Leadership And The Environment

Tired of people saying what you do doesn't matter? Or personal action in general?They're confusing different types of action. In this recording I distinguish three of them so you can feel comfortable acting by your values without the naysayers and navel-gazers distracting you.The three categories arePersonal action, like avoiding packaged foodLeading others, like hosting a podcastInfluence one's local community, like sharing joyDistinguishing them protects me from feeling dissuaded when others confuse one person not polluting with that person trying to change the world. Nobody says, "why do you bother not murdering? You can't stop everyone from doing it." Yet they still say, "why bother avoiding meat? People will still do it."They're confusing personal action with leading others. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

I talk a lot about the lack of leadership in the area of the environment. Many people talk about change but don't lead it. Many others judge but don't support, which leads people to hold back on trying.Well, the mayors of Orlando and Orange County Florida went out of their way and found me. Most guests I seek out. Instead, they took it on themselves to put themselves out there, risking judgment on an issue they don't have to.Most don't, I believe because it makes them feel exposed and vulnerable. But a top trait of effective leaders is that they like accountability.You don't have to make acting environmentally you main focus, but the start is to act, which they've done. From a leadership perspective for a public figure to step forward achieves more than whatever the outcome of his or her first step.If what they do seems hard, Jerry and Buddy's swimming upstream will make it easier so all who follow feel like they're swimming downstream.I intend to help them make personal action a trend among leaders, which wi

Why a military general? Isn't the US military one of the greatest polluters on the planet?My goal is to bring effective leadership to the environment and your life because spreading facts, figures, doom, and gloom isn't doing it. Leadership is about people. Technology and innovation have historically increased pollution, as I described in other episodes. Nearly everyone promoting technological solutions is unwittingly continuing the drive toward efficiency that created our environmental situation and continues to augment it.They miss that increasing efficiency doesn't necessarily lower total waste, which is our problem, as a glance at any plastic-covered beach or Beijing sky will attest. Again: efficiency has overall increased total waste.I invited Rip after reading about the Millennium Challenge, where, in preparation for Desert Storm, the military invited him to come out of retirement to lead the "red team"---a ragtag group to fight the "blue team", representing the 21st century US military strategy using e

The loudest voices these days seem to come from protesters because they design their actions for attention. They aren't necessarily the most effective.Many of us are outraged. Our emotions become intense. Emotional intensity drives us to do what we want most, which doesn't necessarily lead to what's effective. As I see it, people are venting more than leading.I criticize the lack of leadership around the environment because people overwhelmingly spread facts, figures, doom, gloom, and telling people what to do. In no area besides the environment do effective leaders say, "Here's how to lead: spread facts, figures, doom, gloom, and tell people what to do."Effective leadership works when based on the views and motivations of the person you're leading. For many that's uncomfortable. But it works.Fred and EDF's sober, thoughtful approach of working with big business is accessing the biggest potential change and leading them.I wrote a friend on a group geared toward confrontation:They seemed heavy on demands. I ho

Here are the notes I read this episode from:I see human population decreasing the Earth's ability to sustain life and human society.I have a goal of increasing that ability.Actually two goals: my other goal is for people to enjoy the process. This isn't about coercion but joy.If our human population is over what the Earth can sustain, then restoring that balance.Many people view CO2, methane, plastic, and the like as the enemy.We use them, we like them, or making them.They have no volition anyway. They react to our behavior.Some identify Exxon, Trump, or other people. But we spend money on Exxon and we do what Trump does.Paris Agreement example, SUVs, take outSome identify inequality. Poverty and outsourcing make it easier to polluteBut we had inequality before without so much destruction.Some identify lack of education, but scientists pollute. US is educated and pollutes.Not an intellectual issue. An emotional issue.Our emotions and motivations result in part from systems, but we could change the systems and

Here are the notes I read from for this episode. I've talked about what I call The Worst Problem in the World for about ten years, so I'm used to it and worked from scarce notes.The problemExample: Germans and JamaicansIn environment: people say others don't careMakes people feel misunderstood, disengage, makes you seem judgmentalRepels people we want to help mostWhat to do instead: respond with curiosityWhen I don't understand someone, I can learn from themMy multi-month conversation with a skeptic taught me more about my understanding than with any supporterMore than improve understanding about environment, helped me improve my ability to lead othersMy original post from almost ten years ago, The Worst Problem In The WorldA video I did on The Worst Problem in the World See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

