Leadership And The Environment

At the end of our second conversation, Gaya was finishing her book, leaving KPMG, and soon starting at Schneider Electric. The book just came out, Five Insights for Avoiding Global Collapse: What a 50-Year-Old Model of the World Taught Me About a Way Forward for Us Today (a free download), and she's worked at Schneider a while.We talk about the book, how the world has tracked two of the Limits to Growth simulations, and how working at Schneider is.The book treats how to respond to a complex, systemic problem, which is different from how to respond to a simple, linear problem. I consider the advice right on, rare to find, even among environmentalists. To change a system, some of the best levers are its goals and values. Don't change them and you retain the system you're trying to change, which most people are doing.Gaya's views are a breath of fresh air that give direction for people who want to lead to act.Gaya's new book, Five Insights for Avoiding Global Collapse: What a 50-Year-Old Model of the World Taugh

In this episode I answer:Have you tried making home made yoghurt from plant milk and friendly bacteria. I guess you'd want non packaged options like make from almonds or coconut although home made soya milk is possible with some work. (Using my yoghurt maker is one way I've tried to reduce packaging). Likewise have you tried making vegan cheese?andIf you didn't work at NYU what would be your dream job? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Here is the listener's question this time:Where do you think your concern and consideration for others comes from? Is it mostly nature or nurture? (E.g. influence from up bringing). I'm thinking about your social conscience about how your pollution or lack of it has an impact on those you've never met. I like to think I care about others but the truth is I continue to do things like drive to modern jive because it suits me even though it contributes to damage for others. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Mark and I share more highly researched, thoughtful conversation on human welfare and the environment. We see things differently, but I consider our conversations the type we should have more of.This session we coverThe book Limits to Growth as well as the concepts underlying limits to growthEarth's carrying capacityHow much wealth is consumed by food and fuel, now and historically, and how much it's droppedHow the low cost and high availability of energy has allowed us to devote more money for other things, inventions, and life improvementsWhat is pollution?and plenty more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I learned of Bruce and Milad's Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) report, The Carbon Capture Crux – Lessons Learned, with fascination since I held out for carbon capture to be one of the major potential solutions to climate change. Though climate is only one of the many environmental problems risking civilization, it's one of the big ones.I contacted them to learn what could work or not. Many projections take for granted that today's unproven technologies will work in time to help, but our wanting them to work doesn't mean they will.In our conversation, we talked about their findings and what they meant. Sadly, the results aren't pretty. As they said “as a solution to tackling catastrophic rising emissions in its current framework however, CCS is not a climate solution.”Some highlights from the report:They studied 13 flagship large-scale carbon capture and storage (CCS)/carbon capture utilisation and storage (CCUS) projects in the natural gas, industrial and power sectors in terms o

Longtime listeners know I spent some formative years in some rough neighborhoods in Philadelphia. In researching them for my upcoming book, I discovered the many-award-winning book Loving Day by Mat Johnson took place largely a block from where I lived. His Wikipedia page showed he went to grade school with my stepbrother and stepsister.I read and loved Loving Day, which not only described my neighborhood, it explored it through race, which I was looking to understand, and it was raw and vulnerable, which I struggle to create in my writing. It opens: "In the ghetto there is a mansion, and it is my father's house." That house was a block from my home.Loving Day led me to read his books Pym, Incognegro, and Incognegro Renaissance, all of which I enjoyed, comprising most of the fiction I've read lately. I invited him to this podcast to explore all these topics. Since he teaches writing at the graduate level and has written so much, he shared more than I had hoped for, to my pleasant surprise.I think of this epis

I read Holly's book because I see us as a society and individuals addicted to what pollution brings. What can we learn from someone who overcame a different addiction?Holly's book is the opposite of a downer. It's spirited, researched, personal, and engaging. She reveals with infectious anger how society profited at wrecking her life, telling her poison was normal and good. Most of all, she shares how before stopping her addiction she thought sobriety looked impossible to achieve and boring if she did, but after sobriety, she loved life beyond what she could have imagined and beyond what an addiction-based society conditioned her to expect.We live in a society built on addiction. We created it. Almost every sentence in her book applies directly to our addictions to what pollution brings: flying, social media, fashion, and so on, all lowering our quality of life, controlling us, hiding from us reality and how joyful life can be.In our conversation we talk about the forces around us hell-bent on addicting us, c

