Category: low-footprint living

Being frugal gets a bad rap. But it’s a major tool for abundant living, especially in economically tough times like this. And it’s one of the most overlooked tools for what I call broad-spectrum resistance. Basically buying as little of pretty much anything, in every category, as we can possibly get away with.

As I posted earlier on my deep green Facebook page: Voluntary frugality (by those of us who have the leeway to practice it) is a form of broad-spectrum resistance. It frees up resources that we can then share with others who are not getting their basic needs met.

My friend, fellow Floridian, and permie colleague Laura Oldanie / Rich Resilient Living has a delightful newsletter and YouTube channel filled with advice about frugality, simple living, and non-intimidating on-ramps to build community.

Here’s one of her new videos. Being frugal is cooler than you think!

https://youtu.be/6MPijISEoac?si=FY3mwazMVULq80ia

As an activist tasked with communicating in a way that motivates people, I constantly need to keep finding ways to step it up.

Big Problem, I’m learning, is that people (mainly talking about my fellow white boomers) are in an emotional panic state about the state of the planet etc. They (we) KNOW but they (we) can’t stay present to it. Consumerism is one escape hatch that provides some temporary, superficial pain relief.

So I have to learn how to navigate that, in such a manner that offers “my people” a more resilient form of pain management, and motivates them to be willing to stay present and then actually take meaningful action.

In Permaculture design, one of the design principles as Holmgren frames them is “Apply self-regulation and accept feedback.” Unfortunately in industrial capitalism we have lost access to immediate feedback; the damage we do is largely invisible to us. We kind of have to be willing to drop down to a more basic level and voluntarily re-expose ourselves to feedback that we haven’t had to worry about for a long time, if ever in our lifetimes.

A simple way to start this or even just try it out for a minute is try a task with hand tools that you would usually use power tools for.

Or try doing without automated irrigation for a week. Don’t even allow yourself to use a hose. Carry the water by hand. To each plant. This is what I mean by we are not very exposed to feedback loops in our every day industrial life.

A funny thing happens when we get a level of prosperity that’s very much beyond just our basic needs. It seems like there’s some kind of point of diminishing returns beyond which we don’t become more grateful and appreciative; we just become more and more entitled and fragile. So if something is taken away, or even threatening to be taken away, we emotionally melt down.

Hence people just not wanting to think about climate impacts of the “comfortably-off middle-class” lifestyle. What used to be considered cushy has become the baseline of subsistence, and people’s perception, so people get really cranky when anyone suggests that this really is not sustainable.

Therefore one of my self-appointed tasks is to show how abundantly it’s possible to live, while ratcheting down one’s lifestyle to significantly below the comfortably-well-off middle-class level.

Now, be warned: If you choose to adopt a ratchet-down lifestyle, even in just a couple ways that seem innocuous — like getting around by bicycle (for transportation not just recreation), or not having your own washer and dryer in your house, or not using air conditioning – be prepared to be ostracized by people in your circles, especially if your work brings you into contact (even in a very tangential way) with any mainstream middle-class-type circles.

Right now I’m going to take the bicycle as an example because it’s something really visible and obvious that seems to stand out to people. (It may not stand out to people as much if you happen to live in a more urbanized area where people don’t insist on seeing cycling for transport as some sort of bizarre fringe hobby.)

Be prepared to be treated like you’re doing something dangerous that people need to rescue you from. Be prepared to constantly be offered rides, as if you don’t have a legitimate form of transportation. And if you try calling people on this, be prepared to be thought of as rude or mean for not appreciating their kindness.

Be prepared, if you meet someone who met you years ago, and you happen to run across them again, to have the first thing the person asks be, “Are you still riding your bicycle?”

This can mean anything from “Don’t you have a car yet, loser?”, to “I’m going to punish you for making me feel guilty” (umm, I totally wasn’t trying to do that — I actually feel sorry for you because you’re stuck behind the glass of a giant rolling coffin, that furthermore breaks down and costs you $1600 repair every time you turn around). Or some other thing to which there is just no right answer.

(VERY important note! Sometimes it can really be a pure-hearted question, like maybe you met this sweet person years ago when you were both at an eco venue or event, and the person is genuinely interested and wants to share updates, or they just enjoyed meeting you all those years ago and they’re happy to see you again. I have a terrible memory. So I have to be careful and stay curious and open as opposed to going into snarky mode. I really don’t aspire to be a cranky sourpuss, except maybe as a deliberate comical persona for effect.)

Another thing it often means it is, “I’m going to take it out of your hide for making me worry about you.” Hello? No one makes anyone worry about anyone. I’m worried about you for being stuck in your coffin on wheels but I don’t try to force you to get out in the fresh air and walk or ride your bicycle with me.

