Longtime readers know my inclination to speak to people with different views, not disconnect. Rob and Andrew host After Dark on the conservative America Out Loud network and we connect on communicating more, not less.

They’ve been guests on my podcast and I’ve been a guest on their show. We agree on various issues and disagree on others and have become friends. Rob lives in New York City. He and I went biking over the weekend. I shared some of my experience living disconnected from the electric grid since May 22. He invited me to share the experience on their show.

We’ll see what comes up. Both supported Donald Trump, not known for sustainability. I’ve always felt them interested in my genuine, authentic action in living by my values. All three of us bemoan people who promote sustainability without living the values they promote.

EDIT: Here are the recordings

They invited me to continue the conversation to a second episode. Here’s the first:

Here’s the second episode, which overlapped with their covering Biden and Covid (which doesn’t represent my views):

Here are the podcast notes from the first episode:

If you had to give up one convenience of modern living, what would it be? Imagine, if you will, life without electricity. That would mean no Netflix, Hula, YouTube and no TikTok. Also, imagine not having a refrigerator or central air to cool down in the dead of summer. Better yet, what if you were told you had to give all this up today? Could or would you do it?

Well, believe it or not, this isn’t something Joshua Spodek, an astrophysicist living in New York City, has to imagine. He has been living this way, to a degree, for the past few months. 

Spodek, an author and adjunct professor at New York University, recently joined the hosts of “After Dark” to share what he calls living off the “grid.” This means he uses little to no electricity in his apartment. He turned it all off. He has been using a solar panel and battery to charge everything up. This may seem like deprivation to some; Spodek said he doesn’t feel deprived of any of life’s modern conveniences. He explained he is living by his values. While he realizes this might not be ideal for some, this does help him to do his part in reducing his carbon footprint. Those who are concerned about global warming and decreasing their carbon footprint might want to try going off the grid, for a while.

Joshua Spodek Ph.D. MBA is a three-time TEDx speaker, #1 bestselling author of Initiative and Leadership Step by Step, host of the award-winning This Sustainable Life podcast, and professor at NYU. He holds a Ph.D. in astrophysics and an MBA from Columbia, where he studied under a Nobel Laureate and helped launch a satellite. He is one of the founders of an invention that showed animated images to subway riders between stations. He has taught and coached leadership and entrepreneurship at NYU and Columbia Business School. He has spoken at Harvard, Princeton, West Point, Google, IBM, The New York Academy of Science, and Children’s Aid Society. He has appeared on TV and in the NY Times and Wall Street Journal to discuss Sustainable Life and leadership. He was called the “best and brightest” in Esquire’s Genius issue, “astrophysicist turned new media whiz” by NBC, and “rocket scientist” by Forbes.

Spodek has swum across the Hudson River twice, has done burpees daily since 2011 (165,000 and counting), takes 16 months to produce one load of garbage, and hasn’t flown (by choice) since March 2016.

Here are the notes from the follow-up episode, which overlapped with their covering Biden and Covid (which doesn’t represent my views):

Despite what we have been told by subject matter experts like Dr. Anthony Frauci and Resident Joe Biden, you can get Covid-19 regardless of your vaccination status. The proof of this is Biden and Fauci. Both men have been vaxed and boosted and still got the virus. So it begs the question, will getting the virus a third time be a charm for them? We may never know the answer to that question, but maybe if the two men were living by their values and sustainable life like Josh Spodek, the virus wouldn’t be an issue. 

The author and speaker returned to “After Dark” for a third time to discuss his “Sustainable Living” lifestyle. This time around, he walks through the basic steps of how a person can obtain sustainability in their daily living. Spodek explains that while many will bristle at the idea of sustainable living, in the end, it can prove to be fulfilling. 

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