Our Code
To create alignment, make better decisions, and welcome challenges with a smile, we choose to adopt a code.
About our Code
“The most fundamental decision we make is whether we live in a friendly or a hostile universe.”
Albert Einstein
“The way you see people is the way you treat them, and the way you treat them is what they become.”
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Why we choose a baseline attitude:
1. We humans foster an attitude, whether we know it or not, and we build on it, whether we know it or not,
so we rather consciously affirm and integrate an attitude, than let a semi-conscious or unconscious attitude play ball with us.
2. We reap what we sow.
If we unconsciously view others as untrustworthy, we tend to put all sorts of controls and punishments in place to prevent them from doing what we don’t want them to do.
This invites resistance and rebellion, and will most likely leave us thinking, ‘See? I was right!’
If instead we meet people with practices based on trust and love, we will nurture a context of trust and love, calling on people’s innate desire to be honest and to contribute.
In short: fear breeds fear; trust builds trust.
A right baseline attitude (and reminding ourselves of it) helps lay the groundwork for aligned, joyful ways of living and working together.
Adopting Core Premises
Core Premises are:
- a clarification of mindsets and behaviours that either nurture or undermine a safe, empowering environment
- a benchmark for ideas, structures, or projects we wish to implement
- a prerequesite for excellent team play
- a guide for dealing healthily with both blessings and challenges
- a ‘litmus test’ for people who may want to join the team, or with whom we could collaborate — are we a right fit?
Not restricting
Core premises, as we view them, clarify the playing field while meeting our innate human need for autonomy.
Such a playing field is liberating, not limiting.
Healthy accountability
Western society has burdened words like ‘responsibility’ and ‘accountability’ with guilt (‘Who’s responsible for this?!’), shame (‘Are you responsible for this?!’), and punishment (‘I’m gonna get whoever’s responsible for this!’).
In each of these burdens, we see a beautiful kernel of truth
Deep down, humans yearn to have and take responsibility for their actions.
Healthy responsibility and healthy accountability help us to grow, improve our work, and enjoy the fruits of our labour more fully.
Core premises can help remind us of our response-ability: we can respond, in a healthy way, to any situation or event.
Danger zone
Most of today’s rules and ‘agreements’ miss the mark, because:
- they are imposed without consent and against people’s will;
- they put form and strategy first, obstructing the underlying needs they’re supposed to serve;
- they start living their own lives (‘yes, but these are the rules!’), blocking autonomy, freedom, and excellence — sometimes with monstrous consequences.
Whatever agreement, structure, or practice we put in place, it should serve a premise, not the other way around.
By maintaining our awareness of this, we can allow forms and strategies to develop in freedom and in accordance with learnings and insights, while staying aligned with our mission.
The litmus test
Joining a team should not happen when you’re merely willing to accept the playing field.
You need to feel enthusiastic about it — and about helping to improve it.
As a team, we should be prepared to gracefully argue about a lot of things, but not about the foundations.
Testing for alignment beforehand helps us grow a better team that produces more tasty fruit.
That written…
Akin to a constitution, core premises need to remain open to the scrutinizing question, ‘Is this (still) serving our mission?’
Insight, experience, and newly joined genius may lead us to amend certain parts, but a constitution it remains, and we commit to honouring it when we step onto the playing field.
Our Baseline Attitude
What we hold in truth
Or, the lens through which we practice seeing ourselves, each other, and the world.
The Universe is a fundamentally friendly place.
Things are the way they are
only as long as we believe them to be.
Every being’s core identity is love.
We are the change we wish to see.
Our Core Premises
Miracle Project‘s operational foundations
1. We work in ways that work
To build power-with structures that liberate how we act, not power-over structures that imprison how we act:
- We practice deep listening
We view Miracle Project as a living system with its own purpose and direction.
We welcome it as a team member and call on its wisdom during meetings, by giving it a seat and letting it speak through one or several of us.
We treat the goal and the means as one.
Every footstep either helps or hurts what we’re building, so we commit to putting equal care, quality and effort into everything we do—even in temporary solutions.
We do the right thing, even when it’s inconvenient. Because actions that support life do better…
and feel better ☺︎.
- We employ decision-making forms that maximise collective intelligence and honour individual autonomy, creativity, and passion
Everyone who fully steps into the project team is free to take initiative and to lead.
To make this freedom work for the good of all, we agree to seek advice before we act, from:
- people who will be impacted by our decisions (they can voice concerns and help us improve our ideas);
- people and resources with relevant knowledge, skills and expertise (they will prevent us from reinventing the wheel).
In short: we don’t need permission; we do seek advice.
- We organise for clarity and flow
We set clear priorities and stay focused on what matters.
We keep our surroundings clean, functional and organised, fixing things when they break or asking for help when needed.
We implement workable processes and solutions, improving them as we go instead of getting bogged down in perfectionism.
