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There are many different ways to deal with naysayers. You can let them have their say, and then offer your viewpoint and leave it at that. Sometimes you can avoid them entirely, but that isn’t always the case. Oftentimes just ignoring them and getting on with your work is your best bet.

Sometimes the naysayer is your very own self, impeding the good works of others; there are ways to deal with that also and I’ll get to that in a bit.

Avoidance: With this blog and my book, I avoid naysayers simply by not having them as the target audience. This blog is designed to provide resources to people who believe we are in an ecological emergency, and believe in the power of personal action to make a difference. It doesn’t set out to provoke or convince people who don’t share that belief.

Ignore, or Speak Up: On social media, I most often just ignore people who think that some effort I’m involved in is stupid, naive, not enough, or whatever. There are simply not enough hours in the day. But sometimes I will speak up to share an alternative viewpoint. I try to just do this once and then back off, rather than engage in multiple go-rounds in an effort to persuade someone or have the last word.

When the Naysayer is Me: Sometimes I’ve gotten involved with some well-intentioned project, and realized I didn’t agree with the direction it was taking, or the methods being used. In a couple of those cases, when I realized I was the fly in the ointment, I gently withdrew my participation and got out of the way. The projects ended up being successful. And the groups didn’t have to contend with the friction of having a lukewarm or outright rebellious member in their midst. I was happy to end up being a naysayer who turned out to be wrong.

I have more to share on this subject but will leave you with this for now.

Can you think of any situations in your life where any of the above might apply?

At my church (Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Ormond Beach, FL, USA), we have had some sort of composting program in place for awhile now. It sort of ebbs and flows depending on various factors (such as how many of the more green-minded members are in town — we have a significant percentage of “snowbirds” in our congregation).

One problem we run into is lack of understanding about the benefits of composting. Another is the perception that the compost container smells and attracts bugs (which it doesn’t; if anything, throwing food scraps and partially consumed cups of beverages into the open kitchen trash can attracts bugs).

Although not all of our members support the composting program or even know we do it, we have found ways to keep the program going. Right now it seems to be on the upswing. In fact, some members ask us to save the coffee grounds for them to take home for their gardens.

But not everyone loves the compost. Some people are absolutely convinced it’s dirty and attracts bugs.

To address the naysaying component, one of the more longtime members, who is very green-minded, suggested I write a short article in our newsletter to increase awareness and understanding. I was asked to keep it short. Here’s what I submitted; feel free to take what I wrote and adapt it to your church or other organization.

(Note: I apologize for the weird large font size below; I am trying but have so far been unable to figure out how to fix it. I may have to just retype it manually but I would really like to know once and for all how to manage font size because it is an ongoing problem with this blog, especially with text that has been cut and pasted from emails, articles, etc. I try “rinsing” it through text apps but nothing seems to help get rid of extraneous formatting that creeps in. OK, right now this ugly giant-sized mutant font is just bugging the crap out of me so I’m just gonna bite the bullet and retype it for you. Curse my techno-stupid brain but at least I can type! Just one example of how, when technology gets too fancy for our own good, good old-fashioned elbow-grease often saves the day. Update: I think I just figured out a robust “rinse” to get rid of that persistent pesky hidden formatting that wreaks havoc on my blog type sizes: Copy the text I want from an article, etc., and paste it into a phone text message to myself. Copy it from there and paste it into WordPress blog post. I tested it and it seems to work!)

Composting at Our UU: Small Simple Action Makes a Big Difference

You may have notice a small green box in the kitchen next to the recycling bin. That’s a compost collection box. We use it to collect our food scraps and other compostable items, and carry them to the compost bin in the garden. As this organic matter decomposes, rich soil is produced.

By composting, we embody UU values in several ways:

Care for the environment: Radically reduce the volume of trash we send to landfill.

Honor the interconnectedness of all life: Composting feeds the soil microorganisms, on which all life depends.

Respect our fellow human beings: By eliminating food scraps and other compostables, we reduce the weight of our UU kitchen trash by 50% or more. And the trash is much less messy to deal with.

The compost collection box has a snug-fitting lid; it does not smell or attract bugs. The kitchen staff handles composting. You can support our efforts by not putting liquids or food scraps into the trash.

