the situation and my opinion, as well as some evaluations and actionable approaches that you can take, too.

It would be much nicer to live in a world where we can only talk about traveling, food, sports, photography and so many other hobbies or business ideas without having an increasing risk that our freedoms could be suppressed. But we have the chance to get back on the track to a bright future when we take the right steps together quickly.

Unfortunately, populism, direct propaganda, other forms of extremism and self-reinforcing bubbles have started to divide societies in many countries on the globe already - with the help of social media algorithms and news channels that widen these trenches, because it gets more user attention and thus increases their profits. Right-wing extremists and some rich individuals have risen to a status of power that they’ve already been abusing for questionable motives. It seems like they have one thing in common: They only care about their small in-group circle, they didn’t understand and / or don’t acknowledge major global risks that we need to mitigate in order to continue having a livable society and planet, and they seem to not have any good lasting solutions without major negative side-effects.

Some things are critical factors for personal happiness and business success, though. For example, a stable society & economy in peace, sufficient natural resources on a stable planet, and the freedom to fulfill one’s own dreams while making sure that no one else is being hurt or disadvantaged due to that. After all, the best wins are the ones, which we can all celebrate together.

The most effective thing that you can do to reach your long-term personal & business goals, and enable a happy future, could thus also be to partly deprioritize the direct approach in order to have enough time and energy to work on keeping these general requirements first.

The easiest thing you can do is to vote consciously. In addition, there are many other things everyone can do to protect liberal democracies and thus enable proper mitigation measures against the largest global risks, which we are facing already. More on that in the next section.

You can see this engagement as a necessary maintenance task, an important side hustle or a new hobby - whatever helps you best to work on it regularly until we decreased the largest risks to a sufficiently low probability.

 

I would prefer to work hard on projects as a freelance consultant and only go travelling in between, but to keep this option and my other ideas open in the future, we need to set and keep the right societal foundation now. Illustrative photo of lake Bled in Slovenia

 

The risks we are facing

Currently, many major risks are sharply increasing, thus threatening a happy future for all of us. The following points in the described extremes may hopefully still be fairly far away, but once we get pushed too far on the downhill road towards these risks, it gets much harder to turn back around:

What we could lose on that downhill-path:

  • Liberal democracies and engaged societies that care about more than their personal profit & power and have both the will and capacities to act for the greater good.

  • Equality and individual freedoms, e.g. of speech and expression, the possibility to travel freely, to decide where we want to live, with which people and mindsets we prefer to connect.

  • The possibility for cooperation between countries due to nationalization, less communication between different opinions and a loss of understanding for other living conditions and cultures.

  • The belief in science and the reality due to the spread of fake-news and propaganda

  • Adequate, holistic education including the teaching of humanitarian values; critical thinking and fact-checking; prejudice, bias & heuristics; data interpretation with focus on correlation and causality etc.

Furthermore, there are also other risks with potentially existential or at least very big damages, which could become more likely to happen:

  • Devastating climate change, which the richest / most powerful individuals are still able to escape from to their own “safe houses” while leaving the majority to suffer.

  • Already neglected existential risks like pandemics and escalations from uncontrollable biotechnology and AI-technology advances.

  • Giving autocrats, totalitarianism and oligarchs a sign that they are able to destabilize more democracies to increase their power by abusing social media platforms, news-channels and lobbyism.

  • Conflicts and war leading to more economic, political, natural and refugee crises, thus leading to even more conflicts.

  • Propaganda and oppression, which deteriorates the will and engagement of the majority of populations.

  • The vicious cycle of fascism that consists of the propaganda to tell the people that their problems would be caused by a scapegoat, e.g. the actions of liberal democratic counterparts or ethnic minorities, and the actions fascists then actively take to (supposedly) increase these problems and further suppress the majority. Inequality and hate drives the power to the “leading class” and the steered hate against a scapegoat helps fascists keep control of the people’s minds. In the 21st century, I believe we need to be cautious for the potentially even more vicious mix of fascism with capitalism when very few individuals can use propaganda to enrich only themselves while widening the gap of wealth and power.

  • A repetition of the suppression, imprisoning, murders and genocides in Nazi Germany, potentially leading to something similar to the holocaust. It’s helpful to watch this short video, check out this website or read this article about fascism to understand the risk and the way of how the Nazis came to power and were able to execute the holocaust by controlling the media first and creating a society where most people stood by and remained silent instead of demonstrating.

The very big problem about the already existing and threatening major risks like climate change, pandemics, biotechnology- and AI-related risks is that we need to cooperate globally, efficiently and straightforward to be able to mitigate and prevent them to a reasonable extent. This is already difficult enough in a peaceful, unified world, though.

Therefore, any destabilization and nationalization is making it more difficult to prevent these global existential risks already.

Fires in Los Angeles, 02.2025. Image from the UCLA

Damages after the flood in Valencia, 10.2024. Image from earth.org

If we stop cooperating with science globally, much bigger natural catastrophes like the fires in LA, the floods in Spain and central Europe or pandemics like Covid19 will hit us even harder and by more surprise while we’re less prepared to cope with them.

Some ways how to evaluate effective actions

This section is a relatively high-level excursus to show you some qualitative and quantitative frameworks to grossly evaluate the effectivity of actions in such a complex setting. To be honest, my intuition was telling me first this time that a conscious vote and work to protect the liberal democracies and mitigate global risks is very effective. The following frameworks are thus both examples to evaluate other effective actions and show as an example why a conscious vote can be so effective.

It’s good to start off with a small definition: “Effectivity = Doing the right things”, meaning that the action does create the desired difference. The more effective an action is, the more of the right difference it thus makes.


Therefore, the most effective actions help create the most impact. This is very relevant for scalable solutions. As voting and protecting democracy and freedom cannot be scaled up, it is clear that these actions are only effective to the extent that they can make a difference. For example, it’s very effective to spend a few hours to reflect and research for the best parties to vote for on a national and international base, but spending more time on it doesn’t make it more effective. Similarly, stabilizing a democracy is only very effective when its stability is at a higher risk. When it is stable and there are little risks, additional actions do only create marginal additional impacts.

