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This might sound crazy, but I have realized the power of failure. BIG failure. By “big,” I mean failing at something that matters a lot to me.

Who in their right mind wants to fail? Most of us would say we hate failure and really want to succeed.

Nothing wrong with that! The problem comes when we are so afraid of failure that we never really try. Either we go for goals that don’t matter all that much to us, or we go for the things we really want but we hold back from putting forth our full effort. This stance feels “safe” to our reptilian brains.

I spent my whole life, over 50 years, saying I was going to write a book. Finally, I did. It was terrifying. I got a lot of other projects done, and a really clean house, in the course of “avoiding writing.” But the book got done, and it turned out to be good! Then I was still afraid of failure so I did a half-baked job of marketing it. But, people are buying it! (That book is the nonfiction work DEEP GREEN, the book that inspired me to start this blog.)

Truthfully, if I had been any good at waiting tables all those years ago (I was not), I might never have gotten around to writing a book, or any of the other things I have tried in my adult life. Many of the things I’ve tried, I have failed at. Then again … failure is in the mind.

By the way, I have great admiration and respect for the profession of waiting tables. I consider it a ministry (as just about any other profession can be). But, I’m no darn good at it, which is probably a good thing in my case because I was just using it as a pipeline to steady money. And using it to hide out from the work I felt called to do.

This week I did what might have been the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life, and the undone thing that mattered most to me: I posted a piece of fiction writing in the public eye. Then something interesting happened: I realized that I did not care if people thought it was awful! I did not even care if it was actually awful! I realized that I still wanted to keep up the project! For a person who has done a lot of quitting and hanging-back in her life, this was big.

I am surrounded by people who are doing huge things in the world, making a major difference. Restoring landscapes on a large scale; making big public art; reducing single-use plastics on a regional level; making eco motivational speeches to audiences of thousands or millions. It’s very humbling. But interestingly enough, as I voluntarily experienced the crushing sense of feeling “less than” these people in terms of effectiveness, I started to get a spark of renewed energy for my own efforts. And I started to take joy in the efforts themselves instead of measuring how “successful” I was being.

My highest goal, the one that matters most to my earthly self, is to help ensure the survival of human life on this planet, and co-create a peaceful enlightened civilization. It’s something I will never quit.

But, another thing that matters almost as much to me is writing — not just as a vehicle for the above goal, but as a thing in and of itself. Overcoming procrastination, resistance, raw fear, the depth of the abyss … it feels as epic to me as I imagine that surfing must feel. Words, being able to transmit feeling in words — is so huge to me. Words are a low-bandwidth medium of transmission that can survive for millennia and maybe even cross galaxies.

Whatever your big thing is, I encourage you to tackle it! (By the way, one person’s small thing is another person’s big thing, so don’t think you have to make a grand splash on a fancy stage for your efforts to matter.)

In the course of tackling lower-stakes goals and still failing at them, I’ve found that a string of mediocre failures can be like death by a thousand paper cuts. Might as well go for the big enchilada, I say!

I have more to say about this topic but am going to let it percolate for a bit.

Update: It struck me that failure is like a good set of pruning shears. If I fail at something and then quit, that “something” must not have been very important after all. Or else, that “something” was an ineffective action toward an important goal. Either way, it’s a branch that needed pruning! All the better to focus on effective efforts related to things that truly matter to me.

Well, dear readers, I told you I was working on some fiction, and the time has come to share it with you! ALONE is my comic novel-in-progress about a washed-up eco-activist who wakes up one day to find that all the other people are gone.

I had originally planned to launch a complete novella today (February 14, 2020), but the story sort of grew legs, or maybe I should say tentacles! So it’s a work ongoing. I’m going to be posting it here on this blog in installments, as free downloadable PDFs. You can also subscribe to get installments delivered (at unspecified periodic intervals) to your email inbox. Just drop me a line at jnazak at yahoo dot com

Later, once the story is finished, I’ll be formally launching it as a book or series of books, which will be available for sale. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy the wild and woolly “first cut”! Thanks for joining me on this ride! Below, I give you Installment #1 of ALONE.

UPDATE Feb 21, 2020: Early readers have been enjoying the saga so far! Thank you for your feedback. Early readers have also given me useful feedback on the page layout, and I have reformatted the layout to be more mobile-friendly.

Here is ALONE, Installment 1, improved for mobile-readability.

A cornerstone of permaculture design is the idea that “The problem is the solution,” or “Turn problems into assets.” This is also expressed in the design principle, “Obtain a yield.” (As opposed to just alleviating or getting rid of a problem, we turn it into an asset or harvest.)

So-called “weeds” stubbornly growing in a corner of the yard turn out to be native wildflowers that support the pollinators who are essential to our survival. Instead of spending money and labor (and deploying poisons) to eradicate them, we can simply let them be. Providing a net benefit to the ecosystem for free!

The willingness to “turn problems into assets” can make the difference between life and death. One example: In East Africa, a bumper crop of locusts is laying waste to the land, threatening the food supply. However, locusts are edible! (by both livestock and people.) In Israel, where crops are also in the grip of a locust invasion, people have taken to eating the bugs.

Eating bugs might sound gross if you’ve never tried them, but insects are a staple food or even a delicacy in many cultures. I myself have eaten many a bug, and found them unexpectedly tasty. I once attended an “insect potluck.” Held at Zilker Park in Austin, Texas, and organized under the banner “Man Eating Bug,” it attracted some 500 people. Note, for reasons of safety and flavor, it is best to cook bugs rather than eat them raw. Also, if you are allergic to shellfish, don’t eat insects.

Another example of turning a problem into a yield would be harvesting invasive plants and using them to make cellophane or biofuel.

On a personal note — I am channeling my sensitive, reactive temperament into FICTION GOLD, and will be publishing an eco-comedy novella series soon.

Can you think of some area or situation in your life where you might be able to turn a problem into a yield?

Further Reading:

Eating locusts: The crunchy kosher snack taking Israel by storm (BBC News). In addition to reporting the pragmatic snack craze in Israel, the article also mentions that “Locusts are a valuable source of income for women in Niger, who get up early to collect them from the millet fields, and then sell them at the market. They make more money from the locusts on the millet than the millet itself”.

Something I’ve been feeling for awhile: You don’t need a million customers, a hundred thousand, ten thousand, or even necessarily a thousand! A hundred clients can be quite enough. Staying small (right-sized) is often a more powerful ticket to a steady livelihood than any amount of growth. You may find that your number is in fact 1,000 or 10,000 or more. The point is to choose deliberately, choose the right fit for you and your work.

Jeff Goins (one of my go-to bloggers on business and creativity) says it better than I ever could. He doesn’t mention the word “permaculture,” but his advice is very much in keeping with that set of nature-based design principles.

Jeff is a writer and coach, but his advice applies equally to the organic farmer, cottage candy-maker, solo jewelry designer, or whatever you are aspiring to make your livelihood of! Jeff’s article A New Way of Doing Business: Find Your Dream 100 contains maybe the best advice I’ve ever read for business enterprises, especially solo ones.

“… by focusing on helping fewer people, I’m able to reduce my overhead while significantly increasing my profits, so I’ll personally make more money while helping more people.”

And this really hits home:

“For years, I longed to create an “impact” and leave a “legacy” while “making a dent in the universe.” But in reality, I was doing none of that. All I was doing was trying to be famous. Finally, I woke up, realizing my work wasn’t that important. As sad as it sounds, this reality liberated me, allowing me to enjoy my work.”

(Note, this is not to say that we are not doing important work. I interpret it to mean that none of us, individually, holds the fate of the universe in his or her hands.)

Those are just a couple of snippets; go enjoy the rest of Jeff’s article! I look forward to hearing how his advice works for you.

In recent years, and particularly over the past couple of years, I have felt more and more pulled to focus my activism at the neighborhood and city level.

For me, living locally doesn’t mean I’m hiding my head in the sand about statewide or worldwide issues. On the contrary; working locally is what I consider the most effective way to address such issues. Bringing it home to the local sphere. Examples include loss of biodiversity; loss of urban tree cover; loss of unique local culture.

Reading Neal Gorenflo’s new series “Year of Living Locally” on shareable.net (I subscribe to Shareable’s email newsletter; I find it a good one), I could really identify with what he says about “turning to local connection and action.”

Speaking of local connection and action … Today I’m giving my “First Friday of the Month” talk at my local environmental learning center (located on the beachfront just five minutes’ brisk walk from my house, bonus!). The topic I chose for this month is “Diversity: Nature’s Greatest Design Principle.”

(Diversity is also the topic for my “Green Daytona” radio show on the 19th. Tune in at noon EST on Wednesday February 19. WJOY 106.3FM on your radio dial, or online via an app such as TuneIn.)

Further Reading:

Here’s a resource for community-level transformation via sharing: Over 300 “How-To” guides to help you share more in your community (from shareable.net )

And on diversity: Stop Treating Animals as “Invaders” Simply for Trying To Exist (sentientmedia.org) — something the human race needs to learn also with regard to plants, fellow humans, different cultures, and different viewpoints.

The mayor of my city just posted a “State of the City” Address on Facebook. (Kudos to Daytona Beach Mayor Derrick L. Henry for his social-media presence and for being very much out and about in our city.)

And this evening, President Donald Trump will make his State of the Union Address. Yes, it’s that time of year again.

So I got inspired to make a grassroots, green-oriented version of a “State of the City” address. You can see it here on my YouTube channel (UPDATE – I ended up deleting it because it contained some statements that were not well thought out, and I later realized it was not how I wanted to communicate my ideas); I also posted it to various local eco and neighborhood groups on Facebook. (On the topic of solutions to longterm vacancy and other forms of blight, you also might enjoy my talk “Filling Our Empty Spaces,” a 6-minute PowerPoint speech I did a few years back (at the first Elevate Daytona Beach, a TED-style speech event).

I invite you to make your own “State of the City” (or region, or neighborhood) Address, be it in video, audio, or writing; and share it with your community. And if you like, email me the link and I’ll post it on this blog.