The notes I wrote and read from for this episode:Leadership means changing beliefs and goals. If you're doing anything else, you're following and perpetuating the system that created the results. Greater efficiency, recycling, reusing, etc are following, just accelerating, unless you change the goals. Are you clearly and overwhelmingly opposing growth and externalizing costs? If not, you're polluting.My most important goal is not efficiency. It will come if I achieve my goal. I talk a lot about how growth and externalizing costs produce pollution. My goal is not to reduce population and take responsibility. They will come if I achieve my goal. My goal is to change the beliefs that cause the behavior that produces the results. If you lower the population but keep the beliefs, we'll get back here. If we change our beliefs, the change will come. Only if we change our beliefs will change come. "Be fruitful and multiply" and "you have dominion" and "growth is good" and "a rising tide lifts all boats" . . . these a

Here is the text I read from for this post:My environmental role modelsWhy my role models? Because people keep saying what I do is inaccessible. That it's too much or extreme. That they need to balance. Well everyone believes they're balanced. I have to balance too.My difference is that I keep moving toward my values. Instead of letting Americans, the most polluting people in history, be my comparison, I find new role models.It's community. Once you start polluting less, actually putting effort in, not just straws or the latest trendy thing, but based on your passion, you'll find role models and keep doing more to live by your values because you'll like it.Bea JohnsonAuthor of Zero Waste Home, which I read and recommend as well as 4 TEDx talksFamily of four, less than a load per yearMy response to everyone who knee-jerk responds, "Oh, you don't have kids. If you had kids then you'd understand." Well, she has two kids and avoiding garbage brings them together, as it will everyone who tries instead of claiming

People littering is creepy, like a tick or other parasite. It gets under my skin. I don't like it, but if I want to help people stop their parasitical, tick-like behavior, I feel it helps to understand them.Leadership rests on empathy, which sometimes means understanding the feelings and motivations of people who do things you consider disgusting or creepy, like buying coffee in disposable cups knowing it pollutes but acting ignorant or like it doesn't. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Here are the notes I read from to make this episode, sometimes diverging from them.Why I don't call our environmental situation a crisis. People think scientists will solve something or engineers will create a solution and we can go back to before. We will never return to this lifestyle, which, by the way, is a tremendous advance if you value happiness, stewardship, enjoying what you have, and compassion over craving what you don't have and not caring how you affect others.Within your lifetime, planes will never fly you without severely hurting others. Same with having more than one child, eating meat, eating to being overweight especially eating factory farmed or industrial farmed food, and you know the top things. Some rich people will be able to do what they want because edge cases always exist, but for most people, today's way of life is nearly over. I repeat, you'll be glad after the transition for the same reason cocaine users are glad to kick their habits even if it meant the end of partying like they

I've been sharing the sentiment of how people today seem to think of our times versus how people from other times would see now. I expect they'd view us with horror, disgust, and disdain.Today's post reprises that perspective.Here are the note I wrote that I worked from:People say homeless live better than kings before. TVs, fly around the world, any fruit or vegetable any time of the year, music any time you want, meat without meat, etc.They think any one from any time would prefer now to then. That we live in the most wondrous of times. Sure there are some disagreements, might not like this politician or that social problem, but materially, they think we're better than ever.I think future generations will not envy us but look at us with horror and disgust, maybe disdain. That we chose to go to Paris all the time and destroy Earth's ability to sustain life and human society for our fleeting selfish pleasure. If they live in a world we polluted, I suspect they will wonder how we could have neglected caring fo

Since recording this episode, Michael has become Google's Lead for Circular Economy.Michael took on a challenge many people consider: biking to work for a month. He challenged himself amid product releases at work and family obligations as his wife traveled, so he couldn't just start. He had to plan and work at it. Even so, he created cheerleaders of his riding at Google among his coworkers.He led them by doing what others wanted to but didn't.I can't help wonder if his biking contributed to his promotion to a role of environmental leadership.Before all that, you'll get to hear about his spectacular blow out.Michael clearly explains his plans, actions, and results -- what worked and didn't -- so if you're thinking about biking more or any environmental action, you can use him as a role model.I'm curious if he'll follow his personal experience with leading people more at Google or steering Google beyond where he would have otherwise. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

When we pollute, we think we act for the reasons in our minds that justify that behavior, but those reasons generally come after we choose, motivated to justify behavior we consider wrong.Most environmental analysis looks at the science of what pollutes more or less.Today I look at the mental processes and emotions behind choosing polluting behavior. Almost always pollution results in separating yourself from others---you don't want to pollute your world. Avoiding polluting connects you with others because you account for your effect on them.Acting sustainably and regeneratively build community and connection.I suggest that when you get this pattern and internalize it, you will stop trying to justify what you've been doing that pollutes and that those behaviors and results will create disgust in you. You'll prefer that disgust to the blissful ignorance it replaces. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Brad identified the problem of people acting or not as our emotions and behavior, which many forces contribute to. We also talk about media and scientists.This refinement of the understanding to emotions points to what to work on that I see few environmentalists unaddressing: emotions, feelings, and community, not technology, innovation. Almost the only emotions they evoke are fear, panic, and worry, which don't motivate acting on the environment. They motivate disengaging from the speaker.If you associated attraction coaching with trickery or games, you might not expect this identification. On the contrary, Brad knows about relationships, people, and teaching. These things happen to lead to more intimacy---physical, emotional, and intellectual---and they are big elements of leadership.We talk about vegetables, CSAs, helping people in need from the opioid crisis, habit change, and long-term cooking habits with long-term girlfriends. On a personal note, I've found it very relieving to share this part of my lif

