Consciousness Nurtures Contentment

Riding to work this morning I heard that U.S. retail sales were down again in April. While the announcer presented this as bad news, I think it’s great news!

There is an inverse relationship between retail sales and national measures of well being - the less we consume the happier we get, which is not surprising if you think about it. Contentment is the absence of wanting. If we decide we don’t need to buy so much stuff the pressure is off. Whether it’s because we can’t afford it or because we are painfully aware of how our insatiable appetites are literally consuming the earth – we can stop worrying about what we don’t have and start appreciating what we do have, including the people and experiences in our lives that make us truly rich.

This brings up a bigger question: why are we so obsessed with things like retail sales and Gross Domestic Product as measure of how we are doing as a country? It’s time to jettison that outdated way of thinking.

Look at GDP, for example. It simply measures economic activity, it doesn’t distinguish whether it’s good or bad activity. After hurricane Katrina, GDP spiked because of all the money spent on rescue and repair. The swine flu causes GDP to go up as we spend millions on vaccines and prevention. War causes GDP to go up as we spend trillions of dollars to fight the enemy.

But GDP doesn’t measure things like the value of education, the health of our children, the condition of our infrastructure and buildings, or the negative value (cost) of crime, degradation of the environment or our carbon footprint.

Several new measuring systems are under development and many countries, including France, are working on adopting one. The Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI) is a good one to check out:
http://www.rprogress.org/sustainability_indicators/genuine_progress_indicator.htm

The image at the top of this entry is from Chris Jordan, a brilliant artist from Seattle. The top image is the entire art piece and the images below are closer and closer details of the art, until you can see that the image is composed of 2.4 million pieces of plastic, equal to the estimated number of pounds of plastic pollution that enter the world's oceans every hour. All of the plastic in the image was collected from the Pacific Ocean. This will help you visualize the size and impact of our out of control consumer culture.

To see other amazing works by Chris Jordan, check out his website:

http://www.chrisjordan.com/

Out of the Wilderness

By all accounts the Republicans are lost in the wilderness. Their misguided belief that it’s every man for himself created a politics of fear, driving them so far right they landed beyond the fringe of American thought. To paraphrase a Zen koan, if a Republican falls in the forest and there’s no one there to see it, does anyone care?

Well, I do, actually, which is ironic coming from a lifelong Democrat. As a Democrat, of course, I’m in 7th heaven with Obama at the helm of this country. I agree with him on pretty much everything, including the need for a vigorous debate about the issues we face at this critical time in history. The problem is there’s no opposition party to enliven the national dialogue. Obama even tried to emulate a Republican (Lincoln) by putting a “team of rivals” on his cabinet that would provide opposing viewpoints for all to consider, but there were no Republicans available with any ideas.

So now we, the Democrats, are basically talking to ourselves. I mean, if the views of Robert Rubin and Robert Reich form the outer edges of our debate on finance, for example, then we may not get the kind of bold new thinking we need to reinvent economics for the 21st century. I’m a big fan of Reich’s and he’s capable of pushing the idea envelope a long ways, but he, like all of us, would benefit from someone who could challenge his assumptions, point out blind spots and shine a light on areas he might not have considered. I don’t think Rubin, Larry Summers or even Paul Volcker (Democrats all) can do that effectively.

As a Democrat, I loved reading David Leonhardt’s interview with Obama in the Sunday NY Times Magazine. His clear understanding of the issues and ability to articulate his response was thrilling after 8 years of Bush idiocy, er, Presidency. But I missed having Obama tackle the really big questions, like how are we going to reintegrate nature into our economics to include the value of eco-systems services, which are currently an externality on balance sheets? This is, after all, at the heart of why we keep abusing the environment, because we are not accounting for the true costs of goods and services. And what about recalibrating our measure of success using something like the GPI (Genuine Progress Indicator) instead of simply GDP? The GPI measures the value of things like education and the durability of our infrastructure, 2 of the many things GDP doesn’t measure (more on this in my next blog).

Would conservatives push Obama to tackle these big questions, which I believe are part of the key to changing our thinking about the relationship between business and the environment? Is it possible they could argue for an even more rigorous approach than the Dems to solving the climate crisis?

Are you kidding?!?!?!?

Well, actually, they might. Not American conservatives, of course, but the new British brand of conservative thinking.

