Day 46 of 365 Days Of Low Carbon Living.
Sometimes things don’t quite turn out the way you planned.
It’s been quite a while since my last post, and there were a few gaps before that – definitely not what I set out to do with 365 Days Of Low Carbon Living.
It’s Day 142 of the year and yet this is only Day 46 of the challenge.
Why? A few reasons.
I said in my first post for this year that writing every day would be very challenging for me – and it certainly has been.
I have been doing my best to limit things that would get in the way of me blogging every day, reviewing what I am doing and making more improvements.
Yet there have been two types of interruptions to my blogging momentum.
First, my contribution to setting the direction for the Australian Capital Territory’s journey to Zero Net Emissions has certainly taken quite a bit of time and effort – much more than I anticipated. As well as working with community organisations and their contributions, I made my own submission.
And this work was just that little bit more difficult because I was doing it at the same time a few ‘Bolts Out Of The Blue’ happened.
Bolts Out Of The Blue
These were my second type of interruption to blogging. You know, those things you can’t plan for. Like family members seriously ill, or an injury that disrupts your ability to get on with normal life for a while…
Obviously we can’t do much about other people becoming seriously ill.
Yet sometimes we can prevent an injury or illness. In my case, if I hadn’t been travelling so much or so tired and neglecting other responsibilities at home then I could have avoided being injured…and a lot of down time that followed.
The truth is that I have been trying to do too much for what my body and brain and my support systems (in this case, home) could, in combination, cope with.
The real message behind my injury was that I needed to slow down and rest, to make time and effort to look after my support systems (brain, body, home).
Often when we don’t look after the things* on which we rely then something (nature, ‘the universe’, God – call it what you will) intervenes to give us a shock and pay attention to what we have been neglecting. (*These things include our brain, body, home, and the equipment, people and systems that support us.)
Parallels with our bigger world
In many ways, this is just like what is happening with our world: as a whole, humanity has not been taking action to ensure that we look after our support systems. We have been using up resources as if they are unlimited. We have been pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere as if they won’t strengthen the greenhouse effect – with the result that our stable climate is damaged (and continuing to be damaged) and our oceans are becoming more acidic. We throw things we don’t need or want ‘away’ – when there is no ‘away’ because we all live on just one planet.
And now our world, our life-enabling support system, is showing us the consequences of not paying attention to looking after it. Some of it is coming as a bit of a shock, like the consequences of damage to our climate unfolding much faster than many worse cases predicted.
Why slow down?
Our current way of living and the way our economy works is based on speed and greed.
We love speed. We want everything faster and faster – preferably yesterday. And we can’t get to places fast enough.
Most of us have a huge problem with FOMO: Fear Of Missing Out. We can’t bear to miss out on doing things or seeing people just because they are far away. FOMO is behind our greed – and our society currently reward greed.
Sometimes, of course, we don’t have much choice when it comes to travel. Many of us are not able to live close to where we work, so we need to travel to make a living.
And so we have invented ways to speed up transport, so we can travel longer distances faster and get things delivered to us in hours or days from all over the world.
That, combined with FOMO or lack of choice, means that we now do and travel much more – or travel further to do the basics of life – than people in previous generations did in any day, week, month or year.
Could all this speed and FOMO be the cause of so many of the problems we face in the world today?
It means we ‘consume’ much more, with all the transport, resource depletion, pollution, and other costs that go with doing so.
And all that rushing about means that we miss a lot of the experience of ‘being’ in our world: connecting with, understanding and appreciating our environs, our neighbours and everything that supports us surviving and thriving.
Could slowing down be part of the solution?
What would happen if we slowed down?
What do you feel like when you are living more simply, say having a holiday in a beach shack or camping? (Have you ever had a ‘staycation’?)
Personally, I love it!
I love becoming more rested and fit, connecting more with family and friends, having fun and experiencing nature. These are the sorts of things we can miss out on because we are so busy, rushing around to meet ‘commitments’ and feeding our FOMO ‘monster’.
What would your life be like if you couldn’t drive everywhere? (That could be for a lot of different reasons!)
When I walk, cycle and use public transport, I find that I observe a lot more ‘on the ground’. I also find that I am more connected to my community and surroundings. In evolutionary terms, these are necessary for basic survival. They can also be the source of great pleasure: I can literally ‘smell the roses’!
