This Sustainable Life

Erik Bottcher is my elected legislator. New York City's council presides over a budget bigger than most countries'.Yet I met him picking up litter. He organized weekly clean-ups when the city dropped its sanitation budget during the pandemic. He also sees the problem not as too little cleaning up but too much supply of packaging that becomes litter.Let's pause for a moment. How many politicians have you heard of who bend down and pick up litter, week after week? I think the world would benefit from all of them doing it.We talk about changes to the city we'd like to see. He shares about growing up gay not in Manhattan but the Adirondacks, then coming to the city and how that affects his governing. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michael is becoming a regular. Would I have expected an extended conversation with a doctoral candidate at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary when I started? I don't think so, and I don't think many environmentalists engage with evangelicals and conservatives. I think you'll hear genuine friendship, mutual respect, and mutual desire to learn from each other. I think you'll hear actual learning.In this episode we took on a topic we expected to disagree on: population. This time I asked more questions, learning his views and the views of scripture he follows, though I shared my views too.What does the Bible have to say about population? Where do we agree or disagree? What common ground is there, if any, and what can we do about it? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Maxine shares her experience with her commitment across the country. She moved partly to enable living by her values. People often suggest it's easier for someone living in New York not to fly since I have access to so much culture here, but access to many cultures only matters if you value it. Not everyone does. I hope you live where you can access things you value. If you don't, no amount of travel will overcome that you live where you don't like.I mention this because Maxine could live by her values better not in New York. She sounds like she's still flying a bunch, she didn't commit to avoiding flying (yet). As we talk about in our conversation, we build up to bigger changes through smaller ones.Note how often she describes the discomfort that changing to acting on her values liberates her from. I believe we all feel that discomfort when we know we're acting against our values. We know when we're polluting. No amount of rationalization that "everyone else is doing it", "the plane was going to fly anyway", "what I do doesn't matter", and so on can quiet our consciences.I heard her composting commitment liberated her from feelings and behavior she didn't like. Not that she couldn't change any time, but the commitment from our conversation kick started a change. I expect she'll keep developing, maybe not monotonically, but steadily.Vogue: Maxine Bédat Urges the Fashion Industry to Make a Change Now, Not in 2030Maxine in Harper's BazaarElle: Maxine Bédat Unravels The Lies of Greenwashing The author of Unraveled on why she doesn't subscribe to the term "sustainable fashion."Unraveled: The Life and Death of a Garment Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

How do you become one of the premier investigative journalists at one of the premier publishers of investigative journalism? In general, how do you excel in an area with no established path? I consider figuring out how essential in leading others.I feel sad when I hear people say, "I'd like to help the environment, but there are no jobs in it." Of course not! When culture is the problem, following others won't solve it. Leading others requires leading yourself first.Jesse and I have known each other since college in the 1980s, so he shares his path from the start. On the surface, you'll hear him describe his failures, yet he kept rising to more responsibilities. Listen between the lines to hear what prompted the rise. I heard integrity, passion, persistence, vision, and intangibles that don't show up on resumes, but lead to success. What do you hear?After his personal story, Jesse shares his take of American values and culture and how it's changed in his professional lifetime. He hints at what he's working on next.The Secret IRS Files: Trove of Never-Before-Seen Records Reveal How the Wealthiest Avoid Income TaxThe Chickenshit Club: Why the Justice Department Fails to Prosecute Executives,The Wall Street Money Machine Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michael shares about avoiding using a smart phone, or at least using a minimally functional smart phone. Do you remember what life was like without yours? What does solitude mean to you?How much time do you spend on a smart phone? Would you like to reduce it? What would you do instead? What are we missing? How about emotion, love, freedom, and joy?He talks about the irony spending money to help us handle our addiction to those who cause the addiction. It sounds like doof. We talk about addiction, our purposes, and being distracted from them.The above is the starting point of what life is about when not distracted all the time: freedom, family, community, our values, and understanding those things. You'll also hear scripture quoted joyfully than in most conversations.If you've considered a digital fast, I recommend listening as motivation to do it. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Allegheny College was one of the first 10 institutions of higher education in the United States to be declared carbon neutral by an organization called Second Nature. Readers of my blog know my skepticism of claims of "net zero" or "carbon neutral," but I look for people in leadership positions acting genuinely and authentically toward sustainability.So I bring you Allegheny's president, Dr. Hilary Link. She shares the college's experience starting a decade ago, before her arrival, and its institutional long-term action. She also shares her helping her peers do similar work at other schools.Allegheny College took on the challenge without a substantial endowment, a large staff, or a big budget. For the last five years, the College's Environmental Science and Sustainability program has been listed among the top five in the U.S. for its interdisciplinary, experiential approach.Like most guests, she agreed to share her environmental values and commit to live by them personally. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Chad shares his experience motivating his family to try to bring them camping with him. You'll hear they didn't make it easy. I couldn't resist asking questions about his experience of nature, people, and sex without sight. I didn't want to ask questions everyone asks, but he graciously answered.His mindset also emerged of how to handle life's challenges, which he shared. If I could give people new technologies for sustainability or his attitude, I would pick his attitude, since it would enable others to solve their problems. If losing your sight would be a greater challenge than living sustainably, well, he sounds pretty happy and successful handling a greater challenge. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

"People want to act, but it's hard," my business friend said to me, speaking on the environment. I said it to myself for most of my life before learning that acting on the environment, however hard, was fun. Raising a child is hard too, but people do it.This time we happened to be speaking over video and recording it. I'm posting what I happened to say extemporaneously. I wouldn't describe it as a rant, but sort of close. I talked about slavery, abolition, learning, doing hard things, and more.I said what I wish someone had said to me twenty years ago. I would have acted earlier. It also shares how someone who has acted more sustainably for more than a few years thinks.The video version, so you can see me saying it Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Blake shares his results about acting on his commitments from last time. He couldn't work much with rowing with temperatures barely above freezing, but he could act on his diet. He also dusted off an old habit of shooting, which he shared about.We also got to talking about nuclear and alternative energy sources. He asked me my views, so I shared the long-term results I saw from it based on humanity's past.We also spoke of the Bible, Job, and ponder the meaning of having dominion over nature in the context of causing extinctions globally.Beneath all the content, I think you'll hear a friendship growing. I find the discipline of athletes, artists, leaders, and others in ASEEP fields develops the skills and experience to act thoughtfully and effectively. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I've been following Katharine for years. If you don't know of her, after our conversation, watch her TED talk and read her book, Saving Us: A Climate Scientist's Case for Hope and Healing in a Divided World. It comprises decades of science, leadership, and efforts to live sustainably, the overlap I consider essential to influencing people on sustainability.Our conversation is about hope, faith, science, love, and our sledding hills. We know the science, but enough to know not to dwell it it, but to know what we're talking about. Then we apply our values to determine what to do.She's worked at this leading in sustainability to know what to do, and it's not just to focus on the science. The value of our actions is not just the footprint but our shadow: whom we affect. The reason to act is not for an abstract "environment" but for our values, especially shared ones. Connect with people, including ourselves, on what we care about.The goal isn't to lecture people but to help connect the dots between what they care about and sustainability, which affects all of us and everything we do, so we can always know how to connect those dots. It may take practice. Read her book. Start now.Katharine's pageHer book, Saving Us: A Climate Scientist's Case for Hope and Healing in a Divided WorldHer TED talk, The most important thing you can do to fight climate change: talk about it Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.