In the current issue of World Architecture magazine the Right Honourable John Gummer MP, a key member of the conservative party, is quoted as saying: “Architects should prepare themselves for a revolution the magnitude of which hasn’t been seen since the industrial revolution." Gummer, who would likely be in charge of the country’s planning if the conservatives are elected next year, believes that we should be delivering Zero Carbon buildings, now. “The environment can’t wait ten years,” he proclaims.

Gummer went on to say that “if zero carbon is mandatory, then the market will find a way to deliver the volume at a competitive price.” Talk about faith in the market! Gummer even came up with some IDEAS (!!!!!) about how the financing might work.

The Conservatives are investigating a radical restructuring of finance for buildings, where energy supply is as much an integral part of a building’s cost as interest on a mortgage.
Gummer said that they (the Conservatives) were negotiating with utilities to create a finance package that will allow building owners to pre-purchase energy at a reduced rate, possibly even linked to the building’s mortgage. The savings made on energy costs would be used to finance the energy saving improvements to the building.

As the Brits say, “brilliant!”

What’s going on here??? Could it be that a conservative is interested in conserving energy? What a concept!

Not that long ago the British conservatives were wandering in the wilderness just like the Republicans. Defeated by the liberal Labour party amidst sex scandals and economic collapse, for years they kept pushing the same old ideas and for years they kept losing. Finally, along came David Cameron, a young, media savvy conservative who understood the importance of the environment, especially to the next generation. He quickly came up with a new logo, a tree (see top of this article). He also recognized that we are all in this together, a key mindset difference from the Republicans.

So what if the Republicans took a cue from the British right and embraced the environment and a more collective mindset? Imagine how much progress we might make on climate change and reinventing the economy. And we might do it in a way that encouraged business to play a powerful part and maybe, just maybe, maintain a sense of fiscal conservancy as well.

So here’s a new bumper sticker for you: INVIGORATE THE DEBATE - REINVENT THE REPUBLICAN PARTY

And here’s hoping the Republicans find their way out of the wilderness. Ironically, the best way for them to do it might be to recognize the value of the real wilderness and bio-mimic the British right.

The Prius Effect, Take 2

The universe works in interesting and often synchronous ways. After I posted the last entry I picked up Donella Meadows book “Thinking in Systems,” which I’m about halfway through. Amazing book; I highly recommend it. The passage I read last night was about a neighborhood in Holland where all the houses were alike except for one thing – some had their electric meters in the front hall for all to see, while the others had meters in the basement. These were the kind of meters where you can see the little silver wheel spinning faster the more energy you use. Not surprisingly, the houses where people could see their energy consumption used about a third as much energy as the ones with the meters in the basement. This was way before Priuses - the story took place in the early 1970s!

It makes me think we should pass a law that requires putting electric meters inside the house where everyone can see them. With current technology it would be easy to not only have them show energy use, but give you an hourly and daily summary. I can’t imagine we really need to have meter readers going around manually reading each meter, but if we do, a redundant system would still be worth it. As it stands now, I bet most people don’t even know where their meters are!

The Prius Effect

I recently heard a report on NPR about 25 high schoolers in San Francisco who were given cell phones as a way of reducing their environmental impact! You might ask yourself, “how can a cell phone reduce someone’s carbon footprint?” You would think all that talking, talking, would produce more carbon dioxide, not less, especially if you count the heavy breathing created by teenage sexting.

But these phones had something that most mobile communication devices don’t – a built in sensor that takes a reading of your movement speed every 30 seconds and determines how much time each day you spend immobile, walking, riding a bike or traveling by car. At the end of the day you can calculate how your transportation choices have affected the planet.

Brilliant! It’s the Prius Effect in a new application.

If you’re not familiar with the Prius Effect, a quick sidenote. I may or may not have coined the term - I haven’t heard anyone else use it – but I’m surely not the first to recognize it. When I got my Prius nearly two years ago I was only getting about 37 – 40 miles per gallon, which is less than advertised. I started watching the consumption gauge to figure out what was wrong and presto! My mileage improved to about 45 mpg. The constant feedback of how my driving was affecting my mileage changed my driving habits. It became a game and now I’m much better at it – if I’m paying attention I can get around 50 mpg.