I believe many people believe we live in an age of wonder and that people from any other time would envy us.I believe future generations will not look at our flying and pollution not with envy but with horror, as we look at slave holders and people who didn't resist Hitler.The sooner we get that into our thick skulls, the sooner we'll enjoy life with less craving, excuses and acting like spoiled brats.How many spoiled brats do you know where you think, I like how spoiled that person is, I'd like to be like them? But they don't know it, do they? So we don't know it either, spoiled brats that we are, telling ourselves we can't live without eating pizza in Napoli before we die while putting local farms out of business eating vegetables flown from wherever.Or could we live so future generations see us how we see Frederick Douglass, Rosa Parks, or Oskar Schindler?William Deresiewicz's Excellent Sheep See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

People keep describing my environmental actions as praiseworthy. I think they do it to make it seem harder and less accessible to do themselves what they expect will be hard, deprivation, sacrifice, and not what they want to do.Making what I do sound good makes what they do normal. I prefer to see not polluting as normal and polluting as abnormal and worth changing.I feel that praising someone for not polluting is like praising someone for not kicking puppies or abusing their children. I suggest seeing not kicking puppies as normal and kicking them as abnormal.This episode explores this perspective. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

A few words on growth and how people misunderstand it, especially economists.I start by talking about my window garden cherry tomato plants and how the inability of the insects eating them to regulate their growth and up destroying the plants and thereby their own population.Can we outdo bugs?I'm not sure. An educated friend showed surprise to me that his having four or five kids is one of the biggest effects he could have on the environment. How can we not get this? People don't seem to think in this area but instead parrot knee-jerk irrelevancies that distract from that if we don't control our population, nature will for us, which will be painful on a scale we've never faced.We can replace the cultural value of growth with enjoying what you have. When I learned to enjoy what I have more, growth started looking more like craving. I haven't seen craving make for a great life. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Today's episode with guest Brad P, a dating coach and guru---well, former, since he's moved on, as he'll share---partly reveal a major part of my social and emotional development as an adult.He was in a sense my boss when I coached mostly men but a few women on dating and attraction skills, which I did before coaching executives, entrepreneurs, and so on on leadership, initiative, entrepreneurship, and more mainstream things.The episode begins with a long introduction to address the extraordinary misconception about coaching dating and attraction, especially for men.While I haven't kept it formally secret, I haven't shared it publicly, though I tell all my coaching clients soon after starting working with them since it opens up the coaching relationship and makes for faster and deeper improvement. I've also shared with my family. Now I'm sharing it publicly, that I taught and coached people on skills in attraction and dating. I was the #1 coach in the #1 market for the #1 guru.My corporate leadership practice

Polio terrorized the world. People died and became paralyzed and there were no defenses to it.Science understood it and eventually Jonas Salk found a vaccine. Just having a vaccine wasn't enough. They needed massive global public projects to disseminate it.Is the connection to our current environmental problems obvious? As I see it, our behavior is causing the problems. If I'm not too full of myself, this podcast's technique, which I describe in my TEDxNYU talk, in a sense inoculates people from inaction on environmental values. It changes people to where they enjoy wasting less and taking responsibility.We don't need a massive global public works, but what if we spread that technique globally. Instead of trying to figure out how to feed 10 billion or how to accommodate billions in third world countries wasting and polluting as we do, what if first worlders reduced our waste by 75 to 90% and the world over we chose to decrease our birthrate to where we lived well below the carrying capacity?We could solve man

People commonly misunderstand the goals of this podcast. I tried in this episode to clear up two common misunderstandings:They mistakenly believe my goal is individual change---to influence one person at a time.They mistakenly believe I act on my environmental values to lead people by example.On point 1, this podcast focuses on leading people through community. You may hear me leading one person at a time per episode, but I'm not picking people randomly. I'm picking people on more people's community than most others. My goal is for listeners to feel, "I'm not the only one doing this. People in my community are too. It's time I acted more." I'm working my way to people known by hundreds of millions of others.I'll note that I offer value to these well-known people: a legacy valued by billions. I walk them through a process that shows them as authentically and genuinely acting, even if they don't know much about the environment, so listeners want to support them, not judge.On point 2, I act as everyone does. I d