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Several years back, Pope Francis caught the world’s attention by speaking out on climate change. More to the point, he was speaking out about the fundamental human crisis of which he sees climate change as but a symptom. (I share this view, by the way, and I bet lot of you did too, even before he said it.) The Pope is able to use his high position to get his message out to millions of people in a flash.

Now, in this great news event of the Pope speaking out on something that really matters, there’s a bonus lesson for each and every one of us. You and me. We’re not the Pope, but within some sphere of our lives (our family, a circle of friends, a colleague or two), we each have as much influence as the Pope. It might be ten people or five or even just one, but each and every one of us has some circle where we literally have as much influence as the Pope — or more. So, my challenge to you today (and from now on) is, Use your influence to speak up about something that matters. Be your own pope. Even if your sphere of influence doesn’t include any people other than yourself … then, be the pope of your own mind. Issue an encyclical to yourself to remove one veil of self-deception and muster the courage to take action. Choose to out yourself to yourself about something that matters.

The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.” I also think that our lives begin to really BEGIN, the day we START speaking up about things that matter. Even one little thing. Pick one today. And then keep going.

I love you, my readers, and thank you for joining me on this journey! (By the way, each time you speak up on social media, or talk to a neighbor, or write your elected officials, or write a letter to the editor — you are speaking as the “pope” of your many unseen followers who you may never meet or count, but they are there and they’ve been waiting to hear from you. Your words could be that final piece they needed to hear in order to go into action, either by joining an existing tide of forward motion or by forming a new one.)

(August 5, 2022: Yikes!! This post is WAY outdated! I am now updating it. See changes in strikeouts and bold text.)

In my book DEEP GREEN, published in 2017, I called out North American consumer culture as the culprit of ecosystem degradation and social/economic injustice on this planet. And, I called on my fellow North Americans as being the ones who could lead the shift to a sane, humane culture by radically reducing our own footprints.

Now, from my present-day perspective, with an increased awareness of systemic racism, I realize that what I meant, specifically, was that Anglo-European North American culture is the prime culprit of ecosystem degradation and social/economic misery on this planet. It is the dominance of AngloEuroNorthAmerican culture that has caused our human footprint to be so outsized as to render us capable of destroying entire ecosystems and extinguishing human life on this planet (taking who knows how many other species with us). Update: COLONIZER CULTURE. It’s called “colonizer culture” and “white supremacy culture” (often abbreviated WSC).

Speaking as a person of Anglo-European descent, I say the above not in the spirit of woeful self-flagellation, nor performative penitence. Rather, I say it because WE (the same culture that started it) CAN FIX IT by dismantling colonizer culture. Our culture has spread all over the world. Now, by our deliberate choice, we can DISMANTLE COLONIZER CULTURE, in order to make space for the cultures of deep eco-awareness and deep compassion that already exist on this planet but are being destroyed by colonizer culture. Then, compassion and eco awareness will come to underlie more and more of our everyday actions, even those of us who are born into and baked into colonizer culture.

Tasks for us white people include: unlearning the programming that induces us to compulsively center ourselves. Support and amplify the vouces of Black people, indigenous people, and other people of color by paying them for their labor. Promote their businesses and organizations, do micro-reparations, check into what “Land Back” means. The primary task, first and forever ongoing, is LISTEN AND LEARN.

Note, this is nothing personal — in the sense that it’s not about beating up individual AngloEuroNorthAmerican people. It’s about recognizing that our minds have been colonized. And setting about decolonizing our minds. And each doing our part to dismantle WSC/colonizer culture so the prevailing mode on the planet can get back to mutual care and nature-connectedness. And THAT is where it gets personal in a GOOD way.

Because my book is addressed to AngloEuroNorthAmericans as the ones who need to lead the change (by dismantling WSC), does that mean I am seeking to ignore Black readers, or other people of color who might read my book? No way!

To any Black person, indigenous person, or other person of color who has read my book or followed my blog, or has found this post: I am truly honored that you are here, and I hope you will find my writings helpful to you in achieving your personal and planetary goals.

