It’s the world’s largest social movement. Jed Diamond explains what it is, why it’s desperately important, and why it’s remained largely invisible.
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This 4th of July Carlin and I decided to get out of town and watch the parade in Mendocino. I brought a book to read while we waited for the parade to begin–Countdown: Our Last, Best Hope for the Future of the Earth by Alan Weisman. Weisman also wrote the widely acclaimed The World Without Us.
In his review of Countdown in the New York Times, Nathaniel Rich begins with these unsettling words:
“If we wanted to bring about the extinction of the human race as quickly as possible, how might we proceed? We could begin by destroying the planet’s atmosphere, making it incapable of supporting human life. We could invent bombs capable of obliterating the entire planet, and place them in the hands of those desperate enough to detonate them. We could bioengineer our main food sources — rice, wheat and corn — in such a way that a single disease could bring about catastrophic famine. But the most effective measure, counterintuitive as it may be, would be to increase our numbers. Population is what economists call a multiplier. The more people, the greater the likelihood of ecological collapse, nuclear war, plague.”
How can we keep from being overwhelmed with fear and anxiety facing these kinds of realities? Do we simply “eat, drink, and be merry” and deny that anything bad can happen? Do we sink into depression and despair or check out with Alzheimer’s? If we believe humanity still has a “last, best hope,” what can we do that can make a difference?
I’ve been wrestling with these questions since 1993 when I sat in a sweat lodge at the 4th Annual Men’s Leaders’ Conference in Indianapolis, Indiana. During the third round I had a vision of how the “Ship of Civilization” was sinking. Fortunately, I also saw that many people survived in lifeboats and created a world where humans lived in balance with nature. The human species woke up from our destructive dream of domination and once again claimed our place in the community of life.
I’m still learning lessons from that original vision and many more people are now recognizing that our present Civilization, with its belief in continued growth and unsustainable use of the Earth’s resources, is heading for collapse. There are also more and more people who recognize that there is a better life “beyond civilization.”
In his book, Beyond Civilization: Humanity’s Next Great Adventure, Daniel Quinn says, “If a team of Martian anthropologists were to study our culture, their initial findings might read something like this. These people have the strange idea that the thing they call civilization is some sort of final, unsurpassable invention. Even though vast numbers of them suffer in this oppressively hierarchical system, and even though it appears to be plunging them toward a global catastrophe, they cling to it as if it were the most wonderful thing (as they quaintly say) since sliced bread. That a more agreeable (and less catastrophic) system exists BEYOND civilization, seems to be entirely unthinkable to them.”
In my 1993 vision a lot of people went down with the Ship of Civilization. This statement by Rob Watson, CEO and Chief Scientist of the EcoTech International Group, who Pulitzer-Prize winning author Tom Friedman calls one of the best environmental minds in America, captured what I saw in the vision:
“People don’t seem to realize it that it is not like we’re on the Titanic and we have to avoid the iceberg. We’ve already hit the iceberg. The water is rushing in down below. But some people just don’t want to leave the dance floor; others don’t want to give up on the buffet. But if we don’t make the hard choices, nature will make them for us.”
Although many stayed on board, others got into lifeboats, moved away from the ship, and over time came together to create a more sustainable way of being on the planet. This way of life is much more fun, much more healthy, and much more sustainable than anything we have yet known. For them, the day they accepted that the Ship of Civilization was sinking and got into their life-boat was truly “Independence Day.”
What I’m Learning About Life Beyond Civilization
- Life beyond civilization is a state of mind not a place.
For most of human history, people physically moved to a new environment if the old one was becoming less habitable. But now there is no place we can go. This is the only planet we have. It is our home and we will learn to live here or we will die here. We need to change our way of thinking away from “an ever expanding economy” to one that lives within the limits of natural world, of which we are a part.
- We’re all going to die someday, but humanity will live on if we choose to make it so.
It’s not easy to accept our own death, but we all know that someday it will be out time to leave. We cannot continue to populate our planet with more humans. Like any species that expands beyond the limits of the environment, our population will decline. Some seven billion people are alive today; the United Nations estimates that by the end of the century we could number as many as 15.8 billion. Biologists have calculated that an ideal population — the number at which everyone could live at a first-world level of consumption, without ruining the planet irretrievably — would be 1.5 billion.
Though there may be some scientific disagreement about the numbers, everyone agrees that we must decrease the population and consume less of the Earth’s resources. Although the birthrate is declining, we are still adding 1,000,000 people every four-and-a-half days. A lot of people may die if we don’t reverse these trends right away, but humanity will continue to live if enough of us take steps to live in balance with nature, not in opposition to it.
- “Law of Attraction” guides us to focus on what we want, rather than what we don’t want.
Esther Hicks is an inspirational speaker and author. She co-authored eight books with her husband, Jerry Hicks. Together, they have presented Law of Attraction workshops in up to 60 cities per year since 1987. These are a few of the core beliefs that I have found most helpful:
- Individuals are physical extensions of the non-physical.
- The purpose of life is joy.
- People are creators; they create with their thoughts.
- Whatever people can imagine totally and completely, by creating a perfect
vibrational match, is theirs to be, or do, or have.
- Life is not meant to be a struggle, but a process of allowing.
Although my 1993 vision focused on the demise of a dysfunction system (the Ship of Civilization) and the emergence of a more sustainable and joyful one (the inter-connected Boats of Life), we tend to focus more on what is going under than on what is emerging.
- Neuroscience shows that our brains are “Velcro for the bad,” but “Teflon for the good.”