After all these years I haven’t thought of very many good answers. Sometimes if I’m feeling really cheeky I’ll look at a fellow boomer and ask, are you still driving, period. A friend of mine (a fellow Boomer) felt that that rejoinder would be incredibly rude.

Me, I’m just a believer in life-stage planning, what can I say. And I do not consider driving a private automobile everywhere forever to be a good plan, either for our own old age or for the planet.

Sometimes when people cry out at me that walking and bicycling is dangerous, I’ll tell them “OK, if you think it’s dangerous, please lobby our public officials for more public transportation routes and extended hours. Because I’m already busy doing that and I could use some extra voices. Or, please feel free to walk or bicycle with me and then I can show you that it’s not dangerous – Or less dangerous than car.”

For taking up bandwidth with this dialogue, (instead of being on-point with responses), I get really mad at myself. It’s on me, as an educator and activist, to get better at it, and I am going to keep trying.

I think people also like to portray things as really hard or eccentric so they won’t have to do them. Composting is another example of a thing that comes up. My attitude is and has always been, Do what works for you, and there are lots of different ways to have a simplified lifestyle.

But to you, dear reader, right now, I’m just saying be prepared to endure some nonsense. Be prepared for people to use you either as a verbal punching bag (either obvious; or secret as in pretending to “admire” you or be “inspired” by you when actually they pretty much want to bite your face off).

You should also be prepared for people to see you as some sort of walking “Eco hail Mary,” who can somehow absolve them of their Eco “sins” by osmosis. Like just by giving a speech or something, or even just being in their presence. (This is one major reason why I have pretty much stopped giving speeches.)

(I may resume public talks at some point once I troubleshoot a few things; or it may not make sense for me to resume. There’s too much pushback against me insisting on it being outdoors (if local), or by zoom (if further away than walking distance). I’m not willing to entertain compromise on that. People are probably just going to keep thinking I’m being weird or difficult, until I get better at communicating why my position is what it is on this. Oh well! I don’t need any one person or group’s money badly enough to risk my health or set a bad example.)

And even though I’m saying be prepared for pushback and sugarcoated hostility, you will totally know, if you don’t already, that it is absolutely 100% worth it despite all the nonsense and pushback from people.

Which is crazy, because they’re the ones missing out on vastly expanded peace and freedom, right?

Sometimes I have to avoid being really obvious about the fact that I feel sorry for people who are stuck in the mainstream lifestyle. Pity is not an effective way to get people excited about a simpler slower sweeter lifestyle.

When I say stuck in the mainstream lifestyle, I’m not talking about people wanting treats or luxuries. I like my treats and luxuries too. I’m talking about people feeling trapped as in not feeling able to do without certain expensive and laborious things, as in “this is a baseline necessary basic need.”

I love how Sarah Wilson points out in her essay, linked below, that getting a dishwasher just ends up causing people to wash more dishes. It’s a variation on Jevon’s paradox.

Fortunately I’m not the only one out there showcasing a ratcheted-down lifestyle. Others, with far more followers — and far more polished content and presentation — than I, are out there! Two of my top recommendations are Laura Oldanie (Rich Resilient Living); and Sarah Wilson. I’ll post some links to some of my favorite content of theirs below.

I want to show you something pretty that might seem off-topic but it’s actually very much on this topic. This is a post I saw about micro libraries in Indonesia. They are delightful open-air spaces, roofed but open air. You can easily look up how hot and humid Indonesia is if you don’t know already. And yet, smart passive cooling techniques make these spaces very comfortable. And a culture of sharing as opposed to entitlement keeps the spaces safe and neat. I love how they used discarded ice cream buckets to build a translucent wall on one library. Beautiful upcycle.

Further exploration:

• Here is the Indonesia article with photographs. Indonesia’s stunning micro libraries draw young readers — in pictures; the guardian.com. (Photos by Mohammad Fadli and others; text by Joan Aurelia.)

• “Sufficiency” as a way of living a life; Sarah Wilson (Substack and email newsletter).

• “Stop idolizing billionaires: How being frugal is cooler than you think” (Laura Oldanie on YouTube). She also has an email newsletter, and website Rich Resilient Living.

My thoughts in response to one of the memes going around, saying we should plant fruit trees in public spaces. In this meme, it gave a popular objection, “But what if people steal the fruit?” And the meme rejoinder was, “Why should taking fruit off a public tree be stealing?”

My thoughts:

Yes and we need to not accept the thought-terminating clichés like “but rats” and “but liability” lol.

Regarding rats, anyone who has ever lived in a city knows that rats survive and thrive everywhere whether or not there are any fruit trees.

And the biggest “LIABILITY” is OURSELVES being undernourished, broke, and pharmaceutically dependent. And overheated and flooded because of not enough trees and shade.