By addressing my book to my fellow AngloEuroNorthAmericans (“AENA” for short?), I am simply acknowledging that MY culture (white North American colonizer culture) started the problem, whereas Black and indigenous cultures were originally sustainable, earth-centered, & regenerative, before the colonizer culture took hold. And, because of the political, social, and economic oppression wrought by systemic racism, I am in no moral position to tell people of color they need to reduce their eco footprint.

That said, if you are a person of color who has arrived here because you want to find out more about how your seemingly small daily choices as a citizen/consumer can help the planet (while also benefiting you personally), then I am thrilled to welcome you, and will support your quest in any way I can. (And by the way, fellow white people take note: Numerous research studies have shown that there is a significantly higher percentage of Black people and other people of color in the USA who are concerned about the environment, than white people who are. Not surprising when we consider that communities of color tend to be disproportionately affected by pollution and other environmental issues.)

This post is a work-in-progress. I’m still finding my voice to speak up about this thing called systemic racism that needs to be spoken up about, as a first step to rooting it out. And at the same time, noticing how and where stepping up my anti-racist study and practice can intersect with my environmental activism; my efforts to spark a “grassroots green mobilization.”

Update: The very useful term I’ve learned for this synthetic, extractive culture that has spread its damaging influence across the planet, is “colonizer culture.” As in colonialism. And the appropriate corrective effort is to de-colonize. De-colonization movements are gathering momentum all over the world, in every sphere.

Anti-racist study resources: Special thanks to Diversity and Resiliency Institute of El Paso for its Anti-Racism Training webinar. And to Robin DiAngelo for her book White Fragility (a book that has become a bestseller, even edging out a blockbuster pop-fiction title — something that gives me renewed hope for humanity). UPDATE: Although that book happened to be the first antiracism book I stumbled on, it has been widely pointed out that it’s problematic. A white woman wrote it and is profiting from Black people’s labor.

Instead: There are books that I subsequently heard about from recommendations by antiracism educators who are Black people, indigenous people, and other people of color, and I now recommend those instead. For example, Hood Feminism by Mikki Kendall; and How To Be an Anti-Racist by Ibrahim X Kendi have been immensely enlightening to me in my ongoing efforts to decolonize my mind and take that awareness out into my interactions with community, such as calling-in fellow white people.

On TikTok: Portia Noir, White Woman Whisperer, Desiree B Stephens are the three I follow most closely. (I follow many others as well — there are plenty, and once you start following Black antiracism educators, the TikTok algorithm will start to populate your “For You Page” accordingly.) No TikTok? No problem! Each of these three educators has a Patreon feed and/or website as well.

Email newsletter: Antiracism Daily, by Nicole Cardoza with various contributing writers.

Facebook: Ally Henny.

All of these Black educator-activists, and many more, have helped me become more aware of systemic racism, and how to dismantle it in myself and in the world.

Final note: “Whiteness” is a construct. It is not a real thing. For example, I am conventionally seen as “white.” But really, I am of English, Scottish, Welsh, Irish, Scandinavian, and Slavic ancestry. One important part of dismantling white-supremacy culture is to learn about our ancestral roots. At one point, all of us came from indigenous cultures. English peasants had a real culture, etc. To delve into this important work, follow Desiree B Stephens on TikTok and check out her videos on ancestral healing. Here’s one: “Ancestral Healing for White People.”

Great news! A friend clued me in to a Zero-Waste Group — “Zero Waste Zero Judgement”. Not sure how new this Facebook group is, but it’s new to me so I’m calling it new. It is an active group with several thousand members.

I joined ZWZJ to fill the void created recently by the shutdown of the Journey To Zero-Waste group, and after following the posts for a few days, I can wholeheartedly recommend this group to you.

Unlike J2ZW, this group ZWZG 1) allows posts related to #BlackLivesMatter and racial bias (as long as they also relate to pursuit of Zero-Waste); and 2) allows, with prior approval, self-promotion posts; and also does a “self-promotion thread” regularly. (Please be sure and read the rules before posting! Getting to promote our sustainable/regenerative cottage enterprises is a privilege we don’t want to lose!)

