“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a persistent one” – Albert Einstein There are literally thousands of books published on the topics of green, sustainability, mindset, systems thinking and quantum physics. These are some of the hottest topics in non-fiction today. But no book has yet been published that puts these subjects together in a comprehensive and holistic way. In An Eco-logical Mind I will show how they are all connected to a new ecological mindset that is at the core of a profound shift in human evolution and thinking.
This new mindset is affecting every aspect of our lives, including our relationship to each other and the planet. In coming years it will have a profound impact on the way we do business and the role of consumers. Yet this shift is almost entirely beneath the surface of our consciousness – most people are not yet aware that it is happening - and no one has been able to clearly communicate it to a mass audience.
“We cannot solve problems using the same thinking that caused them.” If Einstein was to say this today, he might phrase it, “We can’t solve today’s problems using yesterday’s mindset.”
In “An Ecological Mind” I will show how our mindset determines everything we do. It is the lens through which we see the world. Most people are still looking at the world through an outdated mindset that was born with the industrial revolution. It’s a mindset that has its roots in Newtonian science and Cartesian thinking. It’s the mindset that places man above nature, separate and distinct from it.
“There’s something happening here, but you don’t know what it is, do you, Mr. Jones?” – Bob Dylan
In November 2005 I attended a hospitality conference in New York for Hotel CEOs, designers, developers and the media that cover them. Temperatures in the 70s all week put most people in a buoyant mood – but for me it was unsettling and un-natural.
On the first day of the conference a panel of experts – CEOs of several major hotel brands – talked to an audience of several hundred about issues facing the industry, primarily the escalating cost of energy and how it was eroding the bottom line. Throughout the hour and a half session I waited for someone to mention green or sustainability, but it never happened. Their consensus answer to the problem was for government to subsidize energy costs so they could be more competitive.
When it came time for Q & A I was the first one up.
“Since you are all so worried about energy costs, have any of you considered sustainable design strategies to reduce your consumption?”
To a man – and they were all men – they looked at me like I had just asked: “Are any of you considering building any new hotels on Venus?”
Their eyes said “Get rid of this trouble maker,” but their mouths said, “There’s no consumer demand for it and it doesn’t make economic sense. Next!”
After Q & A was over two editors from major industry magazines came up to me and, sounding like a conspiratorial Greek chorus, they exclaimed, “we must do something! Those guys just don’t get it.”
Today, from the perspective of early 2009, when green and sustainability are in the forefront of society’s thinking, this seems hard to imagine. But then it was not unusual for businesses to ignore the environment. Why could I see what was happening so clearly and they couldn’t. These were some of the smartest guys in the hotel industry, but green wasn’t even on their radar.
At that moment I realized that because for years I had been cultivating a different mindset I might be able to help people see the arc of history and how it is leading to a new paradigm and an amazing new future. That is the purpose of this blog.
