The Initiation

Inside the Dollar Endgame: Why the Global Monetary System Is Reaching Its Limits

In this episode of The Initiation, I’m joined by Roberto Rios also known as Peruvian Bull — monetary researcher, economist, and author of The Dollar Endgame — for a deep and unsparing conversation about the fate of the global financial system.
For decades, central banks have attempted to stabilize growth through zero interest rates, quantitative easing, and ever-expanding debt. What began as emergency policy has quietly become permanent architecture. Peruvian Bull argues that this system has now crossed a point of no return — and that the world is entering a phase of structural monetary breakdown rather than a cyclical downturn.
We explore why the US dollar-based system is increasingly trapped by its own design, how inflation is not an accident but a structural outcome, and why traditional policy tools may no longer be able to restore stability. From sovereign debt dynamics to the limits of fiat money, this conversation traces the deeper mechanics beneath today’s economic volatility.
At the heart of the discussion is Bitcoin — not as a speculative asset, but as a potential new monetary base layer. We examine whether Bitcoin could function as a form of hard money for a digital age, what conditions would be required for such a transition, and what this would mean for states, markets, and individual sovereignty.
This is a grounded, systems-level exploration of where our monetary world may be headed — and what kinds of choices lie ahead once old structures begin to dissolve.
If you’re new to The Initiation, you may also want to explore Season 1, where I lay the foundations for the entire series. Across the first nine episodes, we dive into the core themes shaping our moment in history - from the rise of artificial intelligence and the breakdown of our monetary system to the climate crisis, geopolitics, and the breakthrough forces pointing toward transformation. Season 1 offers the wider context for everything we’ll explore this year.

Economics of Happiness: Helena Norberg-Hodge on Localization, Culture & a Future Worth Living

In this episode, I sit down with Helena Norberg-Hodge — writer, filmmaker, linguist, and pioneering voice in the localization and new economy movements. Helena is the founder and director of Local Futures, an international non-profit dedicated to revitalizing cultural and biological diversity and strengthening local communities and economies around the world.
Helena’s journey began in 1975 when she traveled to the remote Himalayan region of Ladakh, later known as “Little Tibet.” There, she encountered a society that lived in harmony with its environment — until the sudden pressures of tourism, consumer culture, and economic “development” disrupted centuries of ecological balance, community cohesion, and psychological wellbeing. Her experiences shaped her life’s work and became the foundation of her acclaimed book Ancient Futures: Learning from Ladakh, now translated into dozens of languages.
In our conversation we explore:
How a linguist became one of the foremost critics of economic globalization — and why she believes localization is not just economic theory but a path to human and ecological flourishing.
The roots of what she calls the “new economy movement,” and how reconnecting economic life with people and place can counteract social alienation, environmental collapse, and cultural erosion.
Her experience living in Ladakh and witnessing first-hand how traditional societies were transformed by outside economic forces — and what that reveals about the hidden costs of globalization around the world.
The ideas behind her award-winning films, including The Economics of Happiness, which has helped popularize localization through narrative and visual story-telling.
How the work of Local Futures — from World Localization Day to community initiatives and global alliances — represents more than critique: it offers practical alternatives built on human-scale economies, local food systems, cultural diversity, ecological regeneration, and shared meaning.
More than a conversation about economic systems, this episode is a deep exploration of what it means to be human in an era of environmental constraint, social fragmentation, and cultural homogenization. Helena’s perspective weaves together personal story, global analysis, and hopeful possibilities for those seeking a world where economies truly serve people and planet.
Whether you’re curious about why the global growth model is failing us, how localization can restore community and purpose, or what it takes to change the story of our times — this conversation with Helena offers both clarity and inspiration.
If you’re new to The Initiation, you may also want to explore Season 1, where I lay the foundations for the entire series. Across the first nine episodes, we dive into the core themes shaping our moment in history – from the rise of artificial intelligence and the breakdown of our monetary system to the climate crisis, geopolitics, and the breakthrough forces pointing toward transformation. Season 1 offers the wider context for everything we’ll explore this year.

