The paradox of wellbeing: When ill-being helps us along our way

“I don’t think that there is a single word in any language that can describe what life is, but if I had to choose one, I would choose the word “paradox”. Wherever we look at it, we see that life is a paradox.” ―?Alonso del Río

?“Well, the way of paradoxes is the way of truth. To test reality we must see it on the tight rope. When the verities become acrobats, we can judge them.” ―?Oscar Wilde

“Intelligence is to spot paradoxes. Wisdom is to live by them.” ―?Raheel Farooq

Following on from the two previous articles:

- “Three extraordinary women with three tools necessary for regeneration and wellbeing” where I wrote about Naomi Klein’s books and critical thinking,

- “For the inner economist in us all: seven ways to think in the 21st century through the Doughnut Economics” where I wrote about Kate Raworth’s book and systems thinking.

I carry on with the third and last post of the series. Here I will write about paradoxical thinking (embracing paradoxes) inspired by some of the quotes by Ursula K. Le Guin. This triangulation of thinking is what I call “responsible thinking”, in my opinion, the key transversal subject that should be taught in our educational systems.

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The writer and professor of political science, Carlos Taibo, very often in his talks, tells the following story* which many of us have heard before and which contains a paradoxical truth about our modern life:

"In one of its many versions, the parable of the fisherman goes as follows:

In a village on the Mexican coast, a local man is half asleep by the sea. An American tourist approaches him, they strike up a conversation and at a certain point, the stranger asks: 'And you, what do you do for a living? What do you do? I'm a fisherman,' replies the Mexican. 'Wow, very hard work', replies the tourist, who adds: 'I suppose you work a lot of hours every day, don't you? Quite a lot, yes', replies his interlocutor. How many hours do you work on average each day? Well, I fish for two hours or so every day,' he replies. Two hours? And what do you do with the rest of your time? I get up late, fish for a couple of hours, play for a while with my kids, take a nap with my wife, and in the evening, go out with friends to drink a few beers and play the guitar'. But how are you like that,' the American tourist reacts angrily. What do you mean? I don't understand your question. Why don't you work more? If you did, you'd have a bigger boat in a couple of years'. And for what?' 'Later, you could set up a factory here in the village'. And for what?' 'Eventually, you would set up an office in the federal district. Years later you would open branches in the United States and Europe. And for what?' 'Your company's shares would be listed on the stock exchange, and you would be an immensely rich man. And what's the point of all that?' asks the Mexican. Well,' replies the tourist, 'when you are, I don't know, 65 or 70, you can retire quietly and come and live here in this village, to get up late, fish for a couple of hours, play with your grandchildren, take a siesta with your wife and go out in the evening with your friends to drink a few beers and play the guitar'".

*Back cover of the book by Carlos Taibo: La parábola del pescador mexicano: sobre trabajo, necesidades, decrecimiento y felicidad (The parable of the Mexican fisherman: on work, needs, degrowth and happiness)

Whichever way we look at it, life is a paradox, but if we look beyond the surface, a paradox can offer us certain glimpses of truth, reality, of meaning. There we will find its etymological definition, from the Greek prefix "para" (contrary to) and the suffix "doxa" (opinion), which teaches us that the ideas it contains are contrary to common opinion. A common opinion, however, this is highly dependent on the space-temporal context in which these paradoxes arise. And in this time, the 21st century, and in this space, planet Earth, we are already experiencing what the paradoxical Chinese proverb told us: ‘May you live in interesting times’, that is, times of change where stability is not the rule but the exception. This is when major contradictions arise between the old that may be losing relevance and the new that is beginning to emerge. As Oscar Wilde famously told us, we begin to dance on a tight rope, and in those moments of attention, if life matters to us, we can discover what is important in life.