The powers-that-be (with just a few exceptions) don’t care (they actually have many incentives for not caring), WE the ordinary people are the ones who have to care and make it happen. <long row of fruit and veggie emoticons>

And:

And while we’re at it, we need public restrooms and benches everywhere. And we need to not accept the thought-terminating clichés like “but homeless people will use them.” (Yeah, and ????)

I’m not trying to be selfish but I’m in my 60s, and even though I’m in pretty good shape for a person in her 60s, I still really need to go to the bathroom, and take a sit down break on a bench, more than I used to when I was young and skinny lol.

I am obviously not the only old person in Volusia county, none of us are getting any younger! We need shade, benches, public restrooms, and yes plenty of fruits and vegetables and medicine growing everywhere.

And (in response to a friend who commented that it’s government ptb, as opposed to public attitude, that is driving the “liability” response):

In [my country,] the USA, “liability” is used as a thought-terminating cliché by BOTH everyday citizens and public officials. Government attitude and everyday public attitude often overlap on this topic.

Granted, it may be that the citizens parroting this are just parroting the public official line in order to terminate discussions. And their underlying motive might be more NIMBY.

Re liability — Cities have legal departments for this kind of thing. My city included. If a city’s insurance company or whatever is threatening something, then we have to push back against it.

There is also a NIMBY component that citizens have. Can’t have that in my neighborhood etc. Don’t want that it will bring down property values etc.

And [friend commenting] or anyone reading this, feel free to share if your city has found some helpful responses and solutions that have helped overcome the knee-jerk “liability” response. My intuition tells me that the cities that have overcome it are simply the ones who have stood their MORAL ground. Moral ground is powerful in helping people and orgs push through legal/financial fears.

Moral ground also powerful and pushing through NIMBYism. It may be the only thing that gets through the dense defensive barrier of fear regarding property values, the presence of “strangers” and “the other,” etc.

BTW anyone reading this, if you notice yourself harboring a lot of fear about strangers, the other, etc., I highly recommend doing shadow work! And especially recommend it in the context of decolonization and anti-racism study & practice.

Neighbors don’t have to be friends.

This might sound strange coming from someone who is constantly talking about the power of community. The importance of knowing one’s neighbors.

But, cordial working neighborly relations are not the same thing as friendship.

Now, if you happen to meet someone in your neighborhood who turns out to be a friend, that’s an extra bonus. But it’s not necessary.

Knowing each other’s faces, passing the time of day, having each other’s backs isn’t the same as friendship.

I’m saying this because sometimes people’s feelings can get hurt if a neighbor turns out to not want to be a social friend.

Also saying this because we have become so unused to living in real community — largely because prosperity has allowed us to buy ourselves out of it — That our expectations have become unrealistic.

So when people talk about forming an eco village or whatever they get all these romantic expectations of a bunch of people who are best buddies and on the exact same wavelength.

I’m not a very big believer in forming new “intentional communities.” It’s great if it works out but often it doesn’t. I am more a believer in working with where we are. It’s a lot easier and less resource intensive.

Sometimes in a neighborhood there can be sort of a mismatch between people who just want the practical aspects, and people who think they want to be a social friend with this or that neighbor. But that’s life. It happened in school; it happens in activism; and yes it happens in neighborhoods.

People aren’t always gonna want to hang out with you socially. And that’s not only OK; it doesn’t even have to be lonely. Working with neighbors on projects of common concern goes a long way.

One example in my neighborhood right now is us working together on trap neuter release of the feral cats.

Also, existing in reciprocity goes a long way. Someone who might not socialize with you, or who you might not want to socialize with, can still help you with tasks and you help them with a task in return.

And, block parties are an option! Socializing with people you might only socialize with at the block party.

I have been very fortunate to have some close friends in each neighborhood where I have lived. But I don’t take it for granted that that will always be the case.

And I think we sometimes forget that there is a continuum from stranger to acquaintance to friend to close friend. And that continuum can be very very gradual and lengthy in time. It can even spiral or seem to go backwards but that doesn’t have to be a negative thing.

Enjoy your neighbors! It’s actually kind of a cool, low-pressure relationship in a lot of ways. Some of my neighbors, most of our relationship consists of saying hi in passing when they’re out walking their dogs, or they pass by my yard and ask questions about plants.

It’s a whole net we are weaving when we build community. And to expect it to consist entirely of close friendship is unrealistic, and anyway that would be a monoculture. As we learn in Permaculture class, monocultures are not resilient or healthy. Whether on the physical landscape, or in the realm of invisible structures.

A fellow eco activist (who is known for her deep scientific expertise as well as her public service in our county and bioregion) shared this article on her page. (She shared it on her personal page, and it was only shared with friends, so I’m just posting the gist of her comment.)