In stable or peaceful times, elections can still have a large impact potential to enable economic growth and societal development, though. In this blogpost, I’m mostly focusing on the risks and potential damages, which can are a positive impact when mitigated. However, investing in green technologies and alternative proteins while supporting the development with favorable regulations can unlock huge growth opportunities. Here are some links to articles from BCG and Spiegel about these market potentials:

Spending a few hours to choose the “best” vote, talking to other people to do the same, and protesting for democracy, diversity and positive developments on the streets in Germany before the election on 23.02.25 can be very effective (at least) in the current situation (Jan-Feb 2025). For example, many people protesting, sending messages, speaking up within 2 days led to the loss of the majority for a draft legislation, which the conservative “Union” for the first time since WWII wanted to push through with the help of the right, at least partly right-wing extremist party “AFD”. The protests are so popular, because for many it means protecting the base of the democracy, enabling a livable future life and avoiding a dystopia with consequences like during the Nazi period (description on www.bundestag.de, www.dw.com).

But let’s jump into some of the examples to illustratively evaluate the effectiveness of voting and other actions to protect liberal democracies.

Risk evaluation & mitigation

Generally, the “size” of risks can be evaluated by multiplying the potential damage with the probability that it happens: Damage × Probability = Risk

This is a very simple risk model, but therefore also practical for the explanation in our case. Here’s a short explanation of the model by a risk-expert. If you would like to make it more precise, more in-depth research of the size of the damage and the probability goes a long way. In addition, you could create a distribution of all possible damages and the connected probabilities and create an average risk evaluation.

But, let’s jump back to a basic risk evaluation with an illustrative example for the upcoming elections in Germany: What's on the edge in case we let the peaceful stability in Europe collapse due to the efforts of Musk, Trump, Putin, the AFD and other (partly) right-wing extremist parties?

For the sake of simplicity, I’m neglecting the risks of more violence crimes, international conflicts, pandemics, etc. (take a look at the risk section above) and only take numbers from the World Economic Forum for climate change damages by 2050 on the previously expected trajectory towards 2,5-2,9°C:

  • Additional 14,5 million deaths due to climate change

  • >2 billion healthy life years lost

  • $ 12,5 trillion in economic losses (12,5 * 10^12)

This data report is from 2024, before Trump became president of the United States again and before the hottest January ever measured with the global average surface temperature at 1,7°C above the pre-industrial level (Copernicus ECMWF). Based on these recent developments, the current trajectory probably already increased to >3°C global warming. This means that the potential damages are higher already than calculated within this blogpost.
If you want to check out more data and analysis about climate change, I can recommend the many and detailed diagrams of Our World in Data.

Being on the current trajectory, we can assume a very high chance (e.g. ~95%) of hitting these damages by 2050. Even if we neglect that these damages will increase exponentially if the global temperature rises further, a 5% increase of the probability due to the loss of liberal democracies working on climate change mitigation, would lead to the following additional damages:

  • Additional 0,725 million deaths due to climate change

  • >100 million healthy life years lost

  • $ 0,6125 trillion in economic losses (6,125 * 10^11)

Avoiding this increase of probability is a risk reduction and can thus be considered a positive impact.

Because the German right-wing party AFD wants to dismantle wind power plants, “copy” reactions in other countries to this setback alone could lead to losing the track to the above mentioned <3°C scenario. The impact of only one vote out of the approx. 60 million eligible voters in Germany can thus be calculated by dividing the additional damages by 60 million:

  • 0,0125 lifes lost / protected

  • >1,67 healthy life years lost / won

  • >$ 10.400 more / less economic losses

Quite an impact for just a few hours of work including the research and going to the ballot box or arranging postal vote in Germany, right? Or when did you last spend only a few hours to save >10k € and > 1,5 life years?

(The effectivity of votes differs between countries and depends on the potential changes in politics and to which extent they affect the rest of the world.)

And these results are still neglecting the increasing damages and other risks directly connected to right-wing-extremist ideas potentially being executed in the government in Germany. The damages would be much higher and thus the impact of a single vote would also be much higher than what this diagram shows:

Impact of one vote in Germany (February 2025)

Your vote is your choice to help protect or to help destroy. Use it consciously. Remember that you need to be the change that you want to see in the world and that the best way to do so is to treat others in the way that you want to be treated.

I never wanted to get involved with politics. I already dislike that politicians often prioritize to receive votes in the next election period over actually solving problems that often need a longer time to be properly addressed than one election period. Unfortunately in these times, I believe that we have to do something as politicians, billionaires and social media influencers have a massive amount of power, which some do not use for a better world, but mostly to increase and keep their own power and wealth. We simply cannot afford to put the greater good and future of our world at risk for the power of a few rich people, the fear of active change and the populism that exaggerates threats due to migrants already living in Europe over other global risks.

Effective Impact Framework

I made a short evaluation with the Effective Impact framework, which I initially developed for myself, to show you another way of evaluating and comparing effectiveness. The results are a gross approximation as you will see, but sufficiently accurate to show you that you can also make a difference for the climate with your vote and with additional engagement to enable governments that try to keep our world on a 1,5°C path.

The following steps explain and show the results of a gross and illustrative calculation with my Effective Impact framework to give me and you a feeling of the positive impact that I or also you can create by protecting liberal democracies, which continue to work on the 1,5°C path. I chose the reduction of CO2e emissions as a KPI (quantitative variable to compare), because I’m using this KPI as the most motivating for my personal projects and decision-making for long-term-commitments in my working life so that I can compare them with other, previously made calculations.

My Effective Impact framework looks like a descending staircase. It starts at the top with a total impact potential, which needs to be reduced step-by-step which impact is actually additional to what is happening anyways, how much of that is generally feasible and then reachable by the relevant organization / person. Finally, a chance of success for the reachable scale is also considered in order to be able to compare apples with apples and in order to consider all challenges within the idea / impact project:

  • “Total scale”: The starting point of the calculations are the GHG emissions, which we need to reduce on average per year throughout the next 10 years until 2035 compared to the forecast based on current policies. Currently we’re at above 50 Gt CO2e / year and we need to get to ca. 25 Gt CO2e in 2035.