In these 'interesting times' of personal crises, social crises, and environmental crises, a new word has emerged, 'post-truth'. In a sense, this word appeals to what we have always called lies, deception, or bad faith in our ethical conviviality as human beings, be they families or communities. A community that, from a broader perspective, in these global times, would reach the entire population of the Planet. And what this lie or bad faith projects, is directed especially to the three combined parts of our brain, that is to say, the most primitive part that leads us towards instinct, the limbic part in contact with emotions and feelings, and the part of the neocortex that brings us more rational or logical issues. What can be observed, in an anthropological sense, is that these lies are leading our brains and ourselves, paradoxically, to a kind of bad living (ill-being) made up of unfounded fears, unrealistic desires, and illogical reasons. And as the saying goes, ‘It's good fishing in troubled waters’, it is not precisely that of the calm fisherman described by Carlos Taibo but that of that other strange 'fisherman' who wants to fish with his na?ve or Machiavellian ideas (if they carry the seed of bad faith) our peace of mind of that which could mean living well (wellbeing) for us.

This contextual introduction to this article on the paradoxes we experience in life and what we can learn from their flashes will lead to the central text where we will try to answer, through its three sections, the questions 'why, what, how'.

1) Why paradoxes? A short introduction that will give us a brushstroke to better understand this world of paradoxes where life is the complementary of death, the wellbeing of ill-being, the balance of instability… (An eternal moment)

2) What paradoxes are living through? From different areas of our modern society such as health, food, economy, work... we will describe different paradoxical situations so that the reader, on their own, can delve deeper into this context and experience certain flashes of truth, reality, meaning... (The false reality)

3) How could a solution to the paradoxes be found? Perhaps there is no solution or perhaps there are multiple solutions, but from a pragmatic and ethical sense, we will be able to glimpse at which points, as a leverage effect, we could focus on in order to draw inspiration from their mysteries and continue on our path towards living well (wellbeing). (The ignorant philosopher)

1) An eternal moment

Dan Millman:?Life has just three rules?

Socrates:?And you already know them...

Dan Millman:?Paradox, humour, and change.

Socrates:?Paradox...

Dan Millman:?Life is a mystery. Don't waste time trying to figure it out.

Socrates:?Humour...

Dan Millman:?Keep a sense of humour, especially about yourself. It is a strength beyond all measure.

Socrates:?Change...

Dan Millman:?Know that nothing stays the same.

*(Dialogue from the film "Peaceful Warrior")

One of the great physicists of the 20th century, Nobel laureate Niels Bohr, made a trip to China back in 1937. It is very likely that from that trip comes what happened ten years later when he received a title, the knighthood of the order of the elephant. The point, which goes beyond the anecdote of the title, is that it seems that the Danish king asked Bohr for an idea for the design of the Order's coat of arms. Bohr proposed that the Taoist symbol of yin and yang be inserted in the centre along with the phrase or maxim, 'Contraria sunt Complementa', (opposites are complementary). And that is one of the paradoxical essences of living well (wellbeing), it cannot exist without its opposite, ill-being, that is, they are complementary. As complementary as two of the most famous extreme dystopian novels of the last century, Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World" on the one hand, and George Orwell's "1984" on the other. In between, is the infinite play of nuances that every inhabitant of this planet experiences throughout his or her life. However, in this game of tightrope walking, it seems that now we are leaning more heavily towards this ill-being that results in personal, social, and environmental crises. Taking Bohr's principle of complementarity, the more visible one of them is, ill-being, the more the other, well-being, fades away. It is time to stop looking at the precipice and rebalance ourselves so as not to fall into the abyss. That is why paradoxes come to us, because paradoxes, as educational and ethical vehicles, are like those stop signs that warn us to stop and then pay as much attention as possible to the different directions that their message contains and thus avoid a misfortune on our way.

*Coat of arms of?Niels Bohr?with motto "CONTRARIA SUNT COMPLEMENTA" and collar of the Danish order of the Elephant.

On the other hand, that symbol of yin and yang that Bohr placed on the coat of arms takes us to Taoism and to that classic book among classics, the Tao Te King, so full of paradoxical aphorisms and enigmas about life. It is the bedside book of many people all over the world and today, more than 2500 years later, it continues to send us paradoxical flashes about Nature, life, humans, and the relationships between them all. Personally, if I had to choose one among the hundreds of possible books on wellbeing (personal, social, planetary), I would, without any doubt, choose Lao Tse's book. Its 81 chapters, here available to explore for oneself, bring us a certain paradoxical insight into the essence of life where change is the ultimate rule.

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2) The false reality

“Go to work, send your kids to school, follow fashion, act normal, walk on the pavement, watch t.v., save for your old age, obey the law, repeat after me: I am free.”?Unknown

Each of us lives through a value system where we act and create our own reality. Through our different roles in life, at work, in friendships, as a member of a family, etc., we try to preserve this system without being overwhelmed by the different incongruities that often occur. When these arise in large numbers and the discrepancy cannot be ignored, crises or opportunities for change arise. In this way, a different reality appears in the eyes of that person and other values replace the previous ones as an adaptation to this new existence. The above is usually the most obvious and general case, however, there are cases where the option of change is not considered and this entrenchment between reality and values creates an unhealthy way of life. These bad living conditions and illnesses in their most extreme and saddest cases can lead people to let themselves fall off the tightrope, which leads to a 'bad-dying' or, perhaps, a 'well-dying' (resting in peace) depending on the point of view we take.

In the constructionist proposal of "living well" (wellbeing) that I propose through ten systematically interrelated nodes, there is also an interdependence through the different values that inhabit it. In a simpler way, because there are many more nuances and it would take more than one book, I will stick to a certain complementarity of living well / living bad (wellbeing/ill-being). The following motto that I propose through a conscious definition of 'responsible wellbeing': "Fulfilled people in a healthy coexistence of the society within the existence of life on a planet that we are regenerating", could be equivalent to an ideal “living well” (wellbeing: personal, social, planetary). The complementary, in its most extreme case, could be 'dismal ill-being', "People in crisis in a sick society within a rapidly consuming planet". As Jorge Wagensberg told us:

"There are infinite ways of not being in balance, but only one to be."

So perhaps the good life becomes unattainable, and in this bad life, there are many degrees and nuances of being unbalanced. Here we find a wide diversity of contexts, both personal and social, as well as territorial and temporal. From a planetary perspective, encompassing all societies and their individuals, the extreme imbalances to which we are collectively heading lead us to a disastrous way of life. A bad way of life in which some of us influence more than others. However, the worst outcome can affect everyone, the human species could disappear in a short time. This does not mean that the framework in which we are integrated, life itself, will disappear. Perhaps other forms of life (bacteria, cockroaches...) can adapt to the conditions in which we leave the planet so that life can continue without us.

This is the great challenge of our time as a species. On a smaller scale, one of the many human cultural groups that inhabit this planet, but have the greatest influence on it, is a modern Western society whose values have spread across the globe. It is faced with its own paradoxes which were very cleverly brought to light by the former pastor of Overlake Christian Church, Bob Moorehead:

“We have taller buildings but shorter tempers; wider freeways but narrower viewpoints; we spend more but have less; we buy more but enjoy it less; we have bigger houses and smaller families; more conveniences, yet less time; we have more degrees but less sense; more knowledge but less judgment; more experts, yet more problems; we have more gadgets but less satisfaction; more medicine, yet less wellness; we take more vitamins but see fewer results. We drink too much; smoke too much; spend too recklessly; laugh too little; drive too fast; get too angry; stay up too late; get up too tired; read too seldom; watch TV too much and pray too seldom.

We have multiplied our possessions, but reduced our values; we fly in faster planes to arrive there quicker, to do less and return sooner; we sign more contracts only to realize fewer profits; we talk too much; love too seldom and lie too often. We've learned how to make a living, but not a life; we've added years to life, not life to years. We've been all the way to the moon and back, but have trouble crossing the street to meet the new neighbor. We've conquered outer space, but not inner space; we've done larger things, but not better things; we've cleaned up the air, but polluted the soul; we've split the atom, but not our prejudice; we write more, but learn less; plan more, but accomplish less; we make faster planes, but longer lines; we learned to rush, but not to wait; we have more weapons, but less peace; higher incomes, but lower morals; more parties, but less fun; more food, but less appeasement; more acquaintances, but fewer friends; more effort, but less success. We build more computers to hold more information, to produce more copies than ever, but have less communication; drive smaller cars that have bigger problems; build larger factories that produce less. We've become long on quantity, but short on quality.

