Fulfilling and Value Aligned Activites

I finally got to read through the book titled Radical Simplicity by Jim Merkel.  It’s worth a read for those who are interested in simplifying their lives.  Otherwise, the title alone will likely stop even a casual looker.  He basically takes the reader through a few different calculators for estimating the size of their ecological footprint, estimating a size based on their values, and figuring out one’s true hourly wage (which covers all the off the clock time and money which you put in just so you can have that job).  In this way the reader decides how much simplifying they want to do, and even in what areas they’d prefer to do it in.  Everyone’s final draft will look different, as it’s catered to them.

Despite the calculators, however, there’s nothing there to really help you figure out HOW to simplify the things you want to.  What I, personally, got out of it was a way of categorizing and evaluating my activities and money spending.

This morning I started a list, writing down the activities I do during the day.  Currently I’m writing them as/before/after I do them.  I then have 6 categories to choose from for each activity:  survival/health, comfort/luxury, connect, earthcare, peoplecare, return surplus.

For example, getting dressed and hopping onto the PC both counted as comfort/luxury activities.  Clarifying some butter and eating a breakfast of veggies + cheese counted as survival/health activities.  Handwashing my clothes and hanging them up to dry counted as earthcare activities because I used human power, minimal water, and air for drying instead of electricity, thus reducing my ecological footprint and costs.

Then, for each activity, under their category, I evaluate if the activity fulfilled me and if it aligned with my values/goals.  The evaluations are increase it, decrease it, improve the method, and ok as is.

So, for example, putting on a sweater this morning instead of turning up the heater I evaluated as ok on fulfillment (i got warmer), ok on alignment (not using more electricity fits with my goal of trying to reduce costs and footprint).

Another example, the handwashing and drying of my clothes got ‘improve it’ on each part, as it’s a process that I need to refine to better suit feeling fulfilled by doing it, and better alignment with my values.  I do feel that I need to streamline the process better.  And eventually figure out how to reuse the dirty water.

Using the PC decreases my fulfillment and doesn’t align well with my values.  I’d like to improve how I use it and decrease how often I use it.

Yes, after reading that, it all seems so complex.  But it’s more complex to write it out than to actually do it. Basically, the evaluations help me easily see which activities I’d be happier cutting back on, and which I’d be happier continuing or improving on.

I figure this is a good start on simplifying my life, and start working towards aligning myself with my values.

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Do Your activities fulfill you? Do they align with your values?  What purpose do they serve in your life?  Would you prefer to increase them? decrease them? or find ways of improving some of them?

Permaculture Ethics and the 3 Basic Needs

The past couple of days I’ve been going through sites that talk about Permaculture.  Normally when people start talking about ethics and morals and shoulds, etc, I tune out or move on to somewhere else.  But for some reason, the Permaculture Ethics kept popping up, over and over and over.  I mean, yeah, so an intro to permaculture (which is what most sites are..remember, if you want to learn more, open your wallet)…anyways, so an intro to permaculture inevitably spends a little time and space talking about the Permaculture ethics.  And I kept glossing over it, as usual.  But finally, after the constancy, I finally read it.  And then looked at how others described it.  Most of it is repeating the same thing over and over.  But one site went into more detail on it:  http://deepgreenpermaculture.wordpress.com/permaculture/permaculture-ethics/

After reading through this, and mulling it over in my mind this morning, I realized that the Permaculture Ethics correspond with the 3 Basic Needs which I’d written of earlier.

Permaculture Ethic #1 (Care for Earth) fits quite well with Basic Need #1 (to survive)

• The Earth is our sole provider of all the essentials that keeps us alive – air, water, food, shelter.  We cannot get these essentials met from anywhere else.
• As such, we depend upon the Earth, and all its living systems, for our survival.
• So, if we want to meet the survival need, it behooves us to

1. not pollute the air we breathe, nor the water we drink,
2. not poison the plants and animals we eat,
3. not destroy the land which provides our sustenance.

• Survival means caring for the soil on which plant life depends, and therefore is our source of food.
• Survival means caring for the forests that supply us with clean air and plays a key role in rain formation and thus fresh water supplies.
• Survival means caring for the waters, rivers, oceans, streams, etc which circulate nourishment from which all life depends on.
• Survival means recognizing the difference between a need….and a luxury.
• Survival also means taking responsibility for our selves and our actions.

Permaculture Ethic #2 (Care for People) fits a combo of Basic Needs #2,3 (to connect, to co-evolve)

• No man is an island.
• Humans, as a species are generalists, but individuals are not.
• By  nature, humans are social and cooperative animals.
• One person cannot do everything by him/her self, except in the most primitive of lifestyle.  This is why economy developed.  To trade services and skills.  To trade specializations.
• When people collaborate to support each other, and to meet both physical and nonphysical needs, a sense of community prospers.
• However, in order to collaborate with others, we must first take responsibility for our own selves and our own actions.  (depending on others is not the same as collaborating with them)
• We must also have something worth collaborating with, be it information, skill, ability, or other resource, which can be used to help others meet their own basic needs.

Permaculture Ethic #3 (Return of Surplus to Earth & People) fits with Basic Needs #3,1 (to co-evolve, to survive)

• The Earth’s resources are finite.  As such, there are only a finite share of resources available to each person to gain sustenance from.
• If we take more than our share, we reduce someone else’s ability to gain sustenance from the earth.
• If we use finite resources to make things other than for sustenance, we reduce someone’s ability to gain sustenance from the earth…perhaps even our own.
• If we share any surplus of resources, we help someone else gain sustenance.
• When we hoard/destroy resources, we create deficiency.
• When we accumulate unused resources, we create pollution.
• When we share any surpluses of resources, we create bounty.
• When we share our surplus produce, our skills, knowledge, and experience, we build bonds between people and foster a sense of collaborative community.

