LV GRN: What am I?

There are readers who like it when I post about the environmental "big picture," those who like it when I post "individual action tips" and others who like it when I post my "personal experience." I got to thinking that I might write some posts about where those areas all intersect (as Sharon Astyk often comments, there is no distinction between the personal and the political).

For example, during the No Impact project, I found and continue to find some aspects of individual action really difficult. Go to a restaurant and not only can you largely forget about local food (the approach to sustainable eating I chose) but you can also forget about not making trash--you're faced with a current of throwaway paper napkins, plastic cups, glass bottles, paper place mats, etc.

Dedicate yourself to reducing trash in your own life and that's a great step forward (individual action). But use your own experiences to see where reducing trash is difficult--like in restaurants--and you've discovered some great areas to work for system change (collective action). The same applies in the areas of sustainable purchasing, low carbon transportation, etc (it's also important to make sure that concentrating on lifestyle change doesn't blind us to environmentally catastrophic industrial practices).

Anyway, I thought it would be fun to write a series of posts (each distinguished, like this one, by the LV GRN label) discussing my experiences and thoughts with both the individual and big picture issues and how they intersect in the areas that relate to each stage of the No Impact project: not making trash, no carbon transportation, local eating, sustainable consumption, reduced household reliance on fossil fuels and positive impact.

I thought I'd start with trash (and I'm going to come to that soon).

But then I realized that in many ways, the project doesn't start with trash at all. Actually, in a strange way, the project starts with questioning the nature of my existence, of our existence. Because in many ways, the way that I've lived my life has assumed that what I am, that my function, is about getting more and better stuff and life conditions in order that I should be happier.

In a lot of ways, the very structure of our culture, our politics, our government and our economic system assumes that that is the purpose and the meaning of an individual's life and that the purpose of our institutions is to facilitate it. Indeed, getting more and better stuff and life conditions, when it comes to the underprivileged, probably should be the purpose of those institutions.

But what about when it comes to someone like me, a solidly middle-class person who pretty much wants for nothing? Should our culture be trashing the planet to make sure that someone like me gets more and better stuff--which really means a cooler cell phone? Indeed, should getting a cooler cell phone or a bigger house be the purpose of my own life?

These are big questions, the point of which is to ask, if I and people like me are trashing the planet, what are we trashing the planet for? Am I trashing the planet for purposes I don't even really hold dear to my existence (I'm not planning, for example, to have my cell phone put in my coffin)?

For me, to answer these questions, or at least to loosen my grip on the illusory answers to which I've too often clung, it helps me to ask even harder questions. Where was I before my mother and father were born? Where will I be after my grandchildren die? Towards what should I spend this life working?

And in the larger realm, towards what should my culture be working? Because if my life is not about more, should my culture really be about higher GDP? Are there more worthy goals?

The point of asking such questions on a personal level--or I should say one of the points--is not to come up with an answer so much as to shake my confidence in the false answers--like that my life is for getting more. Maybe since, as they say, you can't take it with you, my life is about giving more--which naturally leads to a sustainable lifestyle.

I don't mean to sound pious. Anyone who has to discuss and remind himself of such things as often as I do clearly has no place being pious. Nor do I mean to go all esoteric.

But such thoughts and questions are what nagged me into wanting to lead a more sustainable life. They are the root of my launching myself into the No Impact project. They've won a place in this series of LV GRN posts that will, next, move on to a discussion about trash.

But for now, I'll leave you with an ancient poem that I've posted before and which says much more concisely what I've attempted to say here. It's called "The Human Route":

Coming empty-handed, going empty-handed -- that is human.
When you are born, where do you come from?
When you die, where do you go?
Life is like a floating cloud which appears.
Death is like a floating cloud which disappears.
The floating cloud itself originally does not exist.
Life and death, coming and going, are also like that.
But there is one thing which always remains clear.
It is pure and clear, not depending on life and death.

Then what is the one pure and clear thing?

Comments

[Jessica, NL]

Hit the nail on the head with this post and these thoughts...I think ;-)! Maybe I'll respond again later, after I've pondered about this some more. Tnx.

[Stonehead]

I've long asked myself questions like those you ask in your post and it's why I, and my family, live a threadbare existence on a rundown croft. We have enough for our needs with a few comforts on top, so why keep grasping for more?

I suspect many people bedeck themselves with trinkets as a way of disguising a hollowness within. It's an outward show of richness to deflect attention from the lack of inner richness.

[Uma]

The Paradox of Our Age
by The 14th Dalai Lama

We have bigger houses but smaller families;
More conveniences, but less time;
We have more degrees, but less sense;
More knowledge, but less judgment;
More experts, but more problems;
More medicines, but less healthiness;
We've been all the way to the moon and back, but have trouble crossing the street to meet the new neighbor.
We build more computers to hold more information to produce more copies than ever but have less communication.
We have become long on quantity, but short on quality.
These are times of fast foods but slow digestion;
Tall men but short character;
Steep profits but shallow relationships.
It's a time when there is much in the window, but nothing in the room.

[Recovering Food Waster]

That's so true, Uma! I'll have to save that one.

[Val]

Great post, Colin. This is exactly where everyone needs to start. When you understand that you are more than your things, and more than your thoughts even, then you will break through to the real Essence of life.

Keep 'em coming!