These are the times of fast foods and slow digestion; tall men, but short character; steep in profits, but shallow relationships. These are the times of world peace, but domestic warfare; more leisure and less fun; higher postage, but slower mail; more kinds of food, but less nutrition. These are the days of two incomes, but more divorces; these quick trips, disposable diapers, cartridge living, throw-away morality, one-night stands, overweight bodies and pills that do everything from cheer, to prevent, quiet or kill. It is a time when there is much in the show window and nothing in the stock room.”

As the artist Alonso del Río rightly told us, paradoxes describe life very well and affect us all (let him who is without sin cast the first stone) and Pastor Moorehead was also affected by them.?He resigned from the church in 1999, accused of sexual misconduct.??

Next, through paradoxes, paradoxical aphorisms, antitheses, or some oxymoron structured through 8 of the 10 nodes of wellbeing / Ill-being, readers can make an exercise of "paradoxical thinking" about the reality they live, or we live as a whole. The map I designed below (but not the territory) helps to connect the dots between these nodes and the four key elements of living well (wellbeing):

1)???Upper Right Quadrants: Our existence (Live). Planet Earth

2)???Lower Right Quadrants: Our co-existence (Social-Conviviality). Institutions.

3)???Upper Left Quadrants: Our development (Fulfilment / Responsible Wellbeing). Human Needs.

4)???Lower Left Quadrants: Our consciousness (Ethics + Education)

* Normative model with 10 nodes of wellbeing

Perhaps in this personal introspection, we can get some glimpse of meaning, reality, or a certain truth as mentioned, paradoxically, by Krishnamurti and Ursula K. Le Guin with their respective perspectives.

It is no measure of?health?to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick?society. (Jiddu Krishnamurti)

ENVIRONMENT

<> “When the last tree is cut down, the last fish eaten, and the last stream poisoned, you will realize that you cannot eat money.” Native American saying

<> Pollution kills more people each year than wars and violence. Pollution is the largest environmental cause of disease and premature death in the world today. Diseases caused by pollution were responsible for an estimated 9 million premature deaths in 2015—16% of all deaths worldwide—three times more deaths than from AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria combined and 15 times more than from all wars and other forms of violence. In the most severely affected countries, pollution-related disease is responsible for more than one death in four.

<> Garbage Patch the Size of Germany, France, Spain? Oceans Under Threat.

<> "If Nature is the answer, what was the question?" (Jorge Wagensberg)

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FOOD

<> The hunger-obesity paradox: Why it’s a modern problem? The number of hungry people in the world in 2018: 821.6 million (or 1 in 9 people). Adults who are obese: 672 million (13% or 1 in 8 adults).

<> 'Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food' (Hippocrates)

<> Food waste facts. All the world's nearly one billion hungry people could be lifted out of malnourishment on less than a quarter of the food that is wasted in the US, UK and Europe.

<> Water footprint: It takes 15415 litres of water to produce one kg of beef, 1644 litres for one kg of cereals and 322 litres for one kg of vegetables. That is 10.19 litres for one calorie of beef, 0.51 litres for one calorie of cereals and 1.34 litres for one calorie of vegetables. On the other hand, according to?a Nasa-led study, many of the world’s freshwater sources are being drained faster than they are being replenished. Some hypothesise that increased water shortages around the world will lead to wars.

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ECONOMICS

<> The Jevons paradox: An increase in efficiency leads to a further increase in demand.

<> “The economy is to serve the people, and not the people to serve the economy.” (Manfred Max-Neef, The world on a collision course and the need for a New Economy)

<> Why are rich countries less happy? Economists in the late ‘90s found that rich countries were high on depression and anxiety but very low on subjective well-being. The poorest countries were also unhappy, but some middle-income countries like Peru, Ethiopia, Bangladesh and Thailand were high on happiness.?

<> Ten richest men double their fortunes in pandemic while incomes of 99 percent of humanity fall. They now have six times more wealth than the poorest 3.1 billion people.

<> “Today we have economies that need to grow, whether or not they make us thrive: what we need are economies that make us thrive, whether or not they grow.” (Kate Raworth, Doughnut Economics)

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COMMUNITY

<> “Symbiosis is good business; parasitism kills.” (Jorge Wagensberg)

<> “From the Crisis of the Community to the Community of the Crisis. Some Paradoxes of the Being in Common”. “The central paradox that sums such contradictions is stating that the community is feasible only to the extent that it is not. Close to Russell’s paradox, such aporia allows us to recognize the difference between the community that takes care of its contradictions and inconsistencies, the community of the crisis, and the one that, conceived in absolute and unequivocal terms, is not responsible for their antinomies and contradictions, and leads to what we call the community crisis.”

<> “The pollution paradox: The paradox proposes that the most antisocial commercial interests have the greatest incentive to buy political favour, otherwise they would be regulated out of existence. So politics comes to be dominated by them.”

<> “It's the sense of touch. In any real city, you walk, you know? You brush past people, people bump into you. In L.A., nobody touches you. We're always behind this metal and glass. I think we miss that touch so much, that we crash into each other, just so we can feel something.” (From the movie “Crash”)

?<> Why we’re more connected, yet more isolated than ever.

?<> Glocal Citizens: Think globally, act locally.

FAMILY

<> “It is not flesh and blood, but heart which makes us fathers and sons.” (Friedrich von Schiller)

<> The family Paradox: A dichotomy of joy and dysfunction.

<> “All Happy families resemble one another, but each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” (Leon Tolstoi)

<> The paradox of care: necessary but invisible. Feminism thought about domestic and care work (Conceptual and empirical dimension). Both perspectives show the same difficulties to conceptualize, measure and value care work, in particular, the subjective dimension which is the most invisible one.

<> “Family: Like branches on a tree, we all grow in different directions, but our roots keep us all together.” (Unknow author)

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WORK

<> "The paradox of work: Many people hate their jobs, but they would be much more miserable if they didn't have them". (Enrique Dans)

<> From societies like the Japanese where work can kill (karoshi, more than 100 hours of overtime a month) to a primitive society like the Ju/'hoansi who work about 15 hours a week and where leisure is life.

<> Bullshits jobs: “There are millions of people across the world — clerical workers, administrators, consultants, telemarketers, corporate lawyers, service personnel, and many others — who are toiling away in meaningless, unnecessary jobs, and they know it.”

<> "The biggest disincentive to employment is employment itself". (David Casassas)

HEALTH

<> The paradoxes of humanity: Losing the health to make a lot of money and spend all the money to regain health.

<> Salveen Richter of Goldman Sach asks whether curing patients is a sustainable business. Goldman Sachs would sacrifice sick people at the altar of profitability.

<> Poor health care kills more than no health care. After excluding deaths that could be prevented through public health measures, 8.6 million excess deaths were amenable to health care of which 5·0 million were estimated to be due to receipt of poor-quality care and 3·6 million were due to non-utilisation of health care.

<> “Pain is to health what hunger is to nutrition, thirst to drink, libido to reproduction, fear to security or curiosity to knowledge" (Jorge Wagensberg)

PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT

<> “Only you can take responsibility for your?happiness... but you can't do it alone. It's the great?paradox?of being human”.?(Simon Sinek)

<> "Scientific knowledge is the result of two conversations: experience (conversation with nature) and reflection (conversation with oneself)” (Jorge Wagensberg)