- We welcome experimentation, embracing both success and failure
Because one can’t live without the other 🎉
2. We liberate money and property
- We free Miracle Project’s home base, along with any related land, buildings and assets, from market dynamics and speculation
Ownership of Miracle Project’s real estate goes to a separate entity that clearly defines the following:
- The project’s lands and buildings are to be used in line with its mission—they cannot be treated as things to be exploited or sold for financial profit.
- Land and buildings may only be transferred to an entity aligned with Miracle Project’s premises and objectives.
We keep the project’s energy and assets away from speculative financial dynamics such as interest-bearing debts, stock trading, crypto gambling, and collateral-based loans.
We may sell project assets with the intention of carrying forward the value created—never for financial profit.
- We work to transform the lonely fear of ‘not enough’ into a collective experience of trust, abundance, and resilience
As a project team:
- We commit to letting money, resources, and time flow as positive expressions of a more beautiful world.
- We reduce our dependency on large, anonymous institutions by building diversity and collaboration into the project and local community.
- We learn to rely on the kinds of social, natural, economic, and spiritual capital that, instead of feeding a false sense of independence and security, make us truly equipped and resilient.
As resident team members:
- We choose to give up protecting ourselves individually on a material level.
- We let the fruits of our labour flow into a collective treasure chest that exists for the benefit of all.
- We participate in a shared, peer-based financial and material structure that:
- is fully transparent, because it requires us to present our ideas and needs to the collective for advice before we act;
- honours our autonomy, because it gives each of us full decision-making rights over finances and resources — including what we need for personal sustenance.
3. We relate in life-giving ways
- We train our ability to respond positively to situations and events
We bring our ideas, disagreements and tensions to the table, so that the collective can benefit from our wisdom.
And because this works both ways: we welcome ideas, disagreements and tensions to the table, so that we can benefit from collective wisdom.
We ask for help, especially when asking feels scary.
We support learning and empowerment over fixing each other’s problems.
We distill value from all kinds of feedback, even when it comes in critical or emotionally charged forms.
We embrace tension and conflict as opportunities for learning and growth, and when needed, participate in consciously transformation processes.
- We communicate to connect rather than divide
Recognising that we are all responsible for our feelings, and recognising that our thoughts, words, and actions impact others:
We practice honesty, spontaneity and transparency, free from the fear of reactions or judgements.
We practice empathic listening, seeking to understand before seeking to be understood.
We practice separating strategies from underlying needs, so we can more effectively identify the best courses of action, invite help, and reach goals.
We seek to transform unhealthy relationships into healthy ones, only and respectfully severing ties when no other healthy option remains.
We employ restorative justice when boundaries have been crossed.
We use protective force only to avert a threat, and only for as long as is needed to avert a threat.
- We use information for the good of all
We keep all relevant information available to everyone involved, informing relevant people pro-actively of any change in ideas or plans.
We answer requests for information clearly and on time, which includes saying, “I don’t know yet, I’ll get back to you by…”
We use media channels to share what truly inspires us, communicating in authentic and grounded ways, trusting that what we share will reach the right people at the right time, rather than trying to maximise on likes and ‘results’.
When we share information publicly, we welcome reuse, rather than claiming intellectual ownership.
We safeguard ourselves and each other against digital noise by consciously choosing our interactions with devices, and by speaking up when we feel disturbed or concerned by people’s device use.
4. We lead a genuinely shared life
Recognising that self-sustainability doesn’t exist, and choosing to embrace interdependence:
- We build a healthy, nourishing collective existence
We use collective facilities like a communal kitchen and shared cars to make life less burdensome, less stressful, and more supportive and fun.
We participate in shared events and practices like community meals and weekly gatherings.
We integrate spiritual practice and physical self-care into our collective activities.
We choose to cultivate naturally awakened states of being by:
- keeping project spaces free from alcohol, smoking, and drugs;
- reserving substance use to exceptional occasions, collectively organised with the intention of serving naturally awakened states of being;
- avoiding isolated, recreational and repetitive substance use—even when ceremonial.
We hold regular celebration and gratitude circles—and we welcome spontaneous acts of celebration and gratitude 💃🏽🕺🏾.
We practice to meet our needs within this collective sphere, using retreat and solitude only to nourish our ability to enjoy a shared life.
- We welcome all walks of life to the team
We encourage children and elders to partake in project activities and work, respecting all as full-fledged members of the team.
We welcome animals to the project grounds when we can offer them a mutually supportive space.
- We positively engage with our surroundings
Our resident team learns and uses Portuguese as the primary language.
We contribute to local and regional initiatives and ways of life.
We invite volunteers, visitors, course participants, and the surrounding community to partake in our shared practices.
5. Rule #5
We don’t take ourselves too seriously.
Life’s more 🎉 that way.
Learn more
In Miracle Project‘s Vision Doc you will find:
- a recipe book for prototyping new ways of living, working, and giving
- a first blueprint for Miracle Project’s key operational principles
- practical inspiration for reinventing how we organise ourselves, in service to a more beautiful world
Get Involved
Receive inspiration, become a regenerative investor, join an experience, or join the team: