While the question of sustainability has received more and more attention and publicity in the past decades, all ecosystems services has been constantly deteriorating during the same period. There is an abyss between theory and rhetoric and meaningful and effective action. Our present-day socio-ecological crisis is the result of a distorted world view which in turn is caused by deep psychological mechanisms affecting the individual and the society. Recognizing these underlying mechanisms, making people aware of how they work might help change the suicidal course that the developed societies based on free market capitalism, neoliberal ideology and excessive consumerism has been on in the last two hundred years. This paper aims to discuss some of the obstacles that seem to have been hindering effective action.