<> “Hope is paradoxical. It is neither passive waiting nor is it unrealistic forcing of circumstances that cannot occur… To hope means to be ready at every moment for that which is not yet born, and yet not become desperate if there is no birth in our lifetime. There is no sense in hoping for that which already exists or for that which cannot be. Those whose hope is weak settle down for comfort or for violence; those whose hope is strong see and cherish all signs of new life and are ready every moment to help the birth of that which is ready to be born.” (Erich Fromm)

<> "Changing the answer is evolution, changing the question is revolution.” (Jorge Wagensberg)

Regarding a possible solution to the paradoxes, firstly, it would be necessary to see whether they are paradoxes, aphorisms, antitheses or simply a play on opposing words. If they are paradoxes, we would have to see what kind they are, and many of them could fit into this resolution (own translation):

"...in the form of a 'leap outwards', of a 'going outside the system'.?The paradox is not resolved by determining whether the expression "this sentence is false" is true or false, since the paradox consists precisely in the impossibility of doing so, but in understanding that it is produced by a self-reference; something we can only do thanks to the self-referential structure of our mind (self-consciousness)".

Mathematics and language as systems that play with paradoxes are enclosed within themselves. G?del and his incompleteness theorem for logic and us communicating with language - if only we could communicate without intermediation, a kind of integral telepathy where there were no distances or intermediaries in which information is lost. It would be a return to that 0 or 1 mentioned in the Tao.

3) The ignorant philosopher

“The paradox of education is precisely this--that as one begins to become conscious, one begins to examine the society in which he is being educated”. (James A. Baldwin)

In the previous section, I have left out two of the nodes, education and ethics, which seem to me to be more cross-cutting, and which in a pragmatic sense could be the main leverage points for resolving the paradoxes and contradictions we are experiencing in this society.

Wherever we have come into this world, our family and our society guide us or lead us as etymologically means "education". We are immersed in their culture, their codes and in them we live or die, sometimes without questioning ourselves and sometimes with the appearance of questionings. In the latter case, we may question some of its codes, norms, or main axioms, in which case, as Baldwin mentions, we have reached a certain summit in what education means. Thus that educational peak reached with us now as possible guides, paradoxically, may change the education in which we were educated.

The alternative economist Manfred Max Neef is known for his questioning of the economy in which we are immersed, as it should serve the people and not the people to the economy. However, he is slightly less known for his questioning of education. His best-known writings go in the direction of economics and human needs. However, in 2004 he wrote a very interesting text on education. Its title, “Fundamentos de la Transdisciplinariedad” (then translated in 2005, "Foundations of transdisciplinarity"), reviews education from the past to the present day. The main criticism is given by the mono-disciplinarity that is given from education in universities and that extends from top to bottom throughout the general education system. On the other hand, he also mentions the 'bad living' (ill-being) in which we live and how this mono-disciplinarity cannot help us:

“If we go through a list of some of the main problematiques that are defining the new Century, such as water, forced migrations, poverty, environmental crises, violence, terrorism, neo-imperialism, destruction of social fabric, we must conclude that none of them can be adequately tackled from the sphere of specific individual disciplines. They clearly represent transdisciplinary challenges.”

As a conscious person, apart from criticism, he also proposes possible solutions. Firstly, he clarifies the following terms:

-Disciplinarity (One area of knowledge. Specialization in isolation)

-Multidisciplinarity (Several areas of knowledge without cooperation)

-Pluridisciplinarity (Several areas of knowledge with cooperation but without coordination)

-Interdisciplinarity (Several areas of knowledge with cooperation and coordination from higher level concept)

Then, he arrives at the term transdisciplinarity. In the graph below, he takes several disciplines and hierarchises them based on four levels, whereby transdisciplinarity is the coordination of all these hierarchical levels. To summarise his proposal:

From the bottom up:

First Level (Empirical): “This level asks and answers the question what exists?” E.g.: “Through physics we can learn about quanta, through astronomy we can learn about the magnitude of the universe and the birth of stars.[…] On the other extreme of the pyramid’s base, sociology and economics attempt to describe and explain (not always successfully) the behaviour of rational human beings.” Organizing language: logics.

