Category Archives: Culture and Consciousness

Picture Earth Right Now

I was reminded of this 1946 photograph of Earth, the first photo from beyond the atmosphere when I curated one of the latest views of Earth, a NASA Goddard visualization entitled, One Year on Earth as Seen from 1 Million Miles, (2:46) noting how far we’ve come from that grainy black and white photograph taken nearly 70 years ago to the breathtaking visualizations of today.

We are getting to know more about our Mother Earth from “out there” and heart hopefully it translates to a better understanding and love “in here” nothing short of a change in consciousness, a move from head to heart guided by the Laws of Nature.

There are many such visualizations on the NASA Goddard YouTube channel and I have curated those I found most interesting and added them to EarthSayers.tv, the Voices of Sustainability including this video, The ‘Voice’ of our Earth. (4 minutes)

“Our Universe Is Not Silent~Although space is a vacuum, this does not mean there is no sound in space. Sound does exist as electromagnetic vibrations. The specially designed instruments on board the Voyager and other probes, picked up and recorded these vibrations, all within the range of human hearing (20-20,000 cycles per second).” – NASA Space Recordings Of Earth, Published on Aug 13, 2011.

The NASA Goddard visualizations also capture changes to our Earth that make it difficult if not impossible to ignore the effects of global warming to include this recent video, Earth’s Long-term Warming Trend, 1880-2015 (30 seconds) which shows temperature changes from 1880 to 2015 as a rolling five-year average. Orange colors represent temperatures that are warmer than the 1951-80 baseline average, and blues represent temperatures cooler than the baseline.

Many of these visualizations are enormously popular on YouTube such as the One Year on Earth video mentioned above with over 1.6M views. The number of views for videos addressing global warming suggest our citizens, unlike some elected officials, are active in the learning cycle. An example is another recent video, NASA Sees Temperatures Rise and Sea Ice Shrink -Climate Trends 2016 (47 seconds) published a week ago with over 68,000 views. This news story is what we should be talking about in all sustainability conversations – even informal talk about the weather one hears over cocktails and around the dinner table if we are to increase awareness and change behaviors.

“Each of the first six months of 2016 set a record as the warmest respective month globally in the modern temperature record, which dates to 1880.” – NASA Goddard

Ruth Ann Barrett, Sustainability Advocate, July 29, 2016, Portland, Oregon.

Inspiring Sustainability Champions

This past month we have called out on EarthSayers.tv, Voices of Sustainability, two sustainability champions. These two indigenous leaders address sustainability, as a concept, in their presentations and are active in sharing their wisdom with us through online video. Their guidance has been invaluable to us.

Robin Kimmerer

Ilarion Merculieff

Today Earth Day, we introduce you to Ilarion (Larry) Merculieff (Aleut), Founder of the Global Center for Indigenous Leadership and Lifeways and Dr. Robin Kimmerer, SUNY distinguished teaching professor and Director, Center for Native Peoples and the Environment.

We trust you will find in their words inspiration and a better understanding of why it is the elders from all four directions of Mother Earth are calling for a “change in consciousness, a move from head to heart guided by the Laws of Nature,” a weave of nature with humankind.

These are but two of their teachings – a place to start.

Going to the Heart of Sustainability, Ilarion (Larry) Merculieff, Kalliopeia Foundation, (1 hour, 26 minutes).

Restoration of Our Relationship to Land, Robin Kimmerer, Ph.D., Center for Humans and Nature, 34 minutes.

Ruth Ann Barrett, Sustainability Advocate, April 22, 2016, Portland, Oregon.

Sustainability: Seeking Balance

If you follow my blog posts you know that I often address the question, What Is Sustainability? For me sustainability is bringing into balance the elements of planet, people, and prosperity with an eye to the future generations beginning with our children. I draw from the the sculpture of Alexander Calder to convey the framework sustainability can provide us as we make decisions in both our personal and professional lives. (Click on image to see it more clearly)

I’ve also started to reference the circular economy championed by Ellen MacArthur and her Foundation because of the off-balance orientation of our economic system that has failed the test of time, not only in its collapse, but in the practice of externalizing costs and risks, resulting in the degradation of Mother Earth and her peoples to a point, possibly, of no return. An economic-centered view is championed by many business leaders at the same time they promote their organization’s sustainability initiatives and programs and talk of a sustainable future.