To learn more about composting and its many benefits, ask Jenny or another green team member.

“… [W]e can expect the status quo of consume-and-pollute to continue on for some time. Most likely it will be pursued until it simply proves too painful than the remaining alternatives. By which time our other options are likely to be materially worse than they are today. That’s the bad news.

“The good news is that conscientious, critically-thinking individuals like you can choose to get busy living.

“There is much you can do during this time lag to invest in resilience and install regenerative models before the next systemic crisis is upon us.

“Whatever time we have left, and it may very not be much, is a gift. Use it.

“Many of the best defenses — like fitness, community, and valuable skills — require time to acquire. You can’t simply buy them off the shelf the way you can, say, a water filter or a backup generator. Once time has run out, you either already have them in place or you don’t.”

— From “Living On Borrowed Time,” by Adam Taggart in PeakProsperity.com

Also check out TransitionASAP.org, a website dedicated to spreading the grassroots resilience movement known as Transition; Transition Towns. On this page of their site you can download two adorable, practical, and uplifting mini-zines that explain “Transition in a Nutshell.” One of the zines is titled Transition Towns: Working for Smaller Footprints and Stronger Communities; the other is Habits of the Heart: A Primer for Embracing Lifestyle Practices.

Stay tuned for more posts on resilience. It’s a big topic!

Greetings & Salutations DEEP GREEN troops! My “Green Daytona” radio show tomorrow will be focused on a hot topic: RESILIENCE. Tune in from noon to 1 EST on WJOY 106.3 FM Daytona Beach, or via Facebook Live on the City of Daytona Beach Government Facebook page.

Resilience: What does it mean for governments and the public? On this week’s Daytona Beach Radio program, tune in to hear about how Florida and regional leadership are preparing the state for the environmental, physical and social impacts of sea level rise and other manifestations of climate change. You’ll also hear about grassroots initiatives, and get some tips on how you can boost your own resilience at the household and neighborhood level. #CityDaytonaBeach.

Update: In case you missed it in realtime, here is the Facebook Live recording.

Further Reading:

Climate Change: How Lucky Do You Feel? (article in Reason.com)

You’ve probably heard the expression “peddling influence” … Well, I just heard a happy story from a friend of mine who pedals influence.

My friend Ms. S., age in her late 60s (guesstimate), is a gardener and grandmother who rides her bicycle to the Y five days a week for yoga and other activities.

We had a mini “visit” by text today. After catching me up on the latest with her sons and new grandbaby, she continued:

“… can’t help mentally shaking my head as I pedal past <local middle school> – especially on a chilly day where car after car idle with parents bringing their kiddos to school…and almost all in the car have their heads bowed to their cellphones…and here I go bundled up with my yoga mat in the back basket whizzing past standing traffic breathing fresh crisp air and lavishing the sun on my face.”

I responded, “You are setting a wonderful, beautiful example! So perfect that your route takes you past the school … you never know who you might influence!”

To which she replied: “Actually had not thought about planting seeds as I pedal..going to start throwing those thoughts out…with smiles…as I pedal…oops…time to don my helmet and go about my mission.”

And then a little later:

“Kids were already in school but as I was pedaling on the sidewalk one car stopped and waited a good while before turning into the entrance so I could go on by…rolled down her window to call out Merry Christmas 😊👏😊 We have so much power in our thoughts!”

Yes indeed we do. Our thoughts and our actions are contagious! For better or for worse! Keep on “pedaling” that influence! Whether your pedal is an actual pedal, or a microphone, or a keyboard, or a shovel, or …

Small but mighty green actions made our neighborhood watch group’s holiday party even more fun than it already would have been.

– We composted our food scraps. (Simple: I brought one of my 5-gallon plastic buckets and we used it to collect food scraps, which I took home and added to my compost.)

– We used reusable dishes, cups, and utensils; and cloth napkins. (Have been doing that for a while now. We have a set which one of the members keeps at her house.)

– The same member also generously takes care of washing the dishes and napkins. Since her whole house is powered by solar panels, that’s a green bonus.