Mark is a physicist who went into business around the environment. There aren't many of us, so I think you'll hear a rapport we enjoyed that I think you'll enjoy too. We indulge in physicist talk.I contacted him because I found his reports on what solar and wind---what I don't see how we can call renewable, green, or clean energy sources---require in their manufacture, transportation, installation, decommissioning, and more. Many fans of such technologies gloss over their problems, which seems to me irresponsible. If we are not honest about them we will make mistakes. Partisanship is a problem when there are testable answers to how much a particular solar installation or strategy to lower emissions works.Mark looks at possible futures but also returns to what's happening today, what works now, not just in the future. He looks at what's going on behind the scenes that can be measured. I recommend reading his work I link to below.We talk about the book Limits to Growth, I welcome his views though, for the recor

Do you keep your screens by your bed? Do you find yourself running in circles like: Twitter to email to latest news to Facebook to Instagram to Twitter and repeating the cycle forever?John shares his results committing to turning off his screens no matter what at 8pm a couple nights a week. Do you imagine it would affects his relationship with his wife, with whom he watched shows and movies? Would he get more anxious or less? Read more or sleep earlier? What do you think you would do?He shared what worked, what challenged things he needed to do for work, feelings of addiction.Toward the end he generalized to patriarchy, hierarchy, race, and leadership. Before recording we planned to keep the conversation short, but kept feeling engaged so kept it going. I think you'll find it engaging too. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Don regularly reads my blog. We've emailed for years so after inviting to record episodes with other listeners, I invited him.We both find a systems perspective the most effective way to understand and act on our environmental problems. I enjoyed talking to him about systems. Many people see them as technical, to the extent they get the view at all, but you don't have to work with them that long to see they are how to understand the environment and how we can act on it effectively.The alternative is to keep proposing solutions that sound nice but exacerbate our problems, things like trying to reduce carbon emissions alone, carbon offsets, recycling, chasing efficiency, and plans that accelerate the system and its polluting results. What works is changing our values, goals, images, beliefs, and things leaders work on. Changing the system, not being more efficient.If you get and like systems, you'll find our conversation refreshing. If you don't get systems, you'll appreciate learning from our conversation. Hos

I learned of Alan soon after learning of the Kogi (see below). He lived with and made films of them, among many other documentaries and films. He also works to help preserve their culture and spread their message to help us stop wrecking our environment and selves through the Tairona Heritage Trust, which you can support.His films about them---From the Heart of the World - The Elder Brother's Warning (1990) and Aluna - An Ecological Warning by the Kogi People (2012)---tell stories and show a culture I consider tremendously valuable. As I live more sustainably, I learn more about cultures that live without polluting and are happy and healthy, contrary to what our culture predicts. They look at us and see we could use help seeing how much we hurt others, ourselves, and our future.In our conversation, Alan shares his experiences with them, working with them to record their messages, and stories behind the stories that made part of their (and his) message more meaningful.About the Kogi:The Kogi descended from Tai

Mitzi just returned from the Ukraine War, invited by General Andriy Nebytov from the Kyiv Regional Police. He invited her after reading her piece Human Trafficking on Ukraine’s Border to see this trafficking in person. She saw abductions happening, powerless to act, as traffickers controlled the region.She describes what she saw. This episode isn't graphic, but sober. We'd prefer to live in a world without what she described, but I believe if it exists, better to know about it than not.She also shares what we can do to help and how, in particular helping the charity she created.Mitzi's home pageMitzi's Ukraine charity, ULET Group Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Continuing a long trend of guests sharing partially doing their commitments but not stopping, Stephen comes back for an episode 1.5, not yet his episode 2.Stephen committed to sharing his childhood family experiences hiking on a path near a family cabin (my description doesn't do justice to his description, so listen to his first episode, 622, to hear his description drawing on his life experiences). As happens sometimes when a commitment depends on other people, their being unavailable meant he couldn't complete the whole things.He did his part, as he describes in this episode, and he could have declared he consider it enough. Instead, he shares what happened this time, and that he doesn't consider his commitment finished.He shares what worked, what didn't, the experience of walking solo (and biking there instead of driving).Genuine, authentic leaders know one's measure of personal success depends not on things outside of your control. You succeed if you perform to your potential. Hosted on Acast. See acast.