Second Level (Purposive or Pragmatic): “This level asks and answers the question what are we capable of doing? (with what we have learned from the empirical level)”. E.g.: “how to build bridges, how to travel to Mars and how to navigate in the high seas. What this level does not tell us, is whether our capacities should be implemented. The danger often is that we do things simply and only because we know how to do them.” Organizing language: cybernetics.

Third Level (Normative): “The normative level asks and answers the question what is it we want to do? In democratic societies the answers are normally put to vote.” E.g.:” application of environmental impact assessments that originated as a consequence of the environmental movement. Similar positive results can be identified as a result of the feminist movement.” Organizing language: planning.

Fourth Level (Values): “The value level asks and answers what should we do? Or rather should we do what we want to do? This level goes beyond the present and the immediate. It aims at generations yet to come, at the planet as a whole, at an economy as if people matter. While making explicit a global concern for the human species and life in general.” Organizing language: some kind of deep ecology.

From that fourth level where ethics and values preside, as an ignorant philosopher I dared to propose a normative model where a conscious and global ethics would be related to the regeneration of the planet, to the coexistence (conviviality) of the different societies that populate it and to the personal fulfilment of each of the individuals of those societies.

As Max Neef pointed out in his previous text, the compartmentalisation of disciplines has reached such a level that already in 1950, a book listed more than 1100 known scientific disciplines without including the humanities. In this society, ethics was not going to be any less and has a multitude of perspectives. From that great division between deontological and teleological ethics with their different priorities in their frameworks, the morally right and the morally good respectively, to other models such as the one that sought an integral ethics. The latter was based on proposing the inclusion of three basic dimensions: goods (e.g. Utilitarianism), virtues (e.g. Stoicism, Aristotle) and norms (e.g. Kant). None of the ethics reached all three dimensions.

From a pragmatic point of view, in this "marketplace of ethics" that I encountered, I chose four of them as complementary ethics that I felt integrated a global ethic focused on Nature, society and the individual as well as on the goods, norms and virtues.

Thus, the environmental ethics was concerned with our existence, the ethic of solidarity (composed of the ethic of justice and the ethic of care) with our coexistence, and the ethic of virtues with personal fulfilment. Finally, a fourth one, framed in the internal collective quadrant, our cultural part of reality, would be the dialogical ethics (dia = through) which would mediate among the three previous ones. And in this dialogic ethics lies that leverage point which in my opinion could be more effective for change. Dialogue, conversations, debates, relationships, communication and even democracy in its three phases (representative, participatory and sociocracy) are part of that human cultural and social heritage through which dialogic ethics with its norms and virtues can be the instrument for the conscious search for the good. A dialogic ethics that would be the basis of our education, our culture and where 'yes' there can be differences due to our individualities and our rich diversity, but where lies, bad faith or 'post-truth' would have no place.

As for Lao Tse and his book the Tao Te King, the answer he gives us on "how?" is the 'Wu Wei', normally translated as "no action", but which, more or less, wants to indicate an action in the face of reality without forcing it. Perhaps in this journey of life that we can take as a game or in this game of life that we can take as a journey, "Less is more". Antoine of Saint-Exupery told us that he who wants to travel happily should travel light. This paradox "Less is Max" inspired by Max-Neef is another story that has been shown to us by two other women in this outstanding game.

One last unconscious reflection or introductory epilogue

Paradoxical contradictions, like the oxymoron in this title, offer some glimmers of truth if you dig deeper. Frames can collapse. Sometimes, what seems linear to us, from a more distant perspective, can be a circle where we can find neither the beginning nor the end. In this text full of figures, such as circles, rectangles and squares, the triangle could not be missing. From the saying 'all good things come in threes', this article wants to be the synergic closure of two orphan texts that were waiting for a third companion.

