It’s not every day that the Vice President of the United States stands less than a foot away from you, gives you a disarmingly warm hello and a very firm handshake!  Thanks to a dear friend, Bernard L. Jones, that’s exactly what I experienced a few days ago.

Bernard, a Democratic State delegate from Colrain and Vietnam combat veteran, had invited me to a special reception in Boston for Vice President Joe Biden. Together with several hundred other people on the roof deck of Fenway Park, I listened to the Vice President speak about the issues confronting this new administration. He described his visits to hard-hit industrial communities throughout the United States and the economic necessity for health care reform. His speech was sober, personal, and finally…uplifting. Not in an impractical or hyperbolic way. His optimism was authentic, real.

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A few months ago, on a retreat with spiritual teacher Andrew Cohen, he spoke for a while about love and trust. Love, he said, is vague—you can love ice cream, your dog, your spouse, and God, without really making any distinctions between them.

We also get sloppy with people we love, he said, and I recognized this to be true. Of course, there is something beautiful in feeling free to share our vulnerabilities, but too often this ease turns into taking each other for granted. In many cases, we end up being our worst selves with those who are closest to us, rationalizing that they will love us anyway, and that we deserve to be loved just the way we are.

But is that true? When our lives are expressions of selfishness, or when we lash out at our loved ones because we can, or when we live out of our lowest desires, is that behavior worthy of love? Maybe it isn’t. And, Cohen said, maybe trust is a better measure of our regard for each other than the amorphous concept of love.

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It’s so great to hear from Jessica on her work with the women of Riverbrook Residence. What is possible is so much more than we think, and it’s wonderful that she and her students were able to share this in such a real sense with Governor Patrick. Thanks, Jessica! -ed.

What an amazing night! A few nights ago, my blind student Tanny Labshere and I had the opportunity to play a piano duet for the Governor of Massachusetts, Deval Patrick. For the occasion—a small fundraising party at a private home—we created a special medley of “We Shall Overcome” and “America the Beautiful.” At the last chord, there was a palpable absorption in the room - everyone was completely focused on our playing. People were deeply moved.

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image by Llima

Over the last four months I have been part of a fitness challenge group spurred by Uli, a friend through this site. In February, Megan and I joined her and Brad in their $50/week exercise commitment challenge. Since then, my friend Siobhan has joined us. As Uli wrote about the structure of the group, the group holds us accountable to our goals, and we’ve all experienced a lot of growth through the process.

Not too long ago, Megan wrote about the tremendous positive physical and non-physical changes she has seen in her body and beyond. I have seen changes in my physical body, too, and that’s been so refreshing and a big encouragement for me to continue. But the biggest shift I have made through this challenge of fitness is that I am now starting to understand the importance of consistency. The importance I now place on making time for regular physical activity is what has been most transformative for me.

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image by Maximum Mitch

This is a guest post by Nancy Fisher, a healer and dear friend from Long Island, NY.

On Monday May 18th, The Alliance for a New Humanity (ANH) and Intersections International hosted the Be the Change Community Outreach Program at the Marble Collegiate Church in New York City. For those unable to attend the event was streamed on the web.

With presentations by Deepak Chopra, president of the ANH, and the Rev. Robert Chase, Director of Intersections International, the evening promised to be a passionate and interesting ride. And it didn’t fail to deliver.

The ANH mission is to ‘connect people, who, through personal and social transformation, aim to build a just, peaceful and sustainable world, reflecting the unity of all humanity’. Inspired by a shared intention to create a critical mass to effect the change needed to create a better world, Be the Change is a world-wide movement presented by the Alliance for a New Humanity in Cooperation with Intersections International. It hopes to inspire individuals in local communities to actually participate in co-creating change. Deepak Chopra advises “it is a process that provides guidance, tools and support systems necessary to insure sustainability and success”.

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No Impact Man tells the story of Colin Beavan and his family’s attempt to live for one year without negatively impacting the environment. Starting with a firm conviction that this is a worthwhile pursuit, meaningful to the culture at large, Colin’s vision is both challenged and developed over the course of the year-long experiment.