In his book Hardwiring Happiness: The New Brain Science of Contentment, Calm, and Confidence neuropsychologist Rick Hanson says, “Your brain was wired in such a way when it evolved, it was primed to learn quickly from bad experiences but not so much from the good ones.” It’s why traumatic memories so often stick in our brains, while positive memories seem to slip away. “It’s an ancient survival mechanism that turned the brain into Velcro for the negative, but Teflon for the positive,” Hanson concludes.
Hanson offers a simple, yet powerful, four step process for unhooking our mind from focusing on the negative (such as the sinking Ship of Civilization) and deepening our connection to the positive (the inter-connected Boats of Life).
- Why the world’s largest social movement for good has been largely invisible.
Paul Hawken is an environmentalist, entrepreneur, and author. His work includes starting ecological businesses, writing about the impact of commerce on living systems, and consulting with heads of state and CEOs on economic development, industrial ecology, and environmental policy. After travelling the world connecting with thousands of individuals and organizations devoted to healing our relationship to the Earth, he made a startling discovery.
Rather than being a small group of “fringe environmentalists,” this was a dominant movement that was changing the world. In 2007 Blessed Unrest: How the Largest Movement in the World Came into Being and Why No One Saw it Coming was published. “I now believe there are over one—and maybe even two—million organizations working toward ecological sustainability and social justice.” This movement has grown even larger since 2007.
So, why have so few people heard about it? One reason is that our corporate-controlled media don’t want to tell us about it. Another is the nature of the movement itself. “This movement,” says Hawken, “doesn’t fit the standard model. It is dispersed, inchoate, and fiercely independent.” This movement is not driven by a particular issue of injustice. It is driven by the most engaging issue the world has ever faced. “The planet,” says Hawken, “has a life-threatening disease, marked by massive ecological degradation and rapid climate change.”
But as Bob Dylan sang: The Times They Are a Changin’.
- Here’s how you can join the biggest and best movement the world has ever known.
The philosopher Sam Keen says, “The radical vision of the future rests on the belief that the logic that determines either our survival or our destruction is simple:
- The new human vocation is to heal the Earth.
- We can only heal what we love.
- We can only love what we know.
- We can only know what we touch.”
Here are a few of the organizations I feel are effectively addressing Keen’s vision:
- Wiser Earth: Founded by Paul Hawken, WiserEarth serves the people who are transforming the world.
“We do two things: we describe pathways of change in books and research reports, and we create tools for connecting the individuals, information, and organizations that create change.”
- Ecology Action/Grow Biotensive: Founded by John Jeavons, “Our mission is to train people worldwide to better feed themselves while conserving resources.”
“Since 1972 we and our colleagues have been researching and developing GROW BIOINTENSIVE®, a high-yielding, sustainable agricultural system that emphasizes local food production and is based historically on intensive gardening systems.”
- Peak Prosperity: Founded by Chris Martenson, author of the Crash Course, Peak Prosperity offers specific tools for helping people move from denial to awareness, understanding, and developing creative solutions.
- TransitionUS: Founded by Rob Hopkins, The Transition Movement is a vibrant, grassroots movement that seeks to build community resilience in the face of such challenges as peak oil, climate change and the economic crisis.
TransitionUS is part of a world-wide movement whose role is to inspire, encourage, connect, support and train communities as they self-organize around the Transition model, creating initiatives that rebuild resilience and reduce CO2 emissions.
- XPrize: Founded by Peter Diamandis, XPrize offers large cash incentive prizes to inventors who can solve grand challenges like space flight, low-cost mobile medical diagnostics, oil spill cleanup, and other large social issues that humans need to address and solve.
So, my friends, if you become discouraged about the state of the world you are not alone. I often get discouraged myself. But then I reconnect with people who are addressing these issues and finding creative new solutions for a better world and my enthusiasm and optimism returns. When your Independence Day arrives there will be a lot of people ready to welcome you aboard. What organizations do you feel are most effective in helping humans heal our relationship with the Earth?
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–Photo: roonster/Flickr
The problem is, unfortunately however, going to just keep getting worse since it’s the most highly educated, inventive, intellectual, and innovate peoples who are choosing to not have kids. So as they have fewer and fewer kids, less new and better technology will be forth coming, fewer and fewer innovations. As the West begins it’s decline following the path of the marching morons, the 3rd world will overpopulate the other beyond its carrying capacity. A lot of this wouldn’t be an issue if we would stop subsidizing failed cultures in 3rd world countries with food, military, and medical aid. And… Read more »
Man, actually there are good reasons to care about what’s going on in Africa, because if impacts the lives of our own children and grandchildren. Fortunately, people all over the world are paying attention to the reality that all social problems can be improved, including making a living and having enough food and water to grow food, if population begins to decline.
Love it!
Also, I would like to mention a preeminent environmentalist and author of many books on the critical issues around ecology, population, social transformation. Derrick Jensen (www.derrickjensen.org) cuts through all of the superficial mainstream analysis and ‘solutions’ offered and dares to call it as he sees it. It’s unspeakably bad. Equally prophetic is Guy MacPherson (www.naturebatslast.com) who travels around the world speaking to people about core issues that can only be addressed collectively, radically and immediately to avoid not only destroying humanity, but the fragile ecosystems of the earth. Let’s face it – humanity and civilization may not be worth saving,… Read more »
Joy,
Thanks. Good additions to my list.
Unfortunately, Wiser Earth is no longer. It became wiser.org, which now only offers archived site info and partner links. 🙁
Joy,
Too bad. Thanks for the update. The other organizations, as far as I know, are still going strong.
Thanks Jed. This is very inspiring.