The notes I read for this episode were long, so instead of including them in the podcast notes, I posted them as a separate blog post: The text from episode 630: Simplifying Meditation Words and Meaning.My book: Leadership Step by StepThe Science article I mentioned: Limits to economic growthThe article showing humans lived to a modal age of 72: Longevity Among Hunter- Gatherers: A Cross-Cultural ExaminationViktor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning Wikipedia pageThe Calvin and Hobbes page showing defenestrationThe Not Just Bikes video channelLow Tech Magazine Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We started talking about Michelle's commitment to avoid scrolling on vacation. She did. It sounds like it was both no big deal and something worth building on.We had intended to keep the recording to under thirty minutes for scheduling reasons, but the conversation kept staying too interesting to stop. We talked about addiction, how big a difference small differences can make, the difference between Portland and Vancouver in culture, how to change culture, living off the grid, and what stays with you when transitioning back.Coincidentally, a story of hers appeared in this week's New Yorker: When Summer Becomes the Season of Danger and DreadMichelle's book: Beloved Beasts Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I think Jay's commitment may be the first where I participated and we had a blast!You may remember he committed to kayaking on the Hudson. He invited me to join. As you can see from the picture, I did, and we kayaked together. We shared about the experience.Note the change in our conversation and relationship from last conversation to this one. By last conversation we had spoken several times to set up the call, then you could hear our recorded conversation. Then hear how things changed just spending time in nature, in a way suggested by his values. That the Hudson by Manhattan isn't wild like, say, the mouth of the Amazon doesn't change that acting on our environmental values opens us up and connects us. Mainstream culture has isolated us so much and cut us off from nature, we don't know what we're missing.We're talking about applying this experience to the Queer Liberation March team to help make keeping the event clean fun and enjoyable, not an obligation but an opportunity. Stay tuned! Hosted on Acast. Se

Nadeem contacted me as a listener to suggest Abdal Hakim Murad as a guest, as I hadn't hosted any Muslims on the podcast by then. I learned a lot and enjoyed meeting Abdal, plus Nadeem and I stayed in touch. When Janet Allaker's first episode with a listener went well, I invited Nadeem to be a guest. He loved the opportunity. I think we both enjoyed the conversation. If you're a regular listener, you'll get to hear another voice from your position.You'll get to hear another listener's views on sustainability and this podcast. Nadeem cares enough to act, though not as much as me. He listens to This Sustainable to ground him and inspire more sustainability work. We talk about what motivates him, religion, family, Norway, and of course do the Spodek Method.I think you'll find some similarities and differences in his approach and stick with the podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Regular readers and listeners know my passion for cleaning my local park, Washington Square Park, and how my heart breaks at how we abuse this sliver of a vestige of nature, especially the mornings after the Queer Liberation Marches of the past two years.As an organizer, Jay didn't have to respond to my request, but he did. By the end of this recording, you'll hear us talk about reducing waste next year. We begin by talking about the evolution of the pride marches from when he started attending in the 1980s. He describes them becoming more corporate, less participatory, but most of all, controlled by the cops, not necessarily helping the march. The cops often seem like they're just dominating parades; all New York City parades, not just this march. As a New Yorker, his description struck a chord. His split with the older march sounds almost heartbreaking.Then we talk about the mess attendees created. I point out that nearly everyone identifies ground and waterway waste as sanitation issues, but I see them as

I answer my first listener questions. If you have questions on topics I write about, like leadership, sustainability, sustainability leadership, sidchas, habits, academia, physics, podcasting, and so on, contact me.This episode's questions:Hi, Joshua, in the winter months of this year, in New York, in your flat, will you use heating or blankets?Can you describe a time when you struggled with a decision about a polluting act? To give an example of what I mean from my own life, as you know I'm trying to reduce my car use. To go to my modern jive night requires car use (no suitable public transport and too far to walk in dark). So I've wrestled with giving it up but decided I didn't want to because of all the benefits to me. Can you think of an example like that in your life? Perhaps something that you couldn't find a less polluting alternative but didn't want to give upI referred to my episode with Stephen M. R. Covey. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I came across John from listening to one of his podcast's season, Seeing White, about the development of whiteness as a race. I listened to the whole series, which I found fascinating and provocative. Then I discovered another season, Men, covering another topic important to me. I invited him to be on the podcast, then I learned from him the most recent season, The Repair, is on the environment.We start this conversation talking about systems and approaching the topics above through a systems perspective. With such topics, with which everyone connects intimately, meaningful communication about them becomes personal. John shared his evolution beyond his expectations, challenging his identity even to himself. I comment how openly he shared about himself, which must have taken a lot of courage. From another perspective, I think his, I think he felt compelled to share.He shared how his ongoing research into race and these other systemic issues keeps revealing how baked in to American society inequities are.