The film makes parallel points. As much as it illustrates concrete actions toward no-impact, it also demonstrates, sometimes just by virtue of taking place in New York, just how inhospitable dominant American culture is to a “no-impact” lifestyle. As Colin and family cruise on bikes through Times Square, their smiles cannot obliterate the sea of cabs and huge flashing lights that surround them. Though at the end of the film Colin may be changed, the viewer is also forced to reckon with the fact that his changes don’t begin to touch the existing super-structure in which the well-meaning individual toils to evolve.

In one of the best moments of the film, 60’s anti-war activist Mayer Vishner, who shares his vegetable garden with Colin, points out to Colin that his wife Michelle works for Business Week which promotes the American corporate capitalist system (a blatant wrinkle in their family’s new virtue). Vishner says that if Colin thinks his individual efforts are going to do anything to knock out that system, he’s delusional. However, as a film about the individual’s challenge to live in tune with his or her evolving values, No Impact Man provides a whole lot to like, question and ponder.

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image by gromgull

A funny thing happened the other day in Arches National Park. Rich and I were on our way back from a really fun and challenging hike and had seen dozens of signs along the way asking hikers to stay on the path to preserve the biologically active crust of desert soil. In an enticing alcove full of crevices and minicaves in the stone, I saw a mother and her sons playing off the trail and indignantly said to Rich, “What are they doing? That isn’t the path!” He laughed and said, “Don’t you remember? You went and checked out the exact same place on the way out!”

Indeed I had, and I realized at that point that I am every bit as much of an asshole as everyone I judge and criticize. This judging and criticizing is especially easy to do when traveling, because there are so many people embodying so many unfavorable stereotypes, and I am around them much more than I am at home. From loud obnoxious campers oblivious to others at the campsite to hikers oblivious to the stunning landscapes around them, there are plenty of examples of people who don’t seem to get it, and who bring to life Sartre’s famous statement “Hell is other people.”

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Just wanted to put up a quick note apologizing for the somewhat sporadic posting over the last few days. Spotty wifi service, camps to be set up and broken down, and National Parks calling to be hiked mean that I’m not getting articles up here every weekday as I’d like to.

That being said, though, I’m working on a corker on realizing that I, too, am as much as an asshole as everyone I like to criticize—especially easy to do when travelling!—and Sarah has seen and reviewed the No Impact Man movie! So you’ll have some good stuff to read a little later in the week.

Thanks for understanding. Off to Vegas where the wifi flows freely!

Rich and I are on a month-long roadtrip across the West, and we spent today at Arches National Park in Utah. We got up early and hiked 4.2 miles through the Devil’s Garden, which the visitors’ guide calls “moderately difficult” but which I’d call “pretty freakin’ hard.”

A year ago, I don’t think I’d have been able to scramble up and down all these crazy rocks like Gollum. But today I could, and I am moderately proud of myself. :) The view was definitely worth it.

I’m learning so much on this trip—seeing jaw-droppingly beautiful new things, meeting inspiring people, and noticing the impact my attitude has on how things go. More on all of it in the coming weeks!

I got my hands on this massive, awesome tome the other day—the result of a decade-long research and analysis effort by Sean Esbjorn-Hargens and Michael Zimmerman into how to integrate all the different forms of ecology—and have been slowly working my way through it. This book feels very important so I’m taking my time, making sure to understand each paragraph rather than racing through the way I sometimes do.

I’m catching a lot of gems this way. Here’s one from the introduction, where the authors are laying out their goal for this book: to put together all the various ideas formed by the more than 200 movements within environmentalism to reveal a fuller, multi-layered, and more complete understanding of our home and how best to live in it.

“We do not assert that all perspectives are equal. Some truths are more comprehensive than others. Partial worldviews and partial perspectives reveal partial truths, which are accurate and essential but must be integrated int a larger, more comprehensive picture.”

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image by Caveman 92223

For 6 weeks a group of us here in Stockbridge, MA had worked to put on an event we called the Berkshire Extreme Green Expo and May 23rd was the big day. We were originally inspired by a vision for our county to be a net-zero energy community. The event consisted of several parts. First was a number of displays. One depicted the history of energy—from the big bang through to elemental energies of the earth, like vulcanoes and geysers, and yes, animals and humans too—to our county being one of the first in the US to have centralized electric power generation (hydro) towards future technological possibilities.

