Systems Thinking för hållbar Beyond Organic Gardening

The question posed to the Occupy movement is, “What are your demands?” Terrorists make demands and since Occupy is not a movement of terrorists, why dignify the inane question by a response that would allow the media and the cynical to pigeonhole the movement? Genom att nu, it should be self-evident that people are hungry to experience life unconstrained by, dependent upon, and unmediated by power structures that deify greed while gorging on our lives, not just upon the blood of an underclass that ekes by but on the elites themselves who are just as surely drained soullessly dry by exploiting others.

The Occupy movement doesn’t have the numbers to singlehandedly create a new, uncorrupted system ex nihilo on its own steam. Emellertid, if the movement leverages the support of the American public that supports it, turning their attention towards the question, “What do we create next?", Occupy could create an experiential manifestation of a grounded, integrated vision that is practical, elegant and life-affirming. (More on that subject in a subsequent post.)

Populist and progressive movements have had a self-defeating proclivity to oppose institutional and structural injustice on principle without presenting a substantive alternative that is functional in the real world. It’s not that I can’t sympathize with the seething frustration, resentment, disillusionment, and outrage. After a point though, one has to stop standing against everything and to find something one is willing to proudly stand för without selling out the vision. Then it’s time to walk the talk. Manifestation of a vision that large is a long haul effort, so expectations of instant gratification will weed out the flaky and the uncommitted until these folks are willing to stop complaining and to grow backbones.

Many of the folks within the Occupy movement have deep resentment towards the institutions that represent corruption but the double bind is that the Occupy movement hasn’t yet created alternative structures that people sympathetic to the movement trust will also be free of graft and corruption. There are standing offers to make donations to Occupy, yet no way to receive those donations. While it could be successfully argued that there hasn’t been a nonprofit that wasn’t corrupted eventually, if the Occupy movement wants to get something done as a matter of practicality, it has no choice but work creatively with the tools of extant institutional structures before it can fundamentally redefine and retool how alternative structures could work. It’s the principle of being the change one wants to see in the world (while not losing your sense of humor).

Like it or not, we all carry the unconscious seeds of the abusive system we’re the products of and without conscious, deep excavation of those tendencies, system replication is almost guaranteed if for no other reason than the unavoidable polarities of being incarnate in a realm of dualities. The embedded cosmic joke is the tendency to become what we oppose. We have a great deal of painful, soul-searching introspection to engage in about the paradigms we bring with us. I will risk drawing progressive activists’ anger, negativity, and criticism because if nothing else, the presence of controversy will hopefully distill into clarity the need to examine the roots of any anger provoked. If I provoke discomfort and anger, it’s because there’s a collective psychic or emotional wound that I have touched.

Exempelvis, as a microcosmic fractal of the truth that what is in one is in the whole and that what is in the whole is in the one, Occupy has its share of overbloated egos. In L.A., the “leaders” are easy to identify since their fishbowl niche is monopolizing space in front of cameras and microphones speaking on behalf of the whole. The humorous irony lies in the presence of self-appointed leaders in what is supposed to be a leaderless movement. Meanwhile, the self-serving media would love nothing better than a feeding frenzy on the chum of negative stories about Occupy L.A.. The hunger is palpable since most within the camp don’t like those within the media tents. KPFK barely arrived and started broadcasting from the site when was voted off by the general assembly. It was a puzzling decision tactically since KPFK is a sympathetic ally with which Occupy could have cultivated a positive relationship. Goodness knows that Occupy won’t find mainstream media allies. Could you see Fox portraying Occupy in a positive light? Neither can I.

Economic and ecological sustainability integrated seamlessly with inter/intra generational social justice can’t be pasted over our dysfunctional global society like a veneer. We can’t expect that superficial approach to work because the fundamental dysfunctional power dynamics are still in place. Intensive shadow excavation and healing work through brutal self-honesty needs to take place in both the internal and external realms. The absence of any substantive internal work to change consciousness in tandem with attempting to change the external world is one of the major weaknesses of the permaculture, Peak Oil, Occupy, and Transition Town* movements and it’s a reason why many progressive organizations and movements have flailed and are flailing in their efforts to bring about systemic change. Are my standards high? Ja, but so are the stakes, which are unprecedented in global history.

