Hyakusho is Going to Be the Most Popular Occupation in the Next Few Years.

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You can find out more about Satoyama Capitalism at the site below.

From Money Capitalism to Satoyama Capitalism

https://ourworld.unu.edu/en/from-money-capitalism-to-satoyama-capitalism

 

I told you that I had written a novel called Hyakusho Revolution. Well, what does hyakusho mean?

 

It means a farmer.

 

It represents an old farmer who wasn’t a commercial farmer, a person who lived in a self-sufficient way. A hyakusho didn’t just do farming, went into the mountains to cut trees, built or fixed houses, made clothes and did everything which was necessary for living.

 

Hyaku means 100, and a hyakusho meant someone who had 100 jobs.

 

About 100 years ago, almost everyone in Japan was a hyakusho, and we all lived in Satoyama.

 

There is a revival of hyakusho in Japan now. Many people are moving to the countryside and start living on the land. They first start growing rice and vegetables, but after a while, they expand their lifestyle to doing some forestry work, carpentry work, and making fermented food such as miso and soy source.

 

There is another word for this trend in Japanese, and that is Han No Han X, a half farming, and a half something else. Han means a half, no means farming, and X represents whatever the work the person specializes. For example, there are a half farmer and a half writer; a half farmer and a half musician; a half farmer and a half psychotherapist; a half farmer and a half computer programmer, and so on.

 

I think this trend is a part of a much greater transition of our lifestyle. As I said in the last post, many companies may go bankrupt, and as a result, more people will lose jobs. People will be forced to find ways to survive, but there aren’t any ways left within the present economic structure because nothing is certain in this rapidly changing, globally competitive world of business. If they go back to farming, at least they can manage to get their daily bread. They will minimize their expenditure by going self-sufficient as much as possible, and do some extra work to earn some money. X is more like a hobby at the moment, but I think X will be something more established if more people begin Han No Han X. Many of them will be self-employed, running a small business.

 

Instead of working for a company, they will run their own business to make products, sell products, and provide services which are done by companies now.

 

Ironically, the Internet will play a big role supporting those individual businesses. People are already selling their products on Amazon and promoting their products through Google or Facebook.

 

Another word, there will be many Han No Han Internet-based self-employed people. Living in the land will be crucial because the world of Internet is still insecure and people want something solid. Also working in the digital world is sometimes tiring, and farm life provides good breaks from it. They will be growing food, doing a bit of forestry work and carpentry work here and there in their breaks.

 

If they can minimize their expenditure, they won’t have to earn so much money, and as a result, they won’t have to expose themselves to the never-ending competition.

 

This is the lifestyle I am introducing in the book Zen and a Way of Sustainable Prosperity. It will bring us a lot of freedom and independence. We will no longer be controlled by the government or the media because each of us will be a politician and media.

 

That is what hyakusho really means: An independent individual.