There are also executives, using the imperial “we” of course, who express a more balanced view such as found in the release of the Wells Fargo & Company’s 2013 Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) report. Here is a quote from the press release by Jon Campbell, executive vice president and head of Government and Community Relations:

“We understand and embrace the important role we play in people’s lives, the environment and the economic health of our communities,” said Jon Campbell, executive vice president and head of Government and Community Relations. “We’re committed to meeting our 2020 CSR goals, and will continually find ways to integrate sustainability practices into all of our business strategies, products, operations and culture to benefit our customers and the communities we serve.”

It’s the perfect note to end on.

The Documentary and Sustainability Awareness

In the last weekend of April I attended the conference, What Is Documentary: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow at the University of Oregon’s Portland campus organized by Gabriela Martinez and Janet Wasko of the School of Journalism and Communication. As noted in a previous blog post, it was an extremely interesting two days and three evenings of presentations and film screenings. Best of all, I had the opportunity to interview the ethnographic filmmaker David MacDougall. The interview is in two parts: David MacDougall on Filmmaking and Children in India: Three Places of Learning.

What is Documentary?

In the interview David reminds us there are two kinds of documentary. Some are made based on pre-existing knowledge and prior research while others are the research process itself, a process using video to discover and explore. He notes with the latter “what you end up doing is a product of what you learned during the making of the film. The process “often shifts you into an entirely different direction so it’s quite open ended.”

David MacDougall

Documentary Takes Money

Organizations that fund research and explorations, foundations in particular, might follow the lead of early adopters such as The Ford Foundation and their initiative, JustFilms. JustFilms “focuses on film, video and digital works that show courageous people confronting difficult issues and actively pursuing a more just, secure and sustainable world.” Initiative funds are distributed through three distinct paths, two of which point to support of both kinds of documentary cited by David. They are:

Research

Collaboration with other Ford Foundation grant-making programs where the introduction of documentary film could help draw attention to an issue or advance a movement, and

Discovery

An ongoing open-application process that will help JustFilms stay attuned to fresh ideas and stories wherever they may emerge.

It’s the open-ended, exploratory process that in the past made funders and investors nervous, to the point of excluding documentaries all together, and yet it is through exploration that we are more likely to discover what is working at the personal and community level to insure a future for the next seven generations. It’s learning from what the filmmaker finds and sees, especially about us. And it’s understanding that such explorations are part of increasing sustainability awareness in the category, culture and consciousness.

The Story of Us

Even environmental advocates Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Julia Butterfly Hill talk about the “us.” Kennedy noted in this interview, “…first of all we are not protecting the environment for the sake of the fishes and birds so much as for our own sake” and Hill in this video identifies the greatest threat being our disconnected consciousness. This does not preclude producing well researched documentaries about Mother Earth, about the birds and the bees, but growing a body of work around people’s behavior that goes beyond headlines and newscasts and is not bound by preconceptions imposed by disciplines and ideologies. David MacDougall’s films are good examples of what I am talking about and you will note in his interview he talks about how the story evolved, taking years, not months, to exploring the emotional and physical lives of children.

The Opportunity

Economist and Pachamama co-founder, John Perkins calls out in this video the prophecy of the Eagle and the Condor, an indigenous prophecy told by first peoples all over the world about a time dominated by an intellectual, masculine, mind-driven consciousness, which is followed by an opportunity for balance between that consciousness to one that is heart-driven, intuitive and feminine. It is a call for a shift in humanity’s relationship to the Earth and our relationship to each other and, according to the prophecy, that time is now.

We need to reconnect with Mother Earth and with one another yet how?

It’s documentary filmmakers, using their skills and experience, who can help show us the way, if we invest in them and their projects that explore “fresh ideas and stories wherever they may emerge.” And in the process bringing to the fore those in relationship with Mother Earth and community so we can learn from them.