    • A steady decrease as forecasted in most diagrams means starting with 50 Gt CO2e in year 0, then 47,5 Gt CO2e in year 1… until in year 10 we reach 25 Gt CO2e. The reduction of emissions then forms a triangle of with a striaght line going down from 50 to 25 over a period of 11 years including yeat 0, which in the middle is exactly at the middle of the reduction: 37,5 Gt CO2e after 5 years.

    • Based on the almost linear decrease this leads to approx. 12,5 Gt CO2e reductions / year [50-25)/2], which equals the sum of the yearly reduction divided by the period [(0+2,5+5+7,5+10+12,5+15+17,5+20+22,5+25)Gt/11a = 125 Gt / 11a = 12,5 Gt/a].

  • “Additional scale” (How much of the total scale has not been sufficiently addressed yet incl. work in progress?): Compared to the status quo of continuing current policies, all of these CO2e savings are additional.

    • 100 % * 12,5 Gt CO2e = 12,5 Gt CO2e

  • “Feasible scale” (How much of the additional scale is realistically feasible to work on physically, with imaginable technologies etc.?): We do have the required technologies already or they are shortly before being competitive (e.g. alternative proteins). In addition, we have other means to reduce emissions and sequester CO2 to get on track.
    Nonetheless, I calculated a 20% reduction to consider technologies and cultural changes that cannot be scaled and applied quick enough even in almost perfect conditions.

    • 80 % * 12,5 Gt CO2e = 10 Gt CO2e

  • “Reachable scale” (How much of the feasible potential is Germany able to address as part of the EU potentially?): The vote in Germany alone cannot put us on track for the world. As an approximation, I used the European share of global emissions (6% in 2023), because a liberal government in Germany keeps the option open to cooperate through Europe while inspiring and supporting a continuing engagement for GHG emission reductions around the world.
    Furthermore, I considered the 60 Mio. possible votes in the German elections of which the efforts of an politically unexperienced person with little reach like me can only win approx. 100 additional votes for political parties that protect liberal democracies and keep the door for a 1,5 °C scenario open.

    • 10 Gt CO2e * 6% = 600 Mt CO2e

    • 600 Mt CO2e / 60 Mio. * 100 = 1.000 t CO2e

  • “Realistic scale” (How high is the chance that a German government can help Europe and the world to stay on track to the 1,5°C path as calculated?): This is a gross assumption, but I do not like to calculate with very high chances of success. Therefore, I only used a 10% chance that a German government composed of any of the strong and existing parties actively trying to mitigate climate change both wants to build the foundation for that and is able to put Germany and Europe on this track.

    • 10% * 1.000 t CO2e = 100 t CO2e

Very grossly summarized, one vote in the elections in Germany on 23.02.25 has the impact potential of ~1 t CO2 savings / year, when it’s used for parties, which try to keep Germany, Europe and the world on the 1,5°C path. If an average German manages to win 7 additional votes for political parties that push climate change mitigation sufficiently, this approx. equals the average annual CO2e emissions per person in Germany of 7,1 t CO2e / year.

Effective Impact Framework analysis of protecting democracies that can still work on the 1,5C path

In case you’re interested in learning more about my complete Effective Impact Framework and the playbook how to build effective purpose organizations, you can check out the website and download the playbook there.

Based on the “effective impact framework”, I also gathered some qualitative questions to help individuals guide their decisions to make a positive impact - in their career, free time or generally any projects.

The same document also contains some interesting examples of particularly effective and harmful actions of the past as inspiration what could be done and what should not be done.
For example, the comparably little known Viktor Zhdanov, Dr. Landsteiner and Stanislav Petrov are among the most effective people in humanity with regard to saving lives.


In order to evaluate whether the side hustle of trying to win an additional 100 votes is effective enough to be competitive with other potential actions, I compared it to the impact potential of “normal” jobs I could do. The following chart shows my current, grossly approximate calculations as a freelancer for innovative food start-ups (max. 3 / year), consultant for innovative food start-ups (max. 6 / year), or as a “normal” full-time employee only at a very high-potential alternative protein company. Very high-potential means that this company needs to have such amazing products that they could make 16,5 Mio. additional omnivores consume 80% less meat & dairy, because their products are so good. Most normal jobs at average food start-ups have impact potentials that are ca. 100-10.000 times smaller, because they don’t manage to permanently convince > 150k omnivores to become flexitarians.

But let’s circle back to protecting liberal democracies: Yes, the potential CO2e emission savings by keeping the minimal chance to keep the 1,5 °C path are competitively large even only as a short, temporary side hustle by talking to a few hundred people a few weeks before the elections. In addition, it’s still possible to follow this side-hustle while working full-time on other jobs.

Impact analysis result of protecting democracy compared to freelance consulting and a full-time job

The previous diagram shows that protecting liberal democracies can already be quite effective in terms of reducing CO2e emissions compared to my objectives as a full-time freelancer and consultant or the “normal” jobs that would interest me:

  • Political side-hustle = Protecting liberal democracies in Europe by winning 20 additional votes for the parties that keep the possibility for the 1,5°C path: ca. 40 t CO2e / a

  • Freelancer: Becoming a temporary team member in sustainable food start-ups to make them more efficient and effective (max. 3 companies per year): ca. 109 t CO2e / a

  • Consultant: Build efficient operations for sustainable food start-ups and help them create more impact by becoming more effective (~6 companies per year): ca. 176 t CO2e / a

  • Full-time employee: Joining only a very innovative, sustainable food start-up with potentially large impact in an important and influential role: ca. 76 t CO2e / a

I do have additional, entrepreneurial ideas on my mind, with which I could create much more impact with my personal work and maximize my impact. If I add my current assumptions of some of them to the diagram, it’s not possible to see the differences between the “normal” work, though. This is due to the fact that the additionality of new organizations can be much higher and that the impact doesn’t need to be divided by a larger number of influential employees, but primarily by the number of founders. Additional employees often “just” increase the chances of success and thus the increase of the realistic scale due to them could be attributed as their personal impact within the organization.

Please note that this use of the Effective Impact framework is meant to display the impact potential of protecting liberal democracies and not a perfect use case to display its functionality. For further info, please check out my freelance consulting website, download the playbook and / or reach out to me directly.