– When someone mentioned decorations, and talked about going to the dollar mart for plastic tablecloths (the kind that generally don’t last beyond one use), I instead offered to bring Christmasy fabrics (from my huge collection of fabric scraps people hand down to me), and sprigs from my cedar tree. We arranged the fabric and greenery into mounds in the center of the table and added sparkly bells, mini drums, and other shiny/sparkly decorations (which were bought from the dollar mart but are reusable).

– The greenery got added to my compost collection bucket at the end of the night, and made a nice cover layer for the compost bin at home.

– We have banished bottled water. Instead, we offer a water cooler for people to fill those reusable cups from.

All of these actions are modest in themselves but they add up. Actually, they multiply, because at least a few of the couple dozen people at the party who were exposed to our “green practices” might try it themselves sometime. We made it look simple and fun (because it was). People like and copy things that are simple and fun.

Also, with reusables and “real stuff” (such as actual plant material) there’s an element of respect and reverence that people surely picked up on. Single-use plastics, styrofoam, etc., have become so ubiquitous that I don’t think we’re always conscious of how much they degrade the vibe of a mealtime or other event.

Every little thing you do has a potentially very big impact. Who knows? Maybe someone at your party will try this in their own home. Maybe they’ll make it a regular thing. Maybe someone will even be influenced to go on and start a green local business, like a mobile dishwashing trailer or a compost collection service (shout-out to O-Town Compost* here in my home state). And it all keeps multiplying out from there.

*Special note about O-town Compost, based in Orlando: They (actually it’s one guy, Charlie) handled the compost collection at the Florida Permaculture Convergence this past weekend. Now THAT was a high-volume job! A gathering of about 100 people chowing down all weekend on fresh organic produce, with all the professional dedication a conference of permaculturists can muster (which is a lot)!

Further Reading:

Article from Shareable, on how to start a community “party pack” of reusable dishes, cups, silverware, napkins.

Behold my new “kitchen counter area” (lower right quadrant of photos). I slapped it together yesterday from stuff I had lying around the house.

A concept I really find useful in minimizing my eco footprint, getting good stuff done in the world, and making life all-around more enjoyable is “Minimum Viable Product.” I first heard this term in the startup-business community, especially in software development. It means what it sounds like. Basically, rather than endlessly tweak your software or other product in pursuit of perfection (and years later it’s still not out the door), you put together the minimum possible version that will work for your customers. Now, this is not license to put out half-baked work; hence the use of the word viable.

There’s a wide no-man’s-land between viable and perfect. Better to get a viable product right out the door, then continuously improve it over time, than to hold your work back from people who need it right now (or yesterday).

In my own life, one arena where I use MVP often is in the design of my home environment. The other day I had an area of my kitchen nicely vacated by the removal of a monster stove. The stove came with the house but it was much too large for the space and for my needs. Now it’s in the home of a family who just moved to the area and needed a stove.

The removal of the stove gave me space to create a counter with storage underneath. Rather than wait for the curbside goddess of free furniture, I took an extra door that I happened to have (came with the house), laid it on its side on top of milk crates, tacked on a piece of fabric from my collection of scraps, and voilà!

The buckets for trash, recycling, and compost fit neatly underneath the counter, hidden from view by the fabric. Actually, I quickly found that I like to have the compost accessible at all times without having to bend down and bring it out from behind the curtain, so I am keeping it next to the sink (photo 2).

I am happy with my new counter. Minimum Viable Product! I didn’t even worry about hemming the fabric. This is a work in progress. (I find that allowing works-in-progress brings an element of fun and creativity to daily life.)

Speaking of fabric, I once read a great article about an artsy woman in NYC who’d edit her clothing over the course of her day. She’d start out wearing a long-sleeved sweater (that she’d gotten for $2 from a thrift shop or something), then, as she was bicycling around to her work and errands, she’d decide she wanted short sleeves so she’d cut the sleeves off. Or maybe make it a midriff. And continue on about her day. Minimum Viable Product, constantly evolving!

This blog post is, itself, a Minimum Viable Product. I woke up knowing I wanted to give you a post. But I’m busy getting ready for a talk, a conference, my neighborhood holiday party, and a radio show. So I knew I couldn’t allow myself to spend time fussing over the post.

Over time, I may circle back and add back-story, links for further reading, and so on. In the meantime, hope you enjoy this post and your day!