The biggest challenge to sustainability isn’t a lack of solar panels or carbon taxes. They result from our behavior, which results from our beliefs and culture. Among the biggest challenges is changing those beliefs. To change them, we have to identify them. I think we know they aren’t supposed to be true, just satisfy our consciences enough to let us sleep at night, that I can call them lies. We[…] Keep reading →

Someone being addicted rarely hurts themselves first. Addiction usually hurts the people around the addicted person first and most. One of the hardest parts of recognizing addiction all around is seeing it in people you love, hearing them rationalize and justify hurting people for their pleasure, comfort, and convenience. Someone in my family flew to a birthday party of someone who lives a few miles from her. Instead of a[…] Keep reading →

Short answer: because they realize they are complicit and want what plastic provides. Long answer: Picking up litter every day, I find almost not one type of trash comprises things I buy. Nearly all is doof, mostly beverage bottles and can, takeout, chips, coffee cups, wrappers, and such. I buy or consume none of them. There’s plenty of packaging from Amazon, doof purveyors, retail bags, and more things I don’t[…] Keep reading →

I found some quotes from the roots of what transformed our culture from based on people as citizens, promoting freedom, to one based on people as consumers before citizens. They turn my stomach the way learning a Thomas Jefferson owned slaves. We became a consumerist culture, replacing food with doof, for deliberate reasons. I don’t know if the people promoting the change foresaw where they would lead us. I doubt[…] Keep reading →

Podcast guest Dr. Michael Greger, M.D. FACLM did a video on doof, which he calls ultraprocessed food, junk food, or ultraprocessed junk food. He’s a multiple time number one bestselling author and host of Nutritionfacts.org. Experience shows me that using the word food confuses people into thinking it’s food when it isn’t. Just because something fills your belly when you’re hungry doesn’t mean it’s food. Heroin would make the hunger[…] Keep reading →

Alcoholism is a problem all over the world. There are individual alcoholics and there are systemic issues that lead to alcoholism. If you can’t cure all alcoholism all over the world, should you still get sober yourself? The question sounds too obvious to ask. Of course an alcoholic should do what they can do overcome the addiction, even if they can’t help anyone else. It improves their life. The reason[…] Keep reading →

I’ve noticed people go through a few transitions as they start acting sustainably. I haven’t catalogued them all, but a few: From expecting acting sustainably means deprivation and sacrifice to expecting it bring rewarding emotions. Before this transition, you don’t want to start trying. You may feel obliged or shamed into acting, but you resent it. The AIM/Spodek Method that I teach and coach starts this transition. From thinking your[…] Keep reading →