Quantitative evaluation in terms of government spendings

An interesting evaluation from 80.000 hours (an organization from the Effective Altruism community) also shows that voting is a very effective action and that convincing your friends to vote has a fairly high chance of success.

The impact calculation based on government spendings basically considers the expected “budget” a government probably spends throughout the next legislative period. For the elections in Germany on 23.02.25 this would equal approx. 4 x the last federal budget in 2024 of 476 billion € = ca. 2 trillion €. When we consider that all votes can influence how this money is spent, we can divide the number by the 60 million potential votes. Based on this calculation, one vote in Germany would be worth 33.333 € or 8.333 € / a.

Usually, even a completely different parliament doesn’t completely change the government spendings, but even if only 10% of the spendings are changed in one legislative period, one vote still is worth the allocation of ca. 3.000 € in Germany. This is still a large impact for making a few crosses and informing oneself beforehand about a good use.

80.000 hours also lists several additional aspects, which display how much difference a vote can make due to the effects a certain candidate or political party has on the fate of the country and the world, e.g.:

  • R&D into new clean energy technologies or alternative proteins as “one of the most cost-effective ways to limit climate change”.

  • Vaccine research that can mitigate future pandemics. An example is the “enormous return the world got from countries like the UK that decided, years ago, to fund preliminary research into coronavirus vaccines”.

  • The risk and negative impact of nuclear war and other wars, also due to hot-headed politicians especially when they candidate against well-tempered persons who understand risks and consequences, and care about the people who would suffer from them.

  • Other non-budgetary impacts like the effects of foreign policies, regulations, economic incentives, social freedoms etc.

It is also pointed out that the potential impact divided by the time required to decide for a “good” vote is very small (minutes to a few hours), which makes the effort to take a good vote very effective. Finally, the topic of winning extra votes is evaluated and they show a summary of the cost-effectiveness of several ways to win votes. The most interesting aspect in my opinion is that contacting friends with personal appeals has “10 times or more than the effect of an appeal from a stranger”.

Qualitative evaluation based on requirements

It can also be possible to evaluate effectiveness based on qualitative requirements and the importance that they are met for the success of the project. The more important the requirement is to be able to reach the goal, the more effective it is to set this requirement. A very basic example would be the requirement to add a goalie to your lacrosse / handball / football team, because without one, a team barely has any chance of winning a whole match.

As I wrote in the very beginning, in the worst case, some of my ideas could even become impossible to execute successfully in the way that they can create the desired positive impact. This is the case because these ideas need several requirements such that they can work well:

  • A well-working society and reliable supply chains.

  • Economic stability to make plans and investments due to stable democracies in a strong and peaceful union.

  • Freedom to hire any good person and try out new business ideas that work towards your purpose.

  • Fair and free communication channels where everyone has the same chance to gain attention.

  • Many normal people (working in average jobs) who can afford sustainable (food) products, because the majority of populations is in the middle class and doesn’t need to buy the cheapest products in the grocery store.

  • Fair tax legislations and state supports (subsidies), which increase the costs of products that deteriorate our future living & production possibilities while decreasing or at least not increasing the costs of products that improve our future living & production possibilities, e.g. in order to sustainably feed the world’s growing population.

  • Consumers (generally people or the society as a whole) who believe in science and thus have a rational interest to act against climate change and want to protect the environment.

  • Protection from fake news by independent journalism, (live) fact-checking and actively penalizing them instead of spreading them such that populists and lobbyists cannot greenwash their harming products anymore while using their money to vilify more sustainable solutions that can become a competition to their profits in the future.

  • Consumers are thus generally still able to learn and reflect instead of blindly following populists due to one-sided propaganda on social media platforms that are controlled by very few persons who mostly have their own interests (money & power) in mind.

  • A general believe that anyone in the world can do good and make a difference (and that there are no different classes of humans - no race theory).

  • Generally freedom of speech, travel and opinion.

  • A general openness towards new ideas, technologies, solutions and a positive connotation with progressive change and testing new ideas with adequate risk management.

These requirements can be moved out of reach or simply taken away when we lose our liberal democracies in Europe. In this case, it is a very effective action and important for me to use some of my time, energy, effort and money to protect them. Without these requirements, impact organizations and sustainable businesses with a purpose are artificially disadvantaged against companies that exploit humans and the planet, and it will be much more difficult to build organizations that enable a decent future, too.

Unfortunately, neither the risks nor the mitigation actions are positive reach goals that are easy to follow because they activate more eustress than distress. Looking at them might create a negative feeling connected with them, reduce motivation and even harm your progress. Therefore, I gathered a few ideas in the next section on how to foster hope and motivation while doing effective things that mitigate the risks.

How to foster hope and motivation

Fear and distress can be a powerful short-term motivator to act quickly. However, they also drain our energy quickly and foster intuitive actions more than conscious and reflective actions. Although, fear and stress thus helps us do more of the presumed right things, these things could actually worsen the situation instead of making it better while burning us out and thus reduce our chances to take effective actions against our threats in the future. You can compare it to a sprint in any direction to run away from a sabertooth tiger.

So these “motivators” won’t help us to step-by-step solve complex issues and drive long-term societal developments. Instead we should handle the situation like a marathon or rather a long-distance hike. In the following sub-sections, I gathered a few ideas how to create the hope and long-term motivation that we need to successfully mitigate the global problems, which are major risks for our societies, planet, and life in general:


Create and keep up hope

Hope is a way of thinking that “involves optimism and a can-do attitude” (PsychCentral). It is the belief that the future can be better (than expected) and that you, or we as the people in general, have the ability to make this happen.

Luckily, hope also is a skill / attitude that we all can learn and improve, e.g. by:

  • Setting high, but realistic goals, which you see as exciting challenges

  • Increasing motivation (as with the example in the next sub-sections)

  • Expecting challenges and approaching them with creativity and flexibility

  • Remaining persistent, even when the future looks dim. Take one step at a time.

  • Improving your courage and humor by listening, watching or reading inspiring stories and looking for a good laugh when you start to feel hopeless

I gathered some links with more information on hope and how to cultivate it:

As long as we have hope, we have something to live for.

In case you’re really struggling with the situation and notice suicidal thoughts, reach out to psychotherapists or contact a crisis helpline.

