I loved where this conversation led. We began by talking about recent news: Greta Thunberg taking a political stand and acting publicly on it on an issue unrelated to the environment. Guy described how he saw this action distracting and undermining her credibility in sustainability. We got to talking about overwhelming tribalism today. In the process, Guy shared views he once held that he overcame, specifically about Apartheid. We talked[…] Keep reading →

I start my conversation with Andy with what brought me to him: the meal after recording with the guy who hired him, podcast guest Sven Gierlinger, and the Washington Post article that read like a paid ad for their food, Hospital food is a punchline. These chefs are redefining it. I didn’t record in my conversation with Sven how off-the-charts the food was because I at it after recording. Andy[…] Keep reading →

This conversation was brief, but covered the important points, particularly the challenges of changing habits. Dave didn’t do everything he intended, though I thought he succeeded more than he did. The goal of the Spodek Method isn’t to make big changes, though some do, but to share and act on intrinsic motivation relevant to nature and the environment. Just accessing intrinsic motivation at all can be a challenge in a[…] Keep reading →

Adam treats dependence and addiction in some ways different and unique than past guests who have covered addiction. One way is the business side. For example, early in this conversation, he talks about how people at companies that create products designed to addict, like cell phones, tablets, and the apps and games on them, don’t allow their children to use them. Yet they gleefully reach trillion-dollar valuations based on making[…] Keep reading →

I start by describing how podcast guest Carl Erik Fisher, author of bestseller The Urge, reviewed my upcoming book Sustainability Simplified as a subject matter expert on addiction. Carl mentioned how my book suffered from what Bruce describes as the demon drug myth. He pointed to Bruce’s work as seminal, so I started reading it. I’d heard of Rat Park and later remembered Johan Hari mentioning Bruce in his TED talk[…] Keep reading →

I started by sharing my experience giving after reading Peter’s book The Life You Can Save. I confess I only read it after our first conversation, but loved it. I feared reading a book by an academic philosopher arguing a point would be dry and boring. Instead it led me to donate to causes. Then, even though I didn’t donate for recognition or personal benefit, the organizations I donated to[…] Keep reading →

Regular listeners know I see our relationships with many activities that are enabled by pollution as behavioral addictions like gambling or playing video games. Thus, I bring experts in addiction. Anna’s book Dopamine Nation is one of the most accessible I’ve read. She covers the scale of addiction, how much it’s increasing, how it works, her personal history with her own addiction, and the stories of several of her patients.[…] Keep reading →

Kimberly has, by dramatically reducing her flying, improved her life, living more deliberately and consistent with her values. I met her when she was a panelist at an event on promoting hurting people less by flying less. I invited her as someone to explore her journey of reducing her flying. In our conversation, the shared how she went from learning the possibility to promoting staying grounded. Many stages overlapped with[…] Keep reading →

People who fly think most people fly, but it’s more like a few percent. A small fraction of people fly, let alone across oceans or multiple times per year. If you fly, it’s probably your action that hurts people most through its environmental impact, but you probably rationalize and justify it. Unlike many other polluting activities, most of the money you spend on flying goes to polluting, displacing people and[…] Keep reading →