I spoke at the Sustainable Speakers Club, a Toastmaster event in the UK, on how to lead on sustainability and how not to. The theme was Transformational Projects the Motivate. It’s tempting to think giving people facts and numbers will motivate them, but it rarely does. Learning their intrinsic motivation and helping them achieve what they already wanted to helps more. I share a story illustrating how action leads to[…] Keep reading →

Dave Gardner and I have appeared on each other’s podcasts and have become friends. He is one of the few people who understands our environmental problems and works on it. I learned about him from his documentary Growthbusters (my comment is the first on its YouTube release), which showed him running for office in Colorado on a platform to shrink the local population and economy. He didn’t win the election,[…] Keep reading →

I teach at NYU and work on sustainability leadership. NYU talks about sustainability and to some extend sincerely tries, but it doesn’t come close to its rhetoric. It completely misses on sustainability leadership, as distinct from sustainability. I don’t see much integrity in its sustainability. The same follows for higher education in general, as best I can tell. I’ve been vaguely keeping track of discrepancies I find. I’ve had this[…] Keep reading →

The invitation below says it all, but some background first: Register Here Join this two-session workshop and learn how to inspire people to freely and joyfully move to living more sustainably so they thank you. Read the pledges of the people I influenced and ask: Do they sound like they’re depriving themselves or sacrificing? Most people expect talking sustainability is a drag, not inspiring. So how do I lead people[…] Keep reading →

I pledged on Flight Free USA to avoid flying. Then last year, I inspired someone to avoid flying, which led to the Washington Post quoting her. At December’s year-end meeting of organizers, I pledged to inspire five people in 2024 to pledge. I inspired five to pledge in January alone! A few cited my influence. All took my sustainability leadership workshop. I recommend it! Check out their pledges. Here’s Evelyn‘s[…] Keep reading →

Check the calendar below. I count three days mostly sunny in the past 23 days. Everything else has been mostly cloudy to full on rain or snow. I’m still going up every day that isn’t raining. Many days not getting any power. I missed my first meeting today for not being able to plug in, but it worked out okay, I think for my explaining my situation. It was a[…] Keep reading →

I’ve described what I’m doing practicing sustainability as being an explorer, the Wright brothers, and Roger Bannister. Each comparison had sense, but I think I found a better one: Being like Richard Fosbury creating the Fosbury Flop. He invented a better way to do the high jump. The videos below show how people did it before him and how he developed a new way. Compared to old ways, it looked[…] Keep reading →

I’ve written about Robert Carter III a bunch here. He figures in my book a lot, as someone who could have remained corrupted by slavery, as everyone around him did in Virginia after the American Revolution, but he freed his slaves. Thomas Jefferson didn’t, despite his brilliant words on freedom. Sustainability today is overloaded with Jeffersons: people who talk big on sustainability but act the opposite, undermining their credibility and[…] Keep reading →

The temperature was well below freezing (in the low 20s F or -5C), but today was sunny, the next few days will be overcast, and my batteries were low. So up to the roof I went. In fact, today works out to be a rare three-climb day, meaning close to fifty flights for my over-fifty-year-old bones, and a torn meniscus. But someone has to show it’s possible so we can[…] Keep reading →