Focus on the positive: Create approach goals to enable eustress

The risks and fears I’ve been writing about before can be considered “avoidance goals” that can be a strong motivation in the short-term, but are often more stressful and less effective in the long-term. Instead, we can create positive “approach goals” that create eustress instead of distress. Eustress is the good type of stress that we experience positively when we work towards a goal, for example while doing sports, maybe as a team and with the positive reward or effects in mind that make it easy activate our energy. It’s the type of stress, which makes us feel excited and optimistic and makes us want to work on something, win a game or experience a situation.

And how can we do this? Luckily, it is possible to simply turn around the risk-mitigation-evaluations for a more positive motivation. These are just three basic ideas of what to focus on to use a positive “approach goals” and create more eustress than distress:

  • Instead of preventing X deaths, we can think about the X lives we can save.

  • Instead of protecting freedoms, we can think about the freedoms we can win again for the future (like it’s a reward that needs to be earned first).

  • Instead of preventing the world from climate change and reducing the rising temperatures e.g. to a limit of 1,5°C, we can think about the nature, environment, lives and societies we can give a future.

I know that these goals may not create excitement that easily because they’re still closely connected to the avoidance goals. We can combine personal goals and dreams with the future we need to work for, though. In my case, I would like to live in a future, support businesses and create new organizations that:

  • enable a delicious and sustainable nutrition that are able to feed the growing world population while even reducing negative impacts on the environment and our health, which is so good that we don’t miss anything, but still have a free choice to consume anything.

  • enable and promote fun means of sustainable travels that show how beautiful and interesting the places close to our homes are, and how comfortable it can be to travel by train.

  • give anyone the chance to develop and use their personal strengths for making our world a better and happier place to live in for anyone.

This also leads directly to the next aspect:


Create a vision of the future that you want to build

Imagine the world you would like to live in and draw a clear vision of what it looks like with all the positive aspects that you’re dreaming of. Any of these dreams can be a positive approach goal, which creates the eustress to make you work on it consistently and effectively.

This is part of my personal vision of a future, which is honestly too utopian to become true, but getting close to there is already amazing:

  • Sustainable with a livable climate (as still in the early 2000s), a prosperous bio-diversity and far enough away from crossing the other planetary boundaries, too.

  • Fair with equal chances for everyone, such that effort alone can make a difference to live a successful and effort-rewarding life based on morally-acceptable actions while not creating unachievable differences (especially those not connected to personal effort or even worse - enabled by unfair or morally questionable practices).

  • Peaceful due to mutual understanding and considerate actions that are prioritized by the greater good for everyone and empathetic communications.

  • Happy due to supportive environments and positivity-fostering communications from altruistic people and organizations, which understand that the best way to make them happy is by making other people happy.

You can literally “draw” a picture of this dream in the output format that works best for you both in terms of creating and carrying it with you as an easy reminder. In the best case you can literally open this vision in front of your eyes whenever you need it. Simply taking a look at the “picture” while thinking about all the positive things that should happen, can motivate to work on reaching the goals that are required to build this future.

Motivate yourself with the positive (side) effects

It’s also possible to use positive side effects from avoidance goals as additional or even the main positive motivators.

  • More equality, fairness and generally personal freedoms

  • A more innovative economy and better products

  • Mutual goals that many people work on together

  • A better connected society with happier people who don’t need to worry as much anymore

  • …

In case climate change mitigation is especially important to you, but keeping the status quo is not an approach goal that motivates you sufficiently, you can focus on the following examples of positive side effects:

  • Cleaner air

  • Cheaper energy from renewable sources

  • More protected environments, cleaner cities and a healthier, more beautiful nature

  • Healthier food

  • More resilience of international supply chains by sustainable and local food production, energy production and recycling

  • …

Connect with like-minded people to keep up a good spirit
Seeing that more people feel the same and do something can create a lot of hope and motivation. Furthermore, simply working together with others or finding accountability buddies can activate excitement, motivation and other positive group-dynamic feelings simply by being together.

I brainstormed a few things you can do that also protect democracy and at the same time:

  • Regularly talk to friends and family with similar, benevolent opinions.

  • Go to peaceful demonstrations for a good cause, see how many people stand up for the same cause and talk about your worries and motivations.

  • Engage in local politics or volunteering organizations that work on a better life in the community.

  • Join an NGO, political party or volunteering organizations, which shares the same values, or simply go to their public events to meet and talk to like-minded people.

  • …

Please note that at the same time it is important not to dig yourself too deep into your own bubble in order to stay open-minded for other ideas, living situations, opinions, worries and approaches. Constructive exchange and being able to listen to and reflect about other ideas, is critical to find the best solutions and further improve them. You can do this by regularly talking to and listening to people outside of your bubble and actively searching for opinions and news from a different point of view (because social media algorithms keep us in our bubbles).

Approach it like an athlete to be able to do it consistently for a long time

Practice consciously, learn from your own experience and from others. Doing as much as possible in a short time may be very efficient, but not necessarily effective. Especially when we still have little experience, but also when we think we know everything already, it can be immensely helpful to take and improve. Evaluate what has been going well or bad, do your research about better tactics and scientific foundations, and talk to others about what is helping them.

Take sufficient breaks. Equal to physical activities or work, societal engagement or emotional conversations can also be very exhausting while we only have limited capacities to do them well. In addition to sufficient sleep and the naturally required “maintenance” activities like drinking sufficient water, eating well, exercising in a healthy way and fostering social connections, we need breaks to regenerate. It helps to have “down-time” before going to bed or early in the morning, go offline when spending time with family & friends and having a fun day off on the weekend. Do what is good for you (while not hurting others).

And remember to celebrate your progress - even for the small steps. It can be daunting to start societal / political engagement and it is very difficult to explain logical arguments to ideologically driven humans or just those who don’t listen anymore. So make sure to see the small changes you see in others, the environment and yourself. Constructive feedback and improvement ideations are always helpful, but reminding or rewarding ourselves appropriately for our achievements helps to keep up the good mood and motivation.

For those who work better with avoidance goals

In case you need a “stick” to motivate yourself instead of a “carrot”, it could be sufficient to concentrate on the negative impacts that you’re working to prevent. For example, not working to protect the liberal democracy and thus properly mitigating these risks, means being responsible for the deaths and damages through them - through climate change, pandemics, right-wing extremism, wars, etc.