The article, by Dinah Pulver in USA today, reports that we are seeing record highs in carbon dioxide emissions. “For the first time, the May average exceeded 430 parts per million, reported scientists from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Mauna Loa Observatory and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego.”

And in response to this news, my friend posted, in a nutshell: How do we deal with the reality of increasingly extreme weather? Rather than finger-pointing, how do our communities adapt; and also, what state & local policy changes do we need?

In addition to being a matter for policy change, and for community adaptation, it will also need to be a matter of behavioral economics. And emotional processing; emotional regulation.

How do we go about de de-normalizing, de-popularizing the robber-baron lifestyle that is trashing and overheating the planet? And I’m not talking about billionaires here. I’m talking about the basic, mainstream, “comfortably off” middle-class USA lifestyle.

We may be beyond the ability to reverse things, if we ever were able. But recent years have shown that things can at the very least be slowed down more radically than expected. I’m talking about the environmental improvements we saw during the Covid shutdowns, when transportation (especially air travel + private automobile driving) and manufacturing were radically curtailed.

The middle-class lifestyle as we currently practice it is not sustainable, plainly put.

But social norms of what is “desirable” and “respectable” and “admirable” are very deeply rooted, so changing them involves a bit of effort. Madison Avenue + corporations have been able to make rapacious consumerism very very attractive, much against people & planet’s interest.

So how do we make non-consumerism, and the concept of “enough,” more attractive to a wider segment of the population?

We are going up against so many unprocessed emotions. It’s not hopeless though.

That’s one of what I consider my main self-appointed tasks as a sustainability educator. To get people to see the joy in backing down from the frenetic consumerist rush rush lifestyle. Even fellow environmentalists get caught up in this toxic lifestyle.

One of the things we have to show people is that we can live an extremely comfortable life at a much lower footprint then we are doing now. That’s what I’ve been trying to do for a while, and many others are out there showing it as well.

BTW the above-cited article’s author, Dinah Pulver, used to be the environmental writer for our local paper but is now an environment/climate researcher and writer on the national level.

PS. No, carbon dioxide is not the only index of planetary health. The other main greenhouse gases are nitrous oxide and methane. But it does serve as a fairly practical serviceable yardstick.

In recent times I have unlocked a whole new level of lazy. I always say if something is both lazy and good for the planet, you’ve got a DEEP GREEN win!

What sparked this post: Recently going for my morning dips in the ocean and never having to change out of my swim clothes because I stay outdoors and have coffee on my little garden bench and then do landscaping tasks and then before I know it suddenly my shorts + top that I went swimming in are dry and don’t have to be changed!

#ofrabjousday #slacktivistlife

PS. Later: A friend posted on her personal page about her yard being a workout.

That can be a good thing, wholesome exercise and being outdoors and meeting one’s neighbors and having fun gardening.

But if it ever becomes tiresome drudge instead of a good thing, one can take it as a sign to choose to back off and let nature manage a bigger part of the yard.

And If the immediate thing that comes to your mind is, “but then I’ll get in trouble with code enforcement or my HOA,” then you’ve got your logical next front for activity.

A logical next front for activity in this case would be trying to influence the HOA and your local government, as opposed to wearing yourself out trying to beat back vegetation.

Or, perhaps one of the other members of your household might be willing to help with the yard. Or, perhaps a neighbor might be willing. Trading skills and labor.

Got any “green + lazy” wins? If so, please share them rampantly, on your pages and on my public page. Every share helps shift the norms in a more slackerly joyful direction. I like to think that Mother Earth is cheering us on!

I made this Facebook post about a company called City Bonfires for multiple reasons!

— One, great example of being economically resilient as the old-economy livelihoods vanish. (They started this company after losing their jobs during the pandemic shutdowns.) “When we lost our jobs during the COVID pandemic, we spent a lot of time at home outside with our kids. We realized that we were spending more time keeping our kids away from the fire pit, instead of enjoying it. So, we invented City Bonfires, the world’s first mini portable fire pits that are safer and easy to light and extinguish!”

(Special note for my fellow elders, please stop steering your kids & grandkids into old-economy livelihoods that are supposedly “safe” — and instead start supporting them in their pursuit of meaningful, resilient, transformative livelihoods. Which are probably their best chance not only of happiness and fulfillment, but of mere survival on this planet as we have made things worse and worse for them.)

— Two, great example of promoting outdoor time, family time, community bonding. Every moment we spend outdoors is an opportunity for quality family time, community-building time. This has a safety and security component as well as the enjoyment aspect.

— Three, modeling cozy contentment and simple pleasures.

— Four, I want to remember this page because some of my geographically distant loved ones might need some cute gifts from me

I’ve been mentioning on my blog for a while the concept of a candle as a portable mini urban campfire. Totally love this!

Here is their website. https://citybonfires.com/pages/about-city-bonfires