What would your holidays be like without flying?
Holidaying locally can often mean discovering hidden treasures right in your own back yard. As well, I have found it can be far more relaxing and less time-consuming than travelling long distances to far away places.
And, of course, avoiding driving everywhere, plane travel or cruising on ships would reduce a lot of the climate damage and pollution caused by oil-powered transport.
Buying locally-produced food and goods would too. That, in turn, could reduce the resource depletion and ‘waste’ problems that are part of the international push for us to buy more and more ‘stuff’.
Adjusting our thinking
Of course, slowing down does mean doing less. That is, of course, the point! And that in itself can be liberating.
I also recognise that it can be challenging. (Trust me on this!)
If you are used to doing and having a lot, it can be tough deciding what you are NOT going to do or have. This can be especially hard if you really like everything you are currently rushing around to do or have.
Yet, realistically, we cannot have or do everything. We are always making choices.
It’s just that our lives have been supercharged in ways that that are unsustainable in the long run.
All this focus on speed is damaging our world. The oil, gas and coal that has been powering our transport in recent decades is a major cause of damage to our climate, air, oceans and waterways. The oil and gas wells and coal mines destroy local ecosystems and water. So to do the roads, carparks, airports and other transport infrastructure. They also:
- take up a lot of land
- create heat islands in our increasingly hot summers
- create or worsen flash flooding in our increasingly intense rains.
And this speed can sometimes damage us too. When we are rushing or tired from doing too much we are more likely to become injured (as I have found out) or stressed.
We already know the answer to this problem.
- How often are we advised to ensure we get sufficient rest and relaxation?
- How often do our minds and bodies tell us that, if only we’d listen?
- How often to we here or read about the benefits of meditation and mindfulness (which, of course requires slowing down)?
- And how good does it feel when we are not rushing and overwhelmed?
If we really think about it, we probably also know the answer to living sustainably in our world. Just like we do with our own bodies and minds.
Why slow down now?
There are so many reasons for slowing down.
For a start, the damage already done to our climate means that the consequences of that damage are built in for several hundred years – unless we very rapidly reverse the damage.
The first step in doing that is to stop creating the damage.
With transport being a large and growing source of damage to our climate, stopping that damage means re-thinking our need for transport as well as how we go about transport. In particular, that means we need to stop burning oil, gas and coal to power the transport we actually need. And, until all our transport is powered by electricity generated from clean, renewable energy, it also means:
- avoiding using air transport. That’s because the height at which planes fly means that they injects both carbon dioxide (from burning oil) and water vapour direct into the greenhouse layer of the atmosphere
- avoiding cruising by ship. That’s because cruise liners’ business model is based on speed for customer turnover (rather than straight efficiency). They also use the dirtiest oil. The net result is that they use much more fuel than their freighter cousins. (There are a lot of other reasons why cruising is bad for our environment too.)
Slowing down means we will probably spend more time in our local communities. That enables us to develop and strengthen our relationships there. Stronger relationships means more resilient communities. That’s something we increasingly need as the consequences of our damage to natural world unfold.
The challenge
Think about how you could slow down and what benefits it would bring to you and our world. For example:
- Do you really need to do everything you do?
- What relationships could you form or strengthen by slowing down?
- Could you get what you need locally?
- How would your community be strengthened by buying what you need and spending time in your community?
For me, I will be endeavouring to catch up on my blogging while also slowing down! (At very least, I am aiming to regain my momentum and blog at least daily.)
Join me!
Any change or challenge is easier if you have company along the way.
So let’s embark on this journey together.
- Read my blog every day for ideas, thoughts and experiences for living a lower carbon lifestyle, more in harmony with nature – while also adapting to the consequences of our damaged climate.
- Subscribe to get posts direct to your inbox.
- Commit to taking action yourself.
- Add a comment to let me know you’re joining in the effort to turn around our world so it can remain liveable – and what your experiences are.
- Share with others my posts and what you’re doing – our efforts, progress, experiences and challenges – on Facebook, on Twitter, in conversations with friends, on talkback radio and in letters to the editor.
A problem shared is a problem halved. We’re all affected by the changes to our world so we need to be all in on the action!
Till next time…