Another display showed examples of national and international pioneering projects: net-zero energy communities, like the city of Masdar that is being built near Abu Dhabi; projects like Teal Farm, which is a trail blazing experimental permaculture farm in Vermont; and passive houses in Europe, which do not need any external energy input.

We also showed short films, both about technological break-throughs as well as deeper philosophical context and background for being activists—Brian Swimme was represented, as was Duane Elgin and Mary Evelyn Tucker.

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image by Aidan Jones

In 2000, I worked for Ralph Nader’s presidential campaign. I drove a cleaning truck around the state of Florida for a month, wearing a janitor’s outfit and scrubbing floors for TV cameras while accusing both Democratic and Republican politicians of taking dirty money. “Ralph Nader wants to clean corporate cash out of politics!” I’d holler, and raise my mop angrily for the media.

Some days, we also canvassed the streets and handed out flyers. Inevitably I would find myself in an impassioned argument with a Bush or Gore supporter, and I spent hours pleading Nader’s case. Over the several weeks I spent doing this, I worked tirelessly, met a lot of great people, and had a good time. But what I didn’t do is convince anyone to change their minds.

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This week was all about learning.

• Monday, Victoria wrote about her experiences with giving up perfectionism for the much more fulfilling experience of progress.
• Tuesday, I described what I saw at last weekend’s Evolver Town Fair—lots of energy, tons of potential, and scads of stuff I need to work on.
• Wednesday I wrote about the odd juxtaposition of idealism and realism that was my Tuesday night.
• Thursday, I shared the thoughts sparked by one of my favorite books, Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson.

This week, I also discovered an amazing site, The Art of Non-Conformity, guide to living unconventionally and worldchangingly (hmm, I just changed the world by inventing a word)! Yesterday he put up a video that captures a lot of my thinking this week.

Like many of us, when I’m confronted with something new, my first tendency is to look at it critically. Where does it differ from my point of view? What’s missing? What’s wrong? But Chris proposes a different approach that strikes me as much healthier and productive: looking at every experience, reading, and conversation as an opportunity to learn something new. “All around us are an abundance of opportunities for learning,” he says, “and that’s what I’m trying to focus on.” Me too, Chris!

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When I saw that Kim Stanley Robinson’s Red Mars was available as a free Kindle download, I snapped it up (it’s still available, btw). I’d read this book several years back, and it amazed me. Reading it again now, in the context of what we’re trying to do on this website, is an even richer experience. Much of what the Mars pioneers face parallels what we Earthlings are facing right now: how do we handle ecological, political, and economic complexity? What stars do we navigate by?

Set in the near future, Red Mars tells the story of the first hundred colonists’ arrival on Mars, and the first half century or so of history to happen there. As the colonists spend time on the planet, their ideas on where it should go diverge. Some—the Reds, led by Ann—want to treat Mars as a park, studying it with minimal alteration to the landscape. But most others want to terraform the planet to make it more hospitable to life—partially for the scientific challenge of transforming the planet, and partially so that at least some of humanity can escape an increasingly tapped-out Earth. Over the first few years of Martian settlement, the argument grows in ferocity, and it finally comes to a head in an epic showdown between Ann and Sax after dinner one night.

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image by rachaelvoorhees

For several months I’ve been noodling over the idea of holding a “Salon of Possibilities” at my house—a chance for people to get together and talk about some bigger-picture stuff that doesn’t often come up in day-to-day conversation. Last night we had the first one; together we read and discussed this interview with Susan Neiman, author of Moral Clarity: A Guide for Grown-Up Idealists.

This article appealed to me because I’ve been called an idealist in a semi-disparaging way for many years now, as if being idealistic—holding the belief that things can be better than they are now, and that we can make them that way—is a sign of naivete or simple misunderstanding of “the way things work.” But, Neiman says, when people are “realistic,” even if they present their point of view (“humans are violent and greedy and we just need to deal with it”) as common sense, in actuality, underneath that view of humankind is a metaphysical framework that they are imposing on reality. Neiman argues that a truly realistic point of view, being what she calls a “grown-up idealist,” means holding both visions—of the way things are and of the way they ought to be—at the same time, and operating from an understanding of both.

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