This is what systems thinkers call “a negative regulating feedback loop,” which is a high leverage way to change a system, in this case the system being the car and its driver. A thermostat which keeps your house at a desired temperature is a simple example of a negative feedback loop. So is a hangover!

As Dana Meadows wrote in her seminal article “Places to Intervene in a System” (Whole Earth, Winter 1997) “The ‘strength’ of a negative feedback loop depends on the accuracy and rapidity of monitoring, the quickness and power of response and the directness and size of corrective flows.” In the case of the Prius, the monitoring is constant, while the power of response and the size of the corrective flow both depend on the driver’s ability to optimize fuel flows.

This year at Greenbuild (the world’s largest green design conference), there were literally dozens of examples of the Prius Effect being applied to buildings. Most of them were some variation on gauges that show energy consumption - for each room in a hotel, for example, or the overall building in an office lobby. The gauges tell building users how their habits are affecting energy use, just like the Prius consumption gauge. Lawmakers are currently discussing requiring energy labels on buildings, so that future tenants would have that information as part of their selection criteria.

Ankrom Moisan, where I work, uses Building Energy Modeling during the design of a building to measure how various design strategies will decrease the building’s energy consumption – another example of a regulating feedback loop.

At their best, negative regulating feedback loops positively change behavior. The more we recognize the Prius Effect, the more creatively we can apply it for the betterment of the planet. How about garbage cans that tell you the weight of your weekly refuse? Product labels that tell you how much energy was used in their production?

I’d love to hear from you, dear readers, about other possibilities.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

So which is it?

I often lay awake at night and listen to the wind howling outside my window in a key I’ve never heard before. The weather is just plain weird and if you’ve lost your job, your house, your savings, these are bleak times. We’re all worried about global warming and terrorist attacks and whether the Dow will ever recover.

But even in the darkness I find myself surprisingly optimistic. As hard as it is for many of us, everything is moving in the right direction and things are happening that I could only dream about a few short years ago. The consumer driven society we built was not sustainable. It had to end for us to survive.

Think about it. Because of the drop in consumption, factories are slowing down or closing and Green House Gas emissions are actually declining. People are driving less, saving lives and further reducing emissions. Americans are starting to take the long view and savings rates are going up for the first time since the 1950s.

Companies are reducing people’s hours, forcing them to have a better balance between work and life. Of course if you are struggling to pay your bills on a reduced pay check, you may not enjoy your time off. But our priorities are getting realigned whether we like it or not. Instead of buying stuff, we are spending more time with each other. We’re slowing down and our quality of life is looking up.

Here in Portland a lot of people have been walking or taking mass transit to work for years. But since the crash, the brigade of bicycles riding across the bridges into downtown every day has grown to epic proportions. I recently saw a caravan of bikes pulling small trailers loaded with sofas, lamps, tables, dressers and clothes. Friends were moving someone into a new house, getting exercise and maintaining a zero carbon footprint at the same time! Only in Portland.

Everywhere you look the new paradigm is taking root and people are digging it.

The Party's over!

At long last the Republican party is over!

The orgy of self-indulgence and self-importance ended in the darkest hours just before dawn. The house of cards in which it took place collapsed in a windstorm of change and public outcry. All inside were lost. Only a select few got to enjoy the party favors, but we all got hammered and now we’re nursing an excruciating collective hangover.

How did this happen? How did the Republicans go from running the country (into the ground) to running for their political lives?

Well, of course: they were victims of the paradigm shift.

The Republican philosophy of “every man for himself” was at odds with the reality that we are all in this together. As Sim van der Ryn recently put it, “we are moving from the Me Generation to the We Generation.” Republicans didn’t understand that; they saw the world as basically frightening and full of "the others." Fear was both their response and their primary tactic for maintaining power. Ironically the more they looked at the world as hostile, the more hostile it became. What you see is what you get.

But Hope>fear, as the Obama bumper sticker so succinctly points out, so let the Republicans cower in the corner while the rest of us move on.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m celebrating the end of a regressive and misguided ideology; I don’t have anything against Republicans as people. We need them. I would love to see an invigorated Republican philosophy; after all, Teddy Roosevelt was a Conservative Republican. Maybe if Republicans looked to him for inspiration instead of Karl Rove or Rush Limbaugh they might be able to enter the national debate with some relevant and useful ideas.

An Eco-logical Mind

“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.