i will admit i don’t do a good job to reduce my carbon footprint either. sometimes i buy bottled water cos i’m thirsty, buy food from far away places, throw away stuff that i can reuse etc. most of the time i am pretty good about reducing – whether it’s food, clothes, stuff in general and i hardly buy things – but then again it’s not really all about that. i mean, i can do much more.
often environmental activists make the general people feel guilty about their life ‘style’. and i guess it is very necessary because a big chunk of us are really idiots when it comes to wasting energy and being mindless to how the world is dying slowly at our hands. luckily, over the course of a few years, the words ‘climate change’ and ‘global warming’ have become household names. we’re finally maybe catching up to what’s going on..unfortunately though, still at a pretty slow rate. to many of us it’s not really our problem because we don’t experience it first hand. but then to many many of us, it is a reality. that the weather and seasons are not the way they used to be. that now many people’s homes are demolished and their environments are disappearing.
but how actually can we make changes that will matter? instead of the usual ‘recycle all your bottles, cans…’ or ‘use reusable bags when grocery shopping instead of plastic bags’ etc. I have been thinking about this as i move around this busy city, I feel like there needs to be more than just the ‘we must do this because we have to’ mentality to start changing the way we live, but also an ahimsa – the practice of non-violence- approach that inspires us to not contribute to or create suffering.
for example, like eco-sattvas… i feel like an inner transformation and ‘awakening’ is necessary to become vessels that make positive changes and contribute to making our environment better. at least for me, i must remember to stay focused on why i want to do any of this in the first place, why even this blog? trying to find out more information and solutions can stray us away from our main primary goal. which is more of a spiritual one than a technical or political one. and that is: to love, take care and live in harmony with our environment.
how can we make ‘saving the earth’ something that we are encouraged, inspired and motivated to do instead of feeling obligated to do out of guilt?
kind of as in a relationship i guess.
i thought this image was pretty funny. got it from http://www.polyvore.com/ by Sierra!
fyi: some good podcasts to listen to on the subway or in-between-times.
Big Ideas Podcasts
#42 with Wade Davis on disappearing cultures
#77 with J.B. Mackinnon, Alisa Smith and Adria Vasil on the environment (from Canada, these guys talked about their mission of the 100 mile radius diet, in which they only ate food they could find from within a 100 mile radius. also including sail boat delivery of local CSAs!! great idea ^^)
Also came across a very cool NGO/Graduate School called Future Generations which “provides training and builds the capacity of communities and governments to shape sustainable futures, meeting especially the needs of children, women, the environment, and the poor.”
Their Core Values are as follows:
* Promotes respect for all lives and the conditions for their harmonious co-existence.
* Recognizes the dignity of every human being.
* Gives priority to the interests of women who have a particularly strong interest in the wellbeing of their families, children, and community.
* Emphasizes equity, empowerment, and self-confidence especially among marginalized members of the community.
urban plant project seoul 