Building a Village for a New Way of Being

Welcome to Season 2 of The Initiation. We’re beginning this new season with a conversation that is both deeply grounded and quietly radical – a look at what it truly takes to build a different way of living on this planet.
In this opening episode, I speak with Vincent Daranyi, founder of Neos.life, a 1000-acre village and retreat center in the Alentejo region of Portugal, designed as “a village for a new way of being.” Neos.life is envisioned as a living blueprint for a new form of civilization: regenerative by design, close to nature, and rooted in inner work, community, and ecological responsibility.
Vincent shares the long and often difficult road from early vision to actual place: finding the land, holding the project through uncertainty, navigating regulation and planning, raising capital, and slowly assembling a team and community around a shared commitment to regeneration and transformation. Today, Neos.life is becoming a self-sufficient village and transformational ecosystem - with independent water and energy systems, organic agriculture, a well-being and healing center, educational facilities, and a retreat hotel, all nestled around a large lake in Alentejo.
We talk about:
Why Vincent felt called to build a place like this in the first place - and what problem he believes Neos.life is really trying to solve.
The inner journey of the founder: doubt, persistence, near-failures, and the psychological cost of carrying a big, long-term vision.
The practical realities of community building: governance, money, land use, village design, and the difference between idealistic sketches and what actually works on the ground.
How Neos.life weaves together retreats, regenerative education, and residential living into one ecosystem - a “center for a new humanity” and a potential prototype for future villages.
If you’re interested in land-based projects, intentional communities, regenerative villages, or simply the question of how we might actually live differently on this planet, this conversation offers a rare, honest look behind the scenes of a very ambitious experiment.
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If you’re new to The Initiation, you may also want to explore Season 1, where I lay the foundations for the entire series. Across the first nine episodes, we dive into the core themes shaping our moment in history – from the rise of artificial intelligence and the breakdown of our monetary system to the climate crisis, geopolitics, and the breakthrough forces pointing toward transformation. Season 1 offers the wider context for everything we’ll explore this year.

The Initiation Trailer

Humanity stands at a threshold. Old systems are breaking down; new patterns of life are emerging. The Initiation invites listeners into the deeper story beneath this turbulence — a collective rite of passage for our species.
Hosted by Sebastian Dienst, entrepreneur, author and coach, the show explores how technology, money, ecology, and consciousness are converging to transform the human experience. Through soul-searching solo-episodes and conversations with visionary thinkers — from mythologists and scientists to spiritual teachers and economists — Sebastian traces the contours of our metamorphosis and asks what it means to rise to the occasion of our time.
Intellectually rigorous yet mythically alive, The Initiation is an invitation to participate consciously in the evolution already underway.

Episode 9 – The Evolution of Consciousness: Awakening Through the Metamorphosis

In this final episode of The Initiation, I turn inward—to what may be the most profound dimension of humanity’s transformation: the evolution of consciousness itself.
We’ve traced the forces of collapse and emergence reshaping our civilization. But beneath the noise of technology, money, and geopolitics, a quieter revolution is unfolding—in minds, bodies, and hearts. A revolution in how we understand who we are and what reality is.
I explore three interwoven currents of this awakening:
The Human Potential Revolution — our expanding capacity for healing, optimization, and self‑realization through trauma work, biohacking, precision medicine, and psychedelics.
The Ecological Awakening — a deep remembering of our kinship with Earth and the return of regenerative, relational ways of living.
The Awakening to Transcendence — the rediscovery of consciousness as primary reality, and the re‑emergence of the sacred within science, spirituality, and daily life.
Together, these shifts reveal that the deepest transformation of our age may not be technological or political—but spiritual. We are not just witnessing systems fall apart; we are participating in the birth of a more integrated, interconnected, and awake humanity.