One of the recent posts that caught my eye as being helpful to a wide audience, is a post asking people for suggestions on alternatives to bottled water, from a woman whose husband works construction and doesn’t trust tapwater.

Another thread that just got started — seeking tips for making a clothesline look visually appealing: “Hey all! My husband doesn’t want to do a clothesline because he feels they bring down the appeal of our yard. We have one inside but he just doesn’t want people to see our “dirty laundry”. Can anyone post pics of cute, inventive ways you’ve hung a clothesline outside and made it cute/appealing? Thanks!” (I look forward to following this thread, as many of us eco geeks have encountered similar objections by spouses, or neighbors. And a clothesline is a great way to save money and electricity, while getting naturally disinfected and clean-smelling laundry!)

People are sharing successes and asking questions about all the same essential everyday stuff that made J2ZW such a valuable resource. Sort of a crowdsourced, green-focused version of that old favorite newspaper column “Hints from Heloise.”

Halleluiah! Hope to see you over there. I will also be adding ZWZG to my blogroll as soon as I save this post, so you will always have the link at your fingertips.

It may sound funny coming from me (the author of a book and blog about how reducing our footprint is the best thing we can do for the earth’s ecosystems), but … Footprint isn’t everything.

The point of life isn’t to stand still, hold your breath, suck in your tummy, and try not to take up any space on the planet. The point of life is to be a beneficial influence. Yes, I’m all about cutting footprint. But what matters even more is your handprint.

Think of all the people whose lives you’ve touched in ways large and small. If you’re like me and get down on yourself a lot, there may be moments when you may not be able to think of anything good you’ve done. But you have. Doesn’t matter how small it may seem. Even simply smiling at a person on the street — you don’t know what a difference you might have made, just by that seemingly small act. Or bringing someone a cup of tea or coffee. Even a well-placed Like or comment on someone’s post.

Small is big.

Growing up in a military family, we moved around a lot and did not get to see our relatives on a frequent steady basis. There were some aunts and uncles we kids barely saw long enough to say hello to. And yet, I remember them. Their smiles, their attention, even in a fleeting moment, warmed my soul and helped guide my course through life.

Never underestimate your beneficial impact. It’s something you give to the world, and it’s something you can do all the time.

Reducing one’s footprint is not always easy. For people in certain circumstances, it’s actually impossible or nearly so. Your voluntary efforts to reduce your eco-footprint are a great thing. Every little reduction adds up. But when (for example) that takeout meal (that you bought to support a local business) comes with a bunch of plastic and styrofoam, don’t beat yourself up. Footprint matters, but not nearly as much as handprint.

We have to trust that we, humans, will get our act together and stop trashing our ecosystems before it’s too late. And as long as we are here, our main work is always to love and care for one another.

When you feel overwhelmed and exhausted by this eco reduction game, remember, footprint isn’t everything. Handprint is what really matters. Something I am always having to remind myself of, like the other day when I treated myself to a coffee-shop coffee, and it came with a straw and a plastic lid even though I asked for no straw and no lid. I took a deep breath and smiled at the barista — and meant it, finally. It has taken me some work on my eco-fanatic path to remember that real connections with other human beings (and with all of life) are more important than my distress at unintentionally generating a bit of plastic waste. And at the end of the day, authentic caring connection between people is what’s going to allow us to solve the problems we humans have caused on the planet.

In my book, in my talks, and out there in the world, I am constantly trying to get people to stop beating themselves up about their footprint, and just set about changing what they can. A lot of people are feeling guilty and beat-up. My hope is for us to move beyond those emotions, which actually hinder our efforts to chip away at the consumer excesses that are killing us all.

Note: This is of course about a lot more than plastic. Plastic is just an example that’s easy to visualize, and use as a symbol of everything we are working on to make a greener world.

And now that we’ve got it clear that footprint isn’t everything, I do still want to offer you a note about low-footprint living, and the value of what I call a “Grassroots Green Mobilization”!