Ruth Ann Barrett, Sustainability Advocate, May 6, 2014, Portland, Oregon.

IPCC Ocean Systems and Oceans Advocacy Part II

On Monday, March 31st, I published a blog post on a concept video around OceansAdvocacy, proposing a web-based communications infrastructure to support advocates from all walks of life, but not representing any organizations they might be affiliated with, if they choose to do so. The advocacy landscape is highly fragmented and many organizations, profit and non-profit, are not being successful at meeting their goals due in a large part to under-financing and being over whelmed by the problems brought upon us by global warming and the continued dislocation of entire countries because of war and violence. I think a citizen-rooted network of networks is required if the global village is to be more successful at oceans conservation. I visualized a connected oceans community, based on the Google product’s Maps, Earth, Google+, and YouTube, inspired in part by the recent release of the Global Forest Watch.

To add fuel to my suggestion, this is the final draft of the Ocean Systems, Chapter 6 of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report officially release d on March 31st.

The executive summary begins:
“Ocean ecosystems have responded and will continue to respond to climate changes of different rates,magnitudes,and durations (virtually certain). Human societies depend on marine ecosystem services,which are sensitive to climate change(high confidence),in particular the provisioning of food (fisheries and aquaculture) and other natural resources, nutrient recycling,regulation of global climate(including production of oxygen and removal of atmospheric CO2), protection from extreme weather and climate events, aesthetic, cultural, and supporting services.” [6.3, 6.4, 6.5]

I recommend reading the entire Executive Summary and other chapters of interest to you found here on the IPCC site. As of this morning, nearly 500 citizens have clicked on my 3/31/14 post, distributed through the 3BL Media Network, some viewing the attached concept video, and I am hoping that this update adds to an understanding of why we are at a critical juncture and heed Jimi Hendrik’s advice:Ruth Ann Barrett, Sustainability Advocate, April 2, 2014, Portland, Oregon. Call or email comments and suggestions. (ruthann@earthsayers.tv/415-377-1835)

P.S. There is an IPCC video here, Climate Change: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability by IPCC, in the EarthSayers.tv special (and growing) collection on climate change.

Indigenous Voices of Sustainability – Ecuador Trip

When your videographer colleague announces in March he is going to Ecuador in February you swing into action to get the word out and hopefully raise some money for his trip. This is no vacation, rather with the help of the Pachamama Alliance folks in Ecuador, a dive deep into the interior to interview shaman and get their views on the status of our Mother Earth.

Barry Heidt left on February 2, 2013 and will be returning with the voices of these indigenous leaders of sustainability in late February. The exposure by Barry to the Global Alliance and the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth coupled with his experience from Awakening the Dreamer, the Pachamama Alliance’s symposium series and his most recent work with Sustainability Action Media (SAM) inspires his journey to Ecuador.

The personal history behind this trip started with Barry’s participation in an Awakening the Dreamer workshop. Later, at the Bioneers 2010 Conference Barry documented the panel on the Rights of Nature at which Mari Margil, an associate director of CELDF announced the launch of The Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature and formally made public their Tungurahua Volcano Declaration. His interview of Mari is here.

The Global Alliance then began a campaign for the signing of the Universal Declaration of Rights of Mother Earth introduced at the World People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth in Cochabamba, Bolivia, on the 22nd April – Earth Day 2010.

I interviewed Barry about his upcoming trip. Give a listen here.

Barry’s work with the Sustainability Action Media (SAM) coalition this last year also reflects a focus by the SAM coalition members – EarthSayers.tv, SustainableTV, and Sustainable Today – on increasing the indigenous voices of sustainability to include the live streaming of the Wisdom from the Origins conference in September 2012 and the documenting of the EarthDay 2012 conference sponsored by the Earth & Spirit Council. At both events Barry added to the content mix by interviewing indigenous leaders from the United States, Guatamala, and Mexico. All of this valuable content is highlighted on EarthSayers as will be the Ecuadorian shaman in special collection on Ecuadorian Wisdom Keepers.