Episode 8 – System Change: Money, Energy, and Governance Reimagined

In this episode of The Initiation, I continue our exploration of breakthrough trends—not through technology alone, but through the transformation of systems: how we coordinate, exchange, and govern in a world reaching its limits.
We move through three foundational shifts:
Bitcoin as a potential new base layer for value—decentralized, scarce, incorruptible
The new energy paradigm—clean, abundant, decentralized power reshaping geopolitics, economics, and human potential
Next-generation governance—emerging models that combine blockchain, AI, and swarm intelligence to coordinate at planetary scale
These aren’t band-aids on a failing machine. They’re imaginal cells of a new civilization—blueprints for organizing complexity, trust, and power in ways aligned with both human dignity and ecological reality.
I unpack the deeper logic of these shifts:
Why money isn’t neutral—but a cultural script shaping time, trust, and behavior
How decentralized energy could move us beyond scarcity and into a regenerative economy
Why governance must evolve from control to coherence—embodied in code, data, and collective intelligence
What ties them together is this: we’re not just upgrading old systems. We’re rewriting the core protocols of civilization. These are early signals of a new societal stack—growing quietly, experimentally, from the edges.
And they point to a critical question: What kind of world becomes possible when we reimagine money, power, and energy from the ground up?
Next time, we’ll explore the final—and perhaps most essential—layer of transformation: the evolution of consciousness. Because no system can sustain itself unless we also evolve the story of who we are.

Episode 7 – Foundational Technologies: The Intelligence That’s Emerging

In this episode of The Initiation, we cross the threshold from breakdown to breakthrough—and begin exploring the seeds of transformation already stirring within our dissolving world.
So far, we’ve tracked the destabilizing forces reshaping our reality: superintelligent AI, a faltering monetary system, climate breakdown, and geopolitical unraveling. But just like in nature, collapse is often the prelude to metamorphosis.
This episode is the first in a new arc focused on emerging breakthroughs—starting with what I call foundational technologies: advances that expand what it means to be human and redefine the architecture of civilization itself.
I dive into:
Artificial Intelligence and robotics as a new category of embodied, evolving intelligence
Genetic engineering as the ability to heal, enhance, and even redesign life itself
Quantum computing as a radical leap in problem-solving that mirrors the probabilistic logic of the universe
What makes this moment so potent is not just the power of these technologies individually—but their convergence. Together, they form a new substrate of planetary intelligence, capable of reshaping medicine, ecology, governance, and even our sense of identity and meaning.
This episode invites you to look beyond the headlines and into the deeper pattern: where biology meets code, where machines begin to learn, and where humanity steps into a new relationship with intelligence—not as masters, but as co-creators.
The questions we face are no longer just technical. They’re spiritual, ethical, and existential.
What kind of world are we building?And who are we becoming in the process?

Episode 6 – The End of an Empire: The unraveling U.S. Global Dominance

In this episode of The Initiation, I explore the fourth major force of breakdown: the unraveling of the U.S.-led global order.
Unlike past transitions—like the handover from the British Empire to American dominance—this shift isn’t a simple changing of the guard. It signals something deeper: the structural breakdown of the postwar system, and the slow-motion collapse of U.S. hegemony as both a financial and geopolitical force.
We begin by looking at empire itself. Drawing on Ray Dalio’s research into the rise and fall of great powers, I trace how productivity gives way to debt, how trust dissolves, and how soft power fades. We unpack the Triffin Dilemma—the contradiction at the heart of the dollar’s global dominance—and how it has hollowed out America’s industrial base while fueling a debt spiral with no easy exit.
I also dive into:
The loss of U.S. manufacturing and its geopolitical consequences
Why life expectancy is falling in one of the richest countries in the world
The overdose epidemic and its deeper cultural signals
The erosion of soft power—from Iraq to Gaza
And how trust—in institutions, leadership, and the system itself—is collapsing
This is about more than geopolitics. It’s about a superpower whose foundations are shaking—economically, morally, and socially. We examine how the U.S. might be heading toward a “Suez moment” of its own: a loss of perceived power that rapidly shifts the global balance.
And just like with the other forces we’ve explored—AI, money, and climate—the decline of U.S. dominance isn’t happening in isolation. It’s entangled with everything else. These systems are converging, amplifying, and accelerating each other.
So in this episode, I ask: What happens when the world’s central empire begins to crack - just as we enter a global phase shift?
And how might we prepare—not just for collapse, but for emergence?
 