If that works for you, just look at these risks and potential damages to drive your motivation. But please make sure, that you’re regularly reflecting about your actions and how they’re affecting your environment and yourself, in order to continue going on a path in the right direction and not blindly running somewhere else.

It’s helpful to keep a positive target in mind to keep up good spirits and motivation. Illustrative image by reisemegleren.net of the Innerdalstårnet in Norway, which is a great hiking objective already seen from far and always in sight.

How to vote consciously

It takes just a short time now, but it can keep many doors open and prevent your future life from becoming much harder.

Step 1: Reflect what you need to live an enjoyable life in a functioning society in the future (or what your business needs to be in a functioning society & market in the future). I gathered some inspiration here for you to start your own reflection:

Maybe your personal dream of a future also looks a little bit like mine:

  • An enjoyable life on a livable planet with a functioning infrastructure and society that doesn't harm anyone.

  • A supportive environment that works together and gives everyone equal rights and chances.

  • Being free to decide what you want to do and how to express yourself.

 

Maybe you also need for your business to thrive:

  • Many normal people (working in average jobs) who can afford your or your customers products.

  • A well-working society and reliable supply chains.

  • Stability to make plans and investments due to stable democracies in a strong and peaceful union.

  • Freedom to hire any good person and try out new business ideas that work towards your purpose.

  • Fair and free communication channels where everyone has the same chance to gain attention and that make it easy to check whether an information shows the truth or has been scientifically proven.

In case you want to identify the risks that are threatening your personal and business goals, you can use the so-called inverse thinking, reverse brainstorming and playing the devil’s advocate which describe processes that are among other advantages also helpful for risk identification. In these process you basically ask yourself questions like the following ones:

  • What can I do to avoid reaching my goal / making it impossible?

  • What could someone else do to actively sabotage my plans / the journey towards my goals / destroy the world I want to live in?

  • What are the largest risks / the most likely ones / with the biggest damage to your dream future?

  • When I look back at the failed “project” from the future (in my imagination), which problems do I see that I could have avoided?

  • What else could potentially go wrong?

It’s possible to accelerate / skip the risk evaluation by simply considering the global risks that have already been identified by unpolitical organizations. Here is some general information about some of the largest global risks, which we are currently facing and which are thus most likely to also putting your personal and business goals at stake. When we cannot control these, most dreams of anyone in the world will be much more difficult to achieve:

Step 2: Do your research which political parties do not only blame others for failure, but actually have good ideas and plans to solve pressing problems. Loud propaganda without a good plan that is both feasible and affordable, can be a sign that a party does not have a good idea or is unfit to solve the issue - or even worse, their interests may be opposing yours and put you in a worse situation:

  • Make sure to understand the actual program and goals of the parties themselves, and don’t let yourself be fooled by the marketing slogans in election advertisements.

  • Consider the feasibility of the execution. Is there enough money available to execute the big ideas, are the solutions generally feasible, or are experts advising against it?

  • Evaluate the future consequences of the parties’ programs. What could go wrong? For example the consequences of ideas may not be thought through, or obvious risks and side effects could be neglected?

  • Check which parties may be ignoring, neglecting or actually actively increasing the risks that are threatening a happy life for you, in which you can reach your goals.

Always make sure to check additional, objective data sources, e.g. from proven independent / unpolitical media (no big shareholders/ from a certain industry or political orientation) and scientists who are proven experts in their field and acknowledged by the majority of their peers.

For the election in Germany on 23.02.2025, you can find helpful resources here. They are independent and allow for everyone to test their own thoughts or make up their own mind:

Step 3: You can vote tactically, in case more than one party is “more or less sufficiently” addressing the largest risks and at least one other “risk party” is creating new risks or increasing their probability, e.g. by using populism & propaganda while denying actual risks. Especially if parties are increasing major risks instead of mitigating them, it’s wise to vote in a way that weakens their results. This could be:

  • Vote for the “risk party’s” strongest opponent locally to make sure that this risk increasing party won’t send a direct representative to the parliament for this area.

  • Vote for a party, which may just lose the chance to stay in the parliament due to a minimum percentage (e.g. 5%-hurdle in Germany). This will help them stay in parliament and be additional votes against the “risk party” throughout the next legislative period.

  • Vote for the party that is most likely stronger than the “risk party” and thus able to build the next government while keeping the other party out.

  • Don’t vote for parties that have almost no chances to get into the parliament by reaching the minimum overall percentage or win the minimum number of seats for direct candidates.


Next level: It’s also possible to start in step 1 by reflecting what the society / country / humankind as a whole needs the most to enable a happier future for anyone. Personally, I prefer to vote for all the people around me (and with around me I mean on this planet). Because if they’re not doing well and are not happy, I won’t be happy either.

Spread the process: When you are done with the reflection and research yourself, you can also talk to the people around you. Nudging them to reflect about their future needs, do their research or jointly talking about it can make a big positive difference for your and their life.

We need to talk, show that the majority wants a normal political discourse and positive developments for the planet and humanity, and use this majority to enable the necessary protection against the risks we’re facing.

Voting consciously is one of the most effective things to reach your goals. It includes reflecting about your dream life and the risks threatening them the most, as well as doing your research for suitable political parties and potentially voting tactically. Image by Element5 Digital on Unsplash.

More ideas for actions to protect liberal democracies and our personal freedom

The following actions are extremely relevant, urgently required and probably highly effective throughout the next 2 weeks in Germany until the elections on 23.02.2025.

But their relevance and activity is not limited to Germany and the beginning of 2025. They are also relevant and required in any other parts of the world and at other times. I’ve been gathering all these possibilities here, because they should also give you general inspiration for any time and place.

For the remaining 2 weeks what we all can do (mostly in Germany, but also in other parts of the world) to strengthen the European Union:

Learn by yourself what you need in order to be able to take a conscious vote

  • Reflect what you need for a good life in the future

  • Do your research and use independent resources to identify suitable political parties, e.g. in Germany the Wahl-O-Mat

  • Reflect on shared information critically on all channels and double-check facts and sources if needed

Talk to people in your closer circles (and beyond it if you have the capacities)

Here is a document with many more helpful tips and arguments on how to argue with people who might vote for the AfD.