If you are interested in contributing to Barry’s trip and post production expenses, SAM can accept tax deductible contributions made to our coalition member, The Center for a Sustainable Today, a tax exempt organization. Contact me for details at ruthann@earthsayers.tv or call me at 415-377-1835. Sponsorships by organizations of SAM content is also an opportunity to support increasing the visibility of indigenous voices of sustainability.

Ruth Ann Barrett, Sustainability Advocate, February 4, 2013, Portland, Oregon.

Playing on the Edges? Move to the Center of Sustainability

The MIT/Sloan Management Review article, How to Become A Sustainable Company, addresses playing at the edges in one clear statement:

Currently, organizations that exhibit a broad- based commitment to sustainability on the basis of

their original corporate DNA are few and far between.

I was reminded of this statement listening to Canadian sustainability pioneer, David Suzuki, being interviewed by Amy Goodman on Democracy Now yesterday on RIO+20 and the so-called green economy. Here is the interview.

There is one observation in particular that addresses a fundamental paradigm shift that needs to be made in our thinking, in our consciousness in order to survive beyond this century. It rests on our ability as leaders to “reassess everything.”

“And if we don’t see the that we are utterly imbedded in the natural world and dependent on nature, not technology, not economics, not science — we are dependent on Mother Nature for our very well being and survival. If we don’t see that, then our priorities will continue to be driven by man-made constructs like national borders, economies, corporations, markets. Those are all human created things. They shouldn’t dominate the way we live. It should be the biosphere. And the leaders in that should be the indigenous people who still have that sense, that the earth is truly are mother, that it gives birth to us.”

The indigenous people are our citizens who actually live in places of “extreme sources of energy” as referenced in David Suzuki’s comments and referred to by Erick Gonzalez, the founder and spiritual leader of Earth Peoples United, as the “last frontier.” Erick emphasizes the last frontier for extreme sources of energy are in the territories of the indigenous people. Give him a listen. It takes less than two and half minutes and is a move from the edges of sustainability to its center. Click here.

Next look more closely at Tar Sands as a place and what it means for the biosphere by listening to the indigenous people living there such as Clayton Thomas-Muller and Alanna Hurley and then listen to the Canadian artists, such as Garth Lenz and Edward Burtynsky present their photography as they capture in pictures what is meant by “extreme sources of energy.” Move your attention to the center, but hurry, as “Our Scarcest Resource is Time,” as emphasized by Sustainability Pioneers David Suzuki, Lester Brown, Maurice Strong, Rajendra Pachauri, Bill Ford, Sha Zukang, and Jonathan Porritt in a video of the same title. It is part of the Ray Anderson Memorial Video Series by The Regeneration Project an initiative of the think tank, Sustainability and the research company, GlobeScan and sponsored by SC Johnson and the BMW Group.

Ruth Ann Barrett, Sustainability Advocate, Portland, Oregon on June 27, 2012.

Seek Out and Learn from Sustainability Leaders

In a recent article, How to Become a Sustainable Company, in the Summer 2012 issue of the MIT/Sloan Management Review they ask the question, “What differentiates sustainable companies from traditional ones?” To the answer in a minute.

Although the article references commitment to sustainability, noting that few companies are born with it, an issue arises for me that goes beyond terminology and suggests a fundamental misunderstanding – to be a sustainable company is not equal to being a company committed to sustainability. The adjective, sustainable and the noun sustainability are not one in the same. Unfortunately, the former is what is popular in business, both public and private and the answer to the question above demonstrates what I mean. According to the article the differences are:

Sustainable organizations are effective at engaging with external stakeholders and employees

They have cultures based on innovation and trust

They have a track record of implementing large-scale change

These are not unique to sustainability nor to sustainable companies. Petroleum and toxin-based companies, for example, may be successful at all three and yet have no commitment to sustainability, to the seven generations, mired as their leadership may be in the short term, and, ultimately, in denial about global warming and the inability of an economic system that externalizes risk and costs to ever bounce back.