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The Initiation is a podcast for those who sense we’re living through a civilizational turning point. In each episode, I explore the forces of breakdown and breakthrough reshaping our world - and the inner transformation required to meet them.
If this episode spoke to you, I’d love for you to share it, subscribe, and leave a review.
You can also find me on on Twitter and Instagram under @bastidienst
Until next time - stay awake, stay courageous, and thank you for being part of The Initiation.

Episode 5 – Climate Breakdown: Beyond Carbon, Toward Transformation

In this episode of The Initiation, I explore the third major force of breakdown shaping our time: the accelerating climate crisis.
This isn’t a debate. It’s a reckoning with what the science tells us—and how that fits into the deeper phase shift humanity is undergoing. I begin with the fundamentals of climate physics, then move into feedback loops, tipping points, and the sobering truth about locked-in warming. We also look beyond CO₂ to the collapse of Earth’s broader life-support systems: biodiversity, oceans, soil, and more.
I cover: – How feedback loops can push climate change beyond our control – Why efficiency gains often accelerate consumption (the Jevons Paradox) – The hidden cost of carbon debt—and why net zero isn’t enough – Why sulfur regulations may have accelerated recent warming – And how planetary boundaries show we’ve already crossed six of nine ecological thresholds
But this isn’t just about breakdown. It’s about the possibility hidden in the turbulence. Just like in nature, destabilization can be a precursor to transformation. The signs we’re seeing—ecological collapse, extreme weather, system shocks—might not just signal an ending, but a turning.
So I close with a deeper question: Can we shift from domination to stewardship? From extraction to regeneration? From passive observers to active participants in life’s unfolding?
This episode is an invitation to step into that inquiry—with clarity, humility, and courage.
 
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The Initiation is a podcast for those who sense we’re living through a civilizational turning point. In each episode, I explore the forces of breakdown and breakthrough reshaping our world - and the inner transformation required to meet them.
If this episode spoke to you, I’d love for you to share it, subscribe, and leave a review.
You can also find me on on Twitter and Instagram under @bastidienst
Until next time - stay awake, stay courageous, and thank you for being part of The Initiation.

Episode 4 – The Debt Spiral: Why Our Monetary System Is Reaching Its Limits

In this episode of The Initiation, I turn our focus to one of the most foundational—and fragile—systems shaping our world: money.
This isn’t just a conversation about inflation, debt ceilings, or economic cycles. What I explore here is something deeper: the structural limits of our current fiat monetary system—and why it may be approaching a breaking point.
We trace the full arc: from barter to gold, from centralized banking to fiat currency—and why our system, built on ever-expanding debt, now seems to be entering a spiral that’s mathematically impossible to sustain.
I unpack:
The five core properties of money and why scarcity is the most essential
How fiat currency emerged from gold-backed systems—and what we lost in the process
Why our current system requires perpetual debt creation just to stay afloat
How governments face an impossible bind between default and debasement
And why this isn’t just an American story, but a global reckoning
 
We’re now seeing the consequences:
 – Exploding interest payments  – Record levels of personal, corporate, and sovereign debt  – A decline in the effectiveness of debt as a growth driver  – And trillions in unfunded liabilities that dwarf our capacity to repay
 
I explore the two historical paths that typically follow this kind of system exhaustion: deflationary collapse or hyperinflation -and why both signal a possible phase shift, not just in money, but in the very architecture of global trust and coordination.
 
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The Initiation is a podcast for those who sense we’re living through a civilizational turning point. In each episode, I explore the forces of breakdown and breakthrough reshaping our world - and the inner transformation required to meet them.
If this episode spoke to you, I’d love for you to share it, subscribe, and leave a review.
You can also find me on on Twitter and Instagram under @bastidienst
Until next time - stay awake, stay courageous, and thank you for being part of The Initiation.