Permaculture stresses inter-connectivity and cooperation.
How can we best meet the 3 Basic Needs of surviving, connecting, and co-evolving?  Not by accumulation and competition, but by inter-connectivity and cooperation.

3 Basic Needs: Survive, Connect, Co-Evolve

Just a few minutes ago I responded to an article that put down Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, but then created one just as complex.  So I commented on it, and thought to paste that comment into here.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs made the error of viewing the self as an island, ultimately separate from others and separate from one’s environment.  If we remove that bias, his Hierarchy can be summarized into three basic needs:  to Survive, to Connect, to Co-Evolve.

Survival includes physiological and safety needs.  These needs are met by the environment and/or by our connections.  Without a healthy environment to meet our needs, we can not survive.  Without our connections, we would be too busy re-inventing the wheel of survival to ever move beyond survival.

Connecting includes affiliation and esteem needs.  It also includes connecting with our environment.  If we rely on a healthy environment to survive, it helps to remember that we are connected to that environment; that what we do to the environment will cycle back and influence our survival abilities.

Co-Evolve includes creative, cognitive, aesthetics, and actualization needs.  These are the cultural and personal memes.  We are influenced by the memes of past generations, as well as the memes developed in the present.  This reduces our need to constantly re-invent the wheel of survival.  We also co-evolve with our environment.  Changes we (and others) make to the environment influence changes we have to make within ourselves.

We are NOT islands.  If we want to reach our potential, as individuals and/or as a species, we have no choice but to work with each other, and/or with our environment.

 

 

 

Guiding Principle: Mind&Body as Resource

About a month or so ago I read an interesting article on a blog.  It brought up how our minds and our bodies are our greatest resources.  I’ve been mulling over this ever since.  And have decided to use this as one of my Guiding Principles to help me on my path.

Humans wouldn’t have survived, nor grown to what we’ve become without our minds and bodies.  Such an obvious statement, yes?  But take that to a more personal level.  You wouldn’t have survived, nor grown to what you’ve become without your mind and your body.

I wouldn’t have.  It was my body that got me out of the messes that my mind had gotten me into.  And my mind that got me out of the messes that my body had gotten me into, lol.  Stuff may have helped, but if it weren’t for my mind knowing how to use the stuff, or my body’s ability to manipulate the stuff, I wouldn’t have survived, nor grown to who I am now.

Stuff will come and go.  It will break, burn, get lost, get stolen, etc.  Regardless of what happens to the stuff, my mind and body are my greatest resources.  Stuff can be replaced.  My mind and body can’t.  (Not for me, at least.)

Have you ever refused to loan some thing to someone, because they aren’t the kind of person to take care of it?  Have you ever gotten annoyed with someone who wastes or damages a precious resource of yours?  At people who don’t take care of theirs, nor others’, Stuff?

Yet, how many of us don’t take care of our own most precious personal resources: our minds and our bodies?

I’ve spent too damned many years, trying to salvage a mind that I had considered damaged.  Mostly I had viewed it that way because other people had wanted to use it for their own personal gain, regardless of the damage they caused by using it in a way it wasn’t suited for.  I had lost trust and confidence in my own mind.  Yet it was this same mind that has kept me going, has kept me fighting, and has found creative solutions and options for myself and others.  My mind may not be a resources for a certain group of people/organizations.  But it’s certainly one of my own, personal, greatest resources.

I’m taking back my mind.

Some people may not agree with it.  Some may say that I’m being selfish, or lazy, or living off the work of others.  Yet, by taking back my mind, I’ll actually be able to give back to the community.  Not by making someone else richer, nor by letting them drain me of my resource, but by making the community itself richer, and helping others to find their own resources.  And thus, this resource of mine becomes ever renewable.

In similar token, I’ll be renewing my body as a precious resource of mine.  I have come to rely on Stuff, rather than my body and mind.  I have allowed my body to become weakened and sickened.  Part of this comes from our cultural habits/expectations.  Part from our natural incline towards conserving energy.  We want to conserve our own energy for survival, and by doing so we come to rely on using the energy of others, even of Earth’s non-renewable resources.

Over the next month I will work towards relying on my body more, for meeting physical needs, rather than relying on Stuff or non-renewable resources.  Why do I need an electric rechargeable toothbrush when I can use my own muscle power?  Why do I need an electric dishwasher, when I’ve got two hands of my own, and a good cloth?  Why do I need a car to get me to a grocery store, when I can have a garden?…

Oh wait, see, there are some things I’m not yet ready to rely on my body for, not just yet.  If I lived in town, I wouldn’t need a car to get me around.  But I don’t live in town.  And the nearest bus stop is just over 5 miles away.  AND…my back isn’t at the point that I can walk 5 miles each day like I used to.  I get excited when I can last half a mile without overwhelming pain.  And the road to get to the bus stop?  Not safe for bicyclists.

However, I have a mind that can help me find a solution.  One that follows the Guiding Principle of using my Mind and my Body as my Greatest Resources.  And while I may not be able to find a perfect solution for everything in my life, at least the combined solutions will be an improvement.

And I can’t help but imagine how our culture, and the world, might improve, if each person relied more on our minds and bodies, rather than on Stuff.

 

btw, the blog mentioned above is:  http://artofgreatthings.com/2009/10/a-guide-to-self-reliance-minimalism/