Sustainability is a goal, a desire, a hope and it signifies the ABILITY to drive change, first, at the personal level. We need sustainability leaders to drive a sustainability culture in their organizations. This point is raised in the MIT/Sloan report:

“When leadership commitment drives the process, it usually comes from the personal resolution of a CEO to create a more sustainable company. In general, top-level executives have the ability to create an enterprise-wide vision and the clout to see that it is realized. Without this commitment, becoming a sustainable company is a “nonstarter.”

While leadership commitment is talked about as critical, the report continues with the language of ” leaders of traditional and sustainable companies” rather than sustainability leaders of companies directing our attention to how things are not working rather than who is working. Our sustainability leaders need to influence their “traditional” peers, first, to raise their consciousness as quickly as possible. There are two very effective ways to advance the personal and model the behavior that is desperately needed.

Online Video

Here’s an interview with Dominique Conseil , Global President of Aveda and Karl-Henrik Robert founder of the Natural Step, both sustainability leaders. Or listen to The Regeneration Project’s Ray Anderson Memorial video series, here is one video, Why Meaningful Progress Depends on Activists – Spotlight on Civil Society, featuring sustainability leaders Jonathon Porritt, Vandana Shiva, Nitin Desai, Lester Brown, Bill Ford, Kris Gopaladrishman, Yolanda Kakabadse and Gro Harlem Brundtland.

Online Video and Research

Dr. David Hall of Portland State University stepped out of the box and advanced the personal by producing a series of sustainability leadership videos as part of his research called Native Perspectives. Here you can listen to the indigenous voices, sustainability leaders, of the Salmon Nation.

Face-to-Face

The Regeneration Project, between July and October, will host a number of Salons – curated, facilitated conversations with influential stakeholders from across industry and sector. These Salons will take place in major international cities across the world. Attendance is to be limited to approximately 50 people, on an invitation-only basis. Great work and hopefully the start of something fresh in sustainability awareness, education, and innovation. The project is an inititiave of GlobeScan, a public opinion research company and Sustainability, a think tank and strategy consultancy.

All of this is to say go ahead and read the research digging into sustainable companies, but give more time to listening to your peers who are sustainability leaders, pioneers, heroes, and innovators. Look for research and events that emphasize the personal over organizational. Rely less on processed information when you can now hear directly from the sustainability leadership as found in the hundreds of companies that are for-benefit and in the hundreds of voices of sustainability from across the Web, the reason we invested in bringing together these voices for you in one place, EarthSayers.tv, voices of sustainability.

Ruth Ann Barrett, Sustainability Advocate, June 19, 2012, Portland, Oregon.

The Arts and Sustainability Advocacy

I always like to do something special on my birthday hoping I can look back and remember what I did to celebrate a milestone, heavy as they can be. I remember my 4oth and 50th for example but not much in between and my all time favorite remains my 16th. So for this birthday which is an even numbered one and let’s leave it at that, I want to call out the sustainability advocates I have added recently to our collection, Artist & Musicians on EarthSayers.tv, voices of sustainability. These men and women join business and civic leaders, teachers, consultants, experts, and citizens from all professions as sustainability advocates.

Find some time in your busy schedule to see and hear what they have to say and think about tapping into our great wealth of creative performers and artists to increase sustainability awareness. To warm up, Save Planet Earth by Tokyo Rose Band. If you are at work, put in your ear buds.

Picture this.

Interview of Canadian landscape photographer Edward Burtynsky. He talks about the focus of his latest exhibition, Oil, composed of 55 color landscapes made over the last decade. Here is a where to view his art exhibited by the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. and here is a trailer of the documentary, Manufactured Landscapes.

The True Cost of Oil: Tar Sands by Garth Lenz in his speech before the TEDxVictoria audience. For almost twenty years, Garth’s photography of threatened wilderness regions, devastation, and the impacts on indigenous peoples, has appeared in the world’s leading publications. Garth is a Fellow of the International League Of Conservation Photographers.