[KTHunter]

I think this is a great place to start. Our beliefs drive our behaviors. Not the beliefs we just express with our lips -- but the deep down blood-and-bones beliefs that we are not always aware of until something happens to bring them to the surface. We have to expand our awareness of what is inside of us so we can find out why we do what we do now. That is a good first step in changing what we do. If we don't do that, we'll tend to slip back into our original behaviors.

[Stephanie]

An excellent book about this sort of questioning is _To Have or To Be?_ by Erich Fromm. It's an incredible book that goes deeply into the question of what it means to really live. He sets up the dichotomy between the ways of living vs. living to own stuff. Once you understand the difference, it becomes obvious everywhere. Hard to sum up -- but it holds much food for thought.

[Cory - FoodSciYogi]

Wow! Great blog. Thanks for your effort.

The restaurant dilemma --- a big one for me these days. I do my darndest to prepare my own meals using locally sourced plant-based food, but between work and teaching yoga it's tough to get it all in. So, I end up at the Whole Foods buffet line pretty often --- and even there, where you know people are aware of recycling and they have the cans available --- I go to distribute my trash and recyclables only to find glass and plastic in the trash. UGGHH!

http://foodkarmaalert.blogspot.com/

[Zach @ Pennywise]

I'll look forward to your ideas! This post of mine puts sustainable and green living into a more traditional American context, put I believe that all cultures that have been around for long enough time had at one point (before we thought we knew better) had developed a sustainable method of agriculture and living for their areas.

[Me-chelle]

There is a shallowness and fear which permeates society and I'm not really sure where it's coming from these days. My best guess is it's coming from self-doubt. We humans tend to walk around doubting everything because we don't know who to trust, even though we have gut feelings about what is right and wrong.

I am longing for a strong leader of this country who is not afraid to ask all of us to make sacrifices for the planet, and ultimately, for our great grandchildren.

I will continue to paddle upstream and lead by example, but this isn't supposed to make me feel superior to anyone, it's to try and free us from the constraints put on us by our own self-doubts.

[Lisa]

Oh please! Sound pious! Go esoteric! Ask the hard questions -- someone has to! It is obvious that our culture (and most of our society) has perfected the art of NOT asking questions and blithely ignoring what we don't wish to see. "Just shut up and consume!" Something has to jolt us into that space beyond ourselves.

Thanks, man! Keep up the great posts!

[Chris LaRoche]

Hi Colin,

I share your sentiment. Though I've only been following your blog for a few weeks, I wonder if you've seen www.Storyofstuff.com. It's an eye-opening analysis of our culture of consumption, more specifically, how our society has been designed by economists in the last 50 years for us to consume more, and the implications that has brought about (like global warming). I not only urge you to check it out (if you haven't already), but I'd like to hear your take on it. Thanks and keep up the good work!

[Chris LaRoche]

Oops! I commented too soon, amazing what a quick search of a blog can reveal (and I'm not surprised you wrote about it long before I saw it). Maybe just a reminder to the other newbies: watch Story of Stuff.com!

[Natalie]

I heart LV GRN! :-)

Thanks for the post. You're an excellent writer, Colin. Reading your work helps me articulate my own position more clearly to others...and sometimes to myself.

Through increased awareness and improved technology, we can easily and quickly remove a great deal of the harm we are currently causing. However, getting to a true one-planet lifestyle will require that we all confront the issues of *purpose* and *place* in this world.

[Brandy]

This is a wonderful post. It really gets to the heart of sustainability, if you ask me. Getting stuff for the sake of having more stuff really shouldn't be the point. But it is the way things seem to work these days. I try to do my parts, but I admit that I still feel out of place at times when I pull my own bag out to carry things, or when I'm wearing clothes that are no longer "in fashion." I wonder about buying things that are a "good" price - who makes them? Under what condition? Should I really support this company by making a purchase?

It can be frustrating, because there just aren't many people who think about these things. I enjoy reading your thoughts to keep me motivated in mine.

[Thais]

Eckhart Tolle is talking about this subject on Oprah. Millions of people are participating in her free 10 week webcast. Maybe we'll see a shift. But yes, until more people realize your point, then progress on a large scale will be tough.

[Cynthia Friedlob, The Thoughtful Consumer]

Lovely post, Colin. Those "meaning of life" issues are at the root of so many problems that plague humanity. It doesn't sound pious to profess that the mindless acquisition of more and more stuff quickly becomes meaningless; no, it just sounds insightful.

[Bill]

Just stumbled across you yesterday only to read this post which captures clearly some of the struggles I've been going through in the last year. I'm single, in my mid-thirties, and frankly make about 50% more than I need to meet my needs. So the question of "For what?" has been on my mind lately. I look forward to following your thoughts.

[Jen from Brooklyn]

Now that you've branded yourself with the "LV GRN Label" Colin, you better watch out for Madison Ave types trying to license you to legitimize their cheap plastic crap :)!

I've missed being here every day - been spending all my time on the Obama campaign, which this blog partly inspired me to do.

[Fix]

Hi, Colin -

I've alternated between thinking the "daily tip" commenters are really funny and feeling really angry at them. I mean, really, folks: go out and find your own daily tip! That's what this blog is all about - your engagement in your life, your loves, and your surroundings. After you find something low-impact that works for you, you can post it in the comments section of this blog. Or start your own blog!

You're doing an admirable job of trying to please everyone, Colin, and of staying engaged with what matters to you.

Megan