Show your personal opinion (and maybe even feelings) to present to others that your opinion and worries still exist, cannot be ignored easily and give others the motivation to do the same:

  • Find relatively save areas where you can speak openly with friends and family.

  • Remind people of the risks and what is at stake (example on LinkedIn)

  • Share your opinion and / or worries on social media (German example on LinkedIn).

  • Join peaceful demonstrations (list of events to protect democracy in Germany).

  • Show the politicians and the industries that increase the risks of a livable future that they cannot quietly ignore your rights and interests trying to maximize only their own power and profits.

  • If you’re able to tell a family story from the holocaust or other WWII tragedies, find a good way to share it, which you feel comfortable with (example on LinkedIn).

  • Put positive posters, stickers etc. on your own property to show that you’re standing for something that is good for everyone.

Support democratic movements and morally good actions on social media platforms

  • Follow, Like, Comment, Share

  • Support your friends who share their (vulnerable) opinion in a constructive way

Everyone has the right and option to post their opinion (not a threat) and we should not have to fear threats when doing so.

Engage yourself in or donate to organizations that directly or indirectly protect liberal democracies:

  • NGOs that directly work to protect democracy

  • Independent newspapers, investigative journalism and independent journalism organizations

  • Central and progressive political parties (those that clearly differentiate themselves from and keep a distance to right-wing extremists

  • Organizations that work for human rights, freedom of speech and other personal freedoms, integration and support of any people in need etc.

  • Organizations that actually identify and solve the root causes of the problems, which created enough problems and worries that people prone to election campaigns from extremist parties.

  • Build the world that you want to live in by living according to your values and treating people in the way you want to be treated

  • Invest time, energy or money in education programs that teach people and especially children:

    • How and why to live according to good values like respect and tolerance

    • How to check facts and interpret data

    • How to keep up hope and self-efficacy to solve problems by tackling their root-causes instead of blaming others for them

    • That there is a lot of diversity in the world, which brings different strengths, but that we’re still all humans with the same rights and feelings

    • That intercultural experiences are important and can bring many benefits


I also had the urge to shortly write about what’s happening in the US right now. Trump’s re-election already made me worry, but it is now even more the actions of Elon Musk that I’m following with disbelief.

To be honest, I also used to be a "fan" of Elon Musk's entrepreneurial spirit, impact orientation and efficiency mindset. While first it seemed to me like he was just getting a little bit more weird over time, I cannot find any positive impacts on the world anymore that his current actions create, but just a lot of damage. Actually, there is no person scaring me more right now than Musk, because he already has a lot of power, is smart enough to use it, but doesn’t show any signs of empathy or benevolence. Before making the hitler salute at Trump’s inauguration, he already reminded me of Daenerys Targaryen from Game of Thrones, whose will to do something good in the world drives her crazy, thus leading to more damage that otherwise wouldn’t have happened.

I don’t think that Musk will give away power voluntarily, because I interpret his actions in the way a man is endlessly hungry for power and never happy due to destructive beliefs, inner conflicts and traumatizations. So here is a list of some things that anyone can do to weaken Musk’s negative influences on the world:

  • Not buy or use his products (X, Tesla, SpaceX, xAI, The Boring Company, Neuralink)

  • Learn about his actual achievements and what he actually didn’t do himself or did in questionable ways, e.g. he did not found Tesla, but bought himself in as investor, and illegally abused twitter to influence the stock market (CNN).

  • Understand that he is not an empathetic person, but was described as a sociopath among others by the persons who guided him through Auschwitz where he didn’t show any empathy and his biographer (”The truth about musk, from his biographer”).

  • Learn from both his positive entrepreneurial actions that can still inspire us, while paying close attention also to his other actions & opinions, which separate people, create conflicts, take away freedoms and hinder both positive personal and positive societal developments.

  • Communicate about him in a reflected, holistic way that both considers strength & weaknesses, positive effects and damages.

Moreover, we should all be learning from what is happening in the USA right now in order to identify potential risks early on and copy successful mitigation actions.

Engage yourself against the spread of racism, other extremism, fake-news, scapegoating, hate speech and direct threat – mostly with education:

  • Show and teach your children, friends and family from early on how to live good, humanistic values. These ten humanist commitments can be an orientation for inspiration, but there are so many sources and descriptions of good values that support the chances of any person living a better life.

  • Volunteer in schools, kindergarten or other youth organizations to teach children important skills like critical thinking, how to check facts and identify fake-news, how to lead a constructive discourse, how to keep an open-mind and foster awareness, how to be respectful and understanding, why it is important to cooperate, etc.. For example, the “respect coaches” teach democratic values to promote cohesion and prevent any type of extremism ad racism (more info on BMFSFJ and https://www.lass-uns-reden.de/)

  • Volunteer in other organizations to enable positive experiences for everyone, but especially children, teenagers and young adults with all kinds of people, e.g. empathetic interactions and joined group experiences with foreigners, immigrants, LGBTQ and people with disabilities.

  • Stay aware about democratic rights and the possibility to protect basic and human rights. In Germany for example, the Gesellschaft für Freiheitsrechte e.V. (GFF) juridically fosters democracy and the civil society with strategic legal proceeding and interventions.

  • Find or create simple explanations to uncover typical fake-news and share them – best directly in your social circle and with a personal approach to persons who might have been influenced by fake-news already. In Germany, we need to be particularly careful of fake-news that are spread by Russia (Tagesschau; Correctiv; rnd; . These big disinformation campaigns are probably used to destabilize Europe and keep dependency on russian oil & gas.

  • Support any people in need or simply with less privileges who, due to their current living situation, are at a higher risk to get into a difficult situation that could lead mentally or physically stress them to an extent that they could be turned into extremists, criminals or simply believing fake-news.

  • Support the people who dare to share true information, respectful criticism and well-intended ideas by solidarizing with them. Send them nice messages, supportive comment and criticize the haters and show clearly where the borderline of respectful behavior is crossed. Threats are a crime at least under German law and can be prosecuted (anwalt.de). No one should be afraid to share their opinion. For example, Meret Schneider (member of the National Council of Switzerland) got into a worldwide shitstorm incl. death threats after requesting more regulations for social-media platforms because they are a threat for democracy. She then also received a lot of solidarity including from her political opponents (blick.ch; SRF). Another example of public shaming for a good deed is social entrepreneur and climate activist Clover Hogan who was turned into a meme by Elon Musk into a humiliating meme for explaining that there are more solutions to decarbonizing road traffic than using electric vehicles as a “silver bullet”.This is her TED-Talk about it and the general situation of activists: “Why do the rich and powerful demonize activitsts).

  • Talk empathetically to the people that have been drawn into extremist and fake-news bubbles, and try to reach them on a personal / emotional base to help them see the whole picture and change their mind (see above)

Last but not least, here are some tips on how to use media, and some ideas what could help to keep the media independent, truthful and their content representative:

  • Be aware and reflect about the sources of the content you’re consuming.

    • Which sources are used? Are they reliable?

    • Is it a fact or an opinion? A blog like mine is mostly an opinion and just a collection of information and ideas. Please refer to the sources for facts.

    • Who are the authors, newspapers or the organizations they belong to?

    • Who are their shareholders or sponsors?

    • What are their interests?

    • Who is benefitting from their (style and content of) communication?

  • Message the large media platforms (newspapers, national media, etc.) that they should report more about climate change and the other existential risks to keep an appropriate relation between all the current risks and not to disproportionally focus on the risks of vioelence from immigrants.
    In Germany, the national TV has been reporting very little about climate change lately. Some people in the television industry say, that this is also because the national TV is currently managed and influenced by conservative party members or at least sympathisers: ARD programme director = Christine Strobl (CDU) since 2021; ZDF director (Intendant) = Norbert Himmler since 2022 (candidate for the position “from the black/conservative/bourgeois circle of friends around the CDU/CSU”).

  • Use (alternative) democratic social media, communication platforms and news channels wherever feasible, e.g. “Signal” as a messenger.

  • Actually build a new, democratic, independent and fair No. 1 social media platform for the next generation(s), if you can, or support all options that show this potential

  • Support the media and journalists who do independent and honest work, e.g. in Germany “Reporter ohne Grenzen” or their international equivalents.

I was always sceptical of demonstrations, because as a single person they’re not very effective to reach an approach goal, but they’re important to maintain the necessary environment to be able to work quickly on your goals. And with the right people with similar mindsets, it can be quite fun, too.

Feedback & Discussion

This is a very complex and emotional topic and requires careful words in order not to trigger feelings and vulnerable thoughts that can close the openness to new ideas and displace the important skill to reflect about oneself and the world critically. Therefore, I would highly appreciate if you could let me know whether my words were easy to read and able to help you open your mind to reflect about my thoughts.

In addition, I would like to you to evaluate and share your ideas what could be effective and which risks could be involved. Please feel free to comment this post or message me directly.

If someone would like to start bigger projects to protect our liberal democracies, or in other ways is working effectively on mitigating existing existential risks, or avoiding other problems that make the existential risks even more difficult to mitigate, I would be happy to add my skills (voluntarily or as a freelance consultant). Please feel free to contact me then.

 

I want to be able to feel this happy and carefree again without having to fear the increasing risk of losing the liberal democracies and societies around the world that also enable us to travel freely like on this 3-month interrail trip in 2023

 

Now, it’s up to you. What’s your opinion? In which type of society do you want to live? What do you need to lead a happy life?

Please share if you still want to live in a world that's worth living in - e.g. where all people have an equal chance to be happy instead of a place where we’re giving more power to very few persons who can abuse this power to exploit the vast majority or create other damages. Any voice to protect the liberal democracies in Europe and all around the world can be help.

Message me to talk about this very complex topic.

Summary & Call to Action

When the risks (= the probability) of damages become too large, it is time or already overdue to take mitigation actions. Reducing this probability just a little can be a very effective action when the potential damages are large and especially when they are catastrophic.

Losing the democratic stability & freedom in Europe or elsewhere in the world to right-wing extremism, totalitarianism and / or oligarchs is one of these catastrophic scenarios. In addition to the “straightforward” damages to society like losing personal freedom, human rights, a resilient economy, international communications & progress, this also decreases the possibilities of handling & preventing already existing existential crises to mankind like climate change, (nuclear) great power war and pandemics.

Therefore, it’s time to reconnect the divided parts of our societies and close the trenches, understand and acknowledge everyone’s challenges and fears, accept and properly mitigate the largest risks of our time that affect us all, and work together on a future society where we’re supporting each other to make sure that anyone can have a good and happy life.

We should acknowledge and consider the large risks we’re facing, the potential consequences of certain parties / persons receiving executive or legislative power / influence based on their objectives / programs and thus also consider the potential impact of our vote. Gross calculations based on mitigation probability assumptions lead to the following impact potential of one single vote in the elections on 23.02.2025 in Germany (due to the risks of climate change until 2050 on the “current” trajectory towards 2,4-2,9 °C according to the World Economic Forum) :

  • 0,0125 lives lost / protected (total at risk until 2050: 14,5 million deaths)

  • >1,67 healthy life years lost / won (total at risk until 2050: >2 billion healthy life years)

  • >$ 10.400 thousand more / less economic losses (total at risk until 2050: $ 12,5 trillion in economic losses)

A single vote in Germany is also equal to the following effects as a 1/ 60 million share of the potential climate impact and the government spendings Germany has:

  • ~1 t CO2 savings / year (keeping a 10% chance for the 1,5°C path in Europe)

  • ~30.000 € of government spendings allocation for one legislative period of 4 years

Moreover, all other direct effects based on the elected parliament can make a huge difference in terms of risk mitigation, other R&D investments, foreign policies, regulations, economic incentives, social freedoms etc.

Do your future selves and future businesses a favor.
Please vote consciously. Thank you.

Jump back to the explanation of how to vote consciously in the next elections and check out the ideas for actions to choose what else you can start with this week.

And one last thing:

Once we notice that this helps, let’s not only protect the status quo, but let’s actually use our votes and voices to create a better future.

We might create and use a momentum to completely save the world.

 
Niklas Hermes-BöhlefeldComment