Picturing Excess by the artist, Chris Jordan‘s work addresses the unconscious behaviors that add up to catastrophic consequences which no one intended. He explores the phenomenon of American consumerism. The photo used in this blog is of his book, Ushirikiano: Building a Sustainable Future in Kenya’s Northern Rangelands
(teNeues Publishing Group, 2011).

What’s That Sound?

The band Vocal Trash’s primary goal is to teach children to use their imaginations in a meaningful and perennial regard. Recycling awareness is the secondary goal obtained through creative and inspirational performance utilizing distinguishable items that might normally end up in a Landfill, (metals, plastics, etc).

Along the same lines, percusionista, Fellé Vega is devoted to finding “the sound of life” and experiments with recyclable materials and everyday objects that have percussive possibilities, such as pails, lids and pots, which he then turns into musical instruments. His performance filmed as part of TEDxSantoDomingo.

Hymn to the Rainforest by Sarah Brightman invited by The Prince’s Rainforests Project to sing at an event they hosted to engage the financial community in the task of finding a solution to the problem of making rainforests worth more alive than dead. This is the film that accompanied her singing. The music is Nella Fantasia – used in the soundtrack of the movie – The Mission, and often called a Hymn To the Rainforest. For more information go here.

Our Generation sung by John Legend and The Roots performing Ernie Hines’ 1970 classic at Terminal 5 in New York City, September 23, 2010.

Speak Out!

What Can I do for social and ecological justice? Spoken word poet and activist Drew Dellinger says that one of the deepest questions a person can face is, What can I do?, and describes the quest to answer it as a spiritual challenge.

Our True Nature, a riff on our true nature by spoken word artist, Steve Connell.

Ruth Ann Barrett, Sustainability Advocate, May 25, 2012 from Portland, Oregon.

Helping You Make Smarter Sustainability-related Choices

I regularly read the blog, From Me to We, by Kare Anderson. I thought the title reflected a basic tenet of sustainability and of life in general. As I read her posts I find she delivers on this theme with often very insightful advice as was the case today in her post, Two Ways to Make Smarter Choices Next Time.

1. Don’t Get Anchored Down (and remain open-minded)

“When considering a decision, the mind gives disproportionate weight to the first information it receives. Initial impressions, estimates, or other data anchor subsequent thoughts and judgments…Because anchors influence how others see a situation, savvy negotiators use them to influence how someone feels about a political issue or options for taking sides.”

Do you ever give too much weight to past performance?

“In business, one of the most frequent “anchors” is a past event or trend. A marketer in attempting to project sales of a product for the coming year often begins by looking at the sales volumes for past years. This approach tends to put too much weight on past history and not enough weight on other factors.”

2. When to Stop Digging (move on, start fresh)

“Each time you move, speak and demonstrate what you mean, you deepen your belief, get more articulate about it and are more likely to tell others…(therefore) Seek out and listen to people who were uninvolved with the earlier decisions. Examine why admitting to an earlier mistake distresses you, if it does.”

My experience with these two aspects of decision-making are manifested in the Website, EarthSayers.tv. It emphasizes many points of view around the big social, environmental, and economic challenges. These challenges are being addressed by a wide range of citizens who are experts, teachers, activists, business and civic leaders, artists, employees, entrepreneurs, and citizens from all walks of life. Some of the voices you may have heard of, but most of the voices will be new and fresh to you.

So, there it is. I really can’t make people change their decision-making habits, but for those seeking to be more open-minded and exposed to fresh ideas, I helped create EarthSayers.tv, voices of sustainability. Here’s our special collection on Transforming Our Economy. Give Alan AtKisson a listen. He describes the History of GDP which believe it or not makes for interesting discussions not only in the classroom, but at home and work.

Ruth Ann Barrett, Sustainability Advocate, April 9, 2011.

EarthSayers.tv, an advertising-free and public digital library, features over 1,000 voices of sustainability. We are looking to maintain EarthSayers.tv by customizing the look and feel of the collection with content as an information service to organizations with a shared objective of increasing sustainability awareness and a desire to educate and motivate their audience. The collection will continue to grow by aggregation and by our branded partners adding their original content and that of their stakeholders.