Can you imagine what would happen if millions of people voluntarily reduced their carbon footprint by 90%, 50%, or even just 10%? The impact would be similar to that of the household austerity measures imposed during World War II, except that this time we’d be doing it voluntarily, from a grassroots level. And instead of channeling our time, money, and energy toward a war effort, we’d be working toward a shared global aim of restoring the earth’s ecosystems to health, and preserving our life and wellbeing on this beautiful planet.

Does living at a fraction of the average U.S. footprint sound unrealistic or uncomfortable to you? The truth is, lots of us are already doing it, or are well on our way. And in the process of reducing our footprints, we’re putting money in our pockets, and freeing up our time and energy for the things that give life meaning (which of course differ from one person to the next).

And not only is it not uncomfortable (beyond a bit of manageable discomfort here and there), it’s fun!

At its root, a low-footprint lifestyle is a great way to improve your quality of life, even if planetary concerns were not a factor. In this blog I share a wealth of tips and resources to help you design your own version of a low-footprint lifestyle, or, if you’re already on this path, to go further than you’ve ever gone before.

Again, thank you for being here!

As its sub-title suggests, I aspire in this blog to offer tips, resources, and moral support to people who want to reduce the eco footprint of their everyday activities. There are lots of ways you can use this blog, including:

• get tips on how to do something, like composting or rainwater collection

• get tips on how to simplify a practice that you’re already doing

• read up on radical practices that you might not be ready to try (yet), but are curious about

• get tips for household disaster-preparedness (be it weather-related disasters, pandemics, financial catastrophe or any other unexpected extreme adversity that might come your way)

• because this blog is nearly all text (to conserve bandwidth — yours, mine, and the cloud’s), you can use it to train your mind to be less dependent on photos and videos; able to take in information in written form — an essential low-tech skill that many of us have lost in recent decades

• get talking-points for explaining to the people in your life why you care about reducing your eco footprint

• get articles, case studies and other “backup” for your environmental beliefs

• learn how to live on very little money

• get reassurance that many many other people are on this same path

• find realtime interactive community via the Facebook groups, etc., in my blogroll

Can you think of any other need that this blog is meeting for you? Or any other need that you would like for this blog to help you meet? Drop me a line!

Lessons about trust, from a book about Silicon Valley that I read a few years back:

“Rainforests cannot thrive without trust among strangers. The hard part is having the courage to take the first step. It means being willing to suffer the occasional knife in the back as part of the cost of doing business. This type of thinking would be considered radical in many places. Giving trust first is what fools do, it might be said. In business, there is constant temptation to violate trust for short-term economic gain. The common saying “business is business” implies that taking advantage of the other side is an acceptable action. This behavior, however, would kill a Rainforest. Business is not just business in the Rainforest; business must be suffused with trust. … Michie Slaughter, the former head of organizational development at Marion Laborartories, recalls: “Our founder Wing Kauffman used to say, ‘Trust everybody that you work with. You’ll ge screwed every once in a while, but … people will want to do business with you.’ Similarly, venture capitalist Kevin Fong has observed the role of trust in deal-making in Silicon Valley over the past decades:

‘The friction of getting deals done here is faster. You don’t lawyer everything to the nth degree. If you negotiate with a New York law firm, they want to negotiate every detail. They are probably right on the legalities, but you can spend hours and days to get everything right. But here, basically, you get it mostly right and then move on. Everything is done with a handshake in the Valley. If it’s a failure, no one cares. If it succeeds, then everyone is happy.’

“The underlying importance of trust applies in all human systems. Fukuyama describes how conducting business in systems that are low on trust tends to be expensive and inefficient.

“The economic function of social capital [read: trust] is to reduce the transaction costs associated with formal coordination mechanisms like contracts, hierarchies, bureaucratic rules, and the like … No contract can possibly specify every contingency that may arise between the parties; most presuppose a certain amount of goodwill that prevents the parties from taking advantage of unforeseen loopholes. Contracts that do seek to try to specify all contingencies — like the job-control labour pacts negotiated in the auto industry that were as thick as telephone books — end up being very inflexible and costly to enforce.’