*Not: The Transition Town model includes the formation of Heart and Soul committees but I don’t know if many of these subgroups have facilitators that are skilled enough to navigate the deep, sometimes rough, waters of the psyche and collective unconscious, let alone the prowess to help people own motivations that they don’t discuss proudly. Until we own our shadows, our shadows own us. That work is process, not product oriented, so there is no definable terminus.

Among all of the world’s major spiritual traditions, there are precepts for the personal management of Divine power, our lifeforce, that also enhance physical health and emotional well-bein. Violations of those precepts end up costing us spiritually as well as biologically. These precepts are: 1) Live in the present moment, 2) Seek only the truth, 3) Surrender personal will to Divine will, 4) Love is Divine Power, 5) Honor oneself, 6) Honor the whole of life, och 7) All is one. These precepts correspond to the seven chakras of the Vedic scriptures, the seven Christian sacraments, and the Tree of Life of the Kabbalistic tradition. (reference: Caroline Myss)

All is one is apparently one of the truths that sounds fabulous in theory but is hard to live by in practice. Anything that divides unity or violates the sanctity of the whole, such as racism, homophobia, classism, or sexism, is a violation the precept and hence, Divine law. Social, economic and ecological justice are inextricably linked. Abuse and concatenated energetic/spiritual violations are not permissible behaviors that we should turn a blind eye to and deny because what is in the one is in the whole and what is in the whole is in the one. The enemy isn’t “out there”. It never was. The human heart is the portal for both good and evil in the world; intention and choice mediate what we manifest through our creativity.

We live in a global culture that is highly tolerant of abuse in all its myriad forms. Although physical abuse is horrifying in its senselessness, it is a malignant outgrowth of the more prevalent, but hidden, verbal, energetic, emotionell, and psychological forms of abuse, which are often more damaging because the process of non-physical abuse destroys the abused person (or animal, social class, nation, ecosystem, etc.) from the inside out. Contrary to popular myth, most abusers do not inflict harm because of mental illness or because they too were victims of abuse. Abusers abuse because they can and because no one holds them accountable for their predatory behavior; the motivations, rooted in self-serving values and attitudes of entitlement, lie in needs for power, domination, and control through their impositions on others rather than the cultivation of authentic power from within. Abuse breaches the surface of public consciousness when it surfaces in a salacious story about incest, pornography, sexual slavery or culmination in murder. This kind of violence will not subside unless and until abuse is no longer tolerated socially or interpersonally. Most abusers feel utterly entitled to behaving as they do and merely cracking down with more punitive laws or extensive punishments on the tiny fraction who are caught in the legal system will not stem the tide abuse victims. The vast majority of abusers are never caught, let alone prosecuted; they simply move on to new victims.

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Rather than use hyperbole for literary effect that would lead you to believe that I’m prone to fabrication, I’m letting the story that the e-mail tells exemplify more social patterns in the extreme to make them obvious.

A few years ago, I volunteered as a consulting garden/landscape professional for the first “Gardens of Gratitude” in Los Angeles. I’d be tempted to rechristen the project-driven event if it wouldn’t be dishonoring the spirit of abundance and sharing that Devin Slavin (a classmate in Ecological Agriculture program at New College of California 1n 2005) wanted the idea of “Gardens of Gratitude” to embody. The intention behind making materials and expertise low and no-cost was to make edible sustainable gardens accessible to low-income folks, not to subsidize the acquisitive greed of the haves (who in all likelihood could afford the materials and services when they wanted to pay for them) at the expense of neglecting the have-nots in areas such as East Santa Monica, Westlake, MacArthur Park, Southcentral, Watts, or Pacoima. The opposite of gratitude isn’t ingratitude, it’s entitlement.