On the one hand, the article on Naomi Klein and critical thinking. On the other hand, the text on systems thinking and Kate Raworth. They are complemented by this third one by Ursula K. Le Guin and paradoxical thinking. Unfortunately, Le Guin left us in 2018 but her extraordinary work continues to speak to us. That same 2018 another extraordinary paradoxical thinker left us, Jorge Wagensberg, whom I also wanted to pay tribute to through some of his immense collection of aphorisms, many of them paradoxical, which he wrote in several books. He was a scientist who did science with conscience. One of his mottos was composed by this triad: "think to understand, understand to change and change to live". With Naomi Klein we explored "critical thinking" (think to understand) with Kate Raworth "systems thinking" (understand to change) and finally with the quotes of Ursula K. Le Guin we explored the "paradoxical thinking" (change to live).

The work of Ursula K. Le Guin with her "paradoxical thinking" is very necessary to bring out of us some creativity, innovation, or changes in order to live or find the way of "Living Well". Paradoxical thinking has driven important advances in science, philosophy and mathematics throughout history and could also improve our global society.

This relationship between these three kinds of thinking seems to me to be basic and fundamental in any educational system. Critical education to avoid being carried away by the current, systemic education to focus on relationships and paradoxical education to let our imagination and creativity fly and to solve the different problems we will find on our way. This is what we could call responsible thinking.

On the other hand, I wrote two texts (in Spanish) that complement this one on the paradoxes we encounter. One was about the narratives we live by and the other about the metaphors and frameworks we inhabit.?If to paraphrase former US President Clinton, "It's the economy, stupid" or former IMF President Rodrigo Rato, "That's the market, my friend", I could say "It's linguistics, language, my friends". In this post-truth world, language is a double-edged tool. Therein lies, perhaps, a great paradox of language. As a species, Homo sapiens, we have at some point in time come to a certain dominance and expansion on Earth at the expense of other species. This has occurred mostly in recent years, for example, since the 1970s, 60% of vertebrates have disappeared. In all this progress, the narratives we have been telling ourselves and the metaphors and frameworks we have focused on to reach this evolutionary 'progress' have been very important. At this very moment, the path, perhaps mistaken, seems to end in an abyss, a precipice. We encounter many paradoxes and contradictions about our destiny. The language that in evolutionary terms gave us certain communicative advantages over other species, now turns against our own species. It is a double game that Jorge Wagensberg told us in his own way:

“Lies are constructed,

truths are discovered".?

In one of his latest books, "Teoría de la creatividad: eclosión, gloria y miseria de las ideas.”?(Theory of creativity: hatching, glory and misery of ideas), Wagensberg offers us a cartography of ideas that he classifies into four families, which I have summarised in this infographic.

With some creativity, the triangular figure could be the tool (or thinking hat) to uncover the information from the noise, the true from the false the useful from the useless and the good from the bad. Thus, critical thinking should be used to question our narratives, systems thinking to object to the metaphors or the narrow frameworks we have chosen, and paradoxical thinking to stop and find new ideas, values in the face of the many paradoxes we encounter.

I hope that the idea of "responsible thinking" inspired through these three extraordinary women and embellished through this thinking hat can fit in the future with the three components of the creativity of the human mind that Wagensberg proposes in this interesting writing.

“There are three necessary components for creativity of the human mind: to have a good idea, to recognise the idea is good and to persuade others it is so.”

Finally, we come to the paradox of wellbeing (living well) which gave its name to this article. Wellbeing (living well) --personal, social & planetary -- is an utopia that is helped to be achieved by the signs of ill-being (living bad). The latter are those infinite imbalances that warn us of the exit from our path in life. However, the signs of ill-being in these times are more resounding. We cannot turn a deaf ear. Perhaps it is time to change direction and not fall into the void. To retrace our steps and remember the educational and ethical lessons that our descendants taught us and that, due to the speed we have reached in recent centuries, we have forgotten. Time, also paradoxical, in its linear and circular form, offers us this present where we live to unite those descendants with our, hopefully, future ascendants.

Twitter:?@ResWellbeing?@BienestarRespon

*This is an adaptation and translation into English of my post written in Autonomía y bienvivir,?"La paradoja del bienvivir: Cuando el malvivir nos ayuda en nuestro camino" (5/11/2018)