“Although trust has a cost, the absence of trust in Rainforests has an even higher cost.”

I would say this is true in general, across the board in life: Although trust has a cost, the absence of trust has an even higher cost. So even if you’re not trying to build the next Silicon Valley (as the authors of this book were setting out to offer a blueprint for people who aspired to do), this is superb wisdom for all of us to live by. I have certainly found it true in my own life.

(Quotes from THE RAINFOREST, THE SECRET TO BUILDING THE NEXT SILICON VALLEY by Victor W. Hwang and Greg Horowitt) (As a bonus for you, I’ve chosen a link that leads to a slideshow highlighting some of the core ideas of the book.)

Recently a new friend, Debbie, came into my life. And more recently, I got to meet her sister Cathy. All three of us being middle-aged women, we are “birds of a feather” in many ways. But there is one thing that sets them apart from most people I know, me included: They have impeccable cellphone manners. By which I mean that, if we are hanging out together socially, they do not have their phones out, and they are not constantly checking their phones. What a concept, right? In the old days before smartphones became a human appendage, this restraint would simply have been referred to as, “Well, duh. Common-sense good manners!”

Now, cellphone manners (as in put that thing away! and don’t check it while hanging out with other people) is something I’ve been working on, but I have a long way to go. I still glance at it when I’m supposed to be giving my exclusive attention to the people who are right in front of me. And this is easy to rationalize and get away with, because most of the other people I know do it too! With some of my friends, we are literally multi-tasking the whole time we are hanging out! I end up missing fragments, or even whole chunks, of conversation.

But guess who never does this? My friends Debbie and Cathy! And so, guess who didn’t do it the other night when she was hanging out with Debbie and Cathy? Me! And yes, it sometimes felt weird to not allow myself to “take hits” off that electronic crack-pipe during the evening. But the fact that it felt that weird only increases my resolve.

I use my smartphone mainly for work. And, it is my main tool for work. For writing, research, marketing, activism. And that’s great! But when I allow it to spill over into the personal space, it changes from a work-tool into an electronic crack-pipe! I’m ready to get beyond that for real.

Lots of us are working on this. And I wish us all success in being more deliberate with these tiny computers that for many of us have become such an appendage that we feel naked without it.

Now, the reason I’m bringing up this topic today is to illustrate the power of behavioral contagion. When I’m around most of my friends, it’s all too easy to let myself get away with the cellphone thing. But with Debbie and Cathy, it was easy to hold myself to my intentions to leave the phone alone, because that’s what they were doing.

How many behaviors can we help make contagious, just by being stalwart models of those behaviors? Always turning out the lights; always carrying our own reusable cup, spoon, cloth napkin so we don’t have to use disposables. Never accepting rides that are out of someone’s way. De-normalizing airplane travel.

Being insistent and even a bit of a hard-ass with our beneficial habits can be a good thing, if it inspires and rubs off on other people. What behaviors would you like to make contagious in the world? What are some ways you can help make that happen?

There is much to be gained right now from popularizing habits of restraint.

A fellow environmentalist friend just commented on her page, “I’ve noticed how much more seasonable the weather’s been! It’s like it used to be 20-30 years ago. I can’t help but wonder if the Earth is responding favorably to the temporary shutdown of factories and the less car/airplane travel.”

This is great news to hear that lots of people in various places are seeing more traditionally seasonable weather. (I had noticed the cooler breezy weather myself; some nights I have almost needed long sleeves.)

This possible evidence of a return to older weather patterns makes me all the more want to limit my car travel and air travel, and find positive ways to encourage other people to do the same.

Other things we can do include reducing our food footprint by eating local and more plant-based; minimize consumption of electricity to the bare necessities; minimize purchases of new goods. These are all big categories; it all helps!

And – not everyone everywhere is experiencing good weather. There are severe droughts; extreme heat; high winds in places. We have to keep doing our part to put the brakes on human activity’s contribution to extreme weather; disruption of healthy weather patterns.

So let’s hold ourselves to certain behaviors and do all we can to set an example that other people feel intrinsically motivated to follow.