Entitlement is one pervasive manifestation of America’s shadow and it is what St. Teresa of Avila called a “reptile in the soul” according to Caroline Myss. Until you own your shadow aspects, they own you.

From:

To: (e-mail addresses deleted)

Date: Sun, Maj 3, 2009 1:30:43 PM

Cc: (e-mail addresses deleted)

Subject: Re: Gardens of Gratitude – Thanks for signing up

Greetings Sean & All:

Thank you for welcoming us into the event. Just to let you know, our knowledge is minimal (book-learned permaculture curiosity), and being a corner lot, our blank palette is large and L-shaped. For that day, we’ve segmented off one 12×20 full-sun rectangular section of the yard to work with, and have been doing some sketches.

Our goal is to do this without spending much at all.

Uh-oh. That last sentence was a red flag.

A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing when culled from a book without any grounding in experience but anchored to high expectations. The only way that this family could visually achieve the upscale “architectural” results that they strove for would be on the back(med) of whoever was generous and/or foolish enough to subsidize their enterprise. Translated, the first and second paragraphs meant: “We have high expectations shaped by ideas cherry picked from books sans application contexts and we’re hoping to siphon off good quality freebies from whomever and wherever we can get them.”

We’ve acquired some piles of free dirt (about 6 pick-up loads) that my husband has dutifully sifted. We also found some medium-sized rocks to help with berms, since our vision is to create one natural-looking elevated wall to hold in the height, with the elevation sloping down to the sidewalk and some DG pathways.

Hmmm….let’s get this straight. You want a sculpted wall and decomposed granite pathways and you want materials and labor for these features for free? There’s charity and generosity on the one hand, and then there’s milking an event for everything it is worth.

My husband wants a more drought tolerant architectural look–not an obvious food garden, so no overt raised beds. But since we have hardpan, we need to pile on the good stuff… So in our efforts to compromise, I’ll be interspersing any edibles into the schema. I will have a mini tangerine and a loquat onsite for that day, and probably tomatoes. Any other stealth edibles advice is welcome!

Can’t have an obvious food garden in full view of neighbors. It sounds oh-so untidy and low class (God forbid). What will de think? (Who gives a flying fig as long as the plants are happy and skillfully cared for? A tended, well-loved garden always looks better than a soulless, stiff planting arrangement designed to appease the neighbors and win their approval.)

Here’s where it gets interesting since the subject wanted to mingle plants that have contrasting horticultural requirements. Once established, the tangerine and loquat would probably do just fine among drought tolerant plants as long as the trees were periodically deep soaked, but tomatoes and garden variety (pun intended) edibles would not be getting their needs met among the drought tolerant plants. If the soil were watered frequently enough to satisfy the garden veggies, the drought tolerant plants would eventually succumb to fungal disease and rot. Although the couple in question might stubbornly resist following the advice they claim to want, they would have to pick either the annual edible plant palette or the perennial drought tolerant plants in lieu of conceding garden design to someone who knows what they’re doing.

Also, I think we have some snakey sand bags from Cal-Earth in the garage which can be moulded into low holding walls… TBD. That could be fun to play with!

Here’s our questions to be more ready for the day:

• BASE PREP:

All grass is gone and we’re down to the hard pan. We were thinking we would just pile the new dirt on top of that, with one side bermed, and the other sloping to the sidewalk. (The piles of dirt are a few yards away dumped on the unsolved section of the yard). We read the gardens of gratitude links about Instant No Dig Garden Beds och Double Digging… We were wondering:

     – Can we drill holes into the hard clay to help make more permeable and skip the hard labor? (the carpenter has a pneumatic drill…)

     – Or get out the pick-axes to loosen the hardpan (we’d rather not!!!)

     – Should we have cardboard onsite to place on top of hardpan (as we saw on the Mar Vista Garden tour last week)? Or is that just for lawn-suppression?

     – Any other prep tips we should know about?

I’m not going to comment on what they could have done more specifically about that alleged hardpan because I don’t know enough about their prospective garden site. This family didn’t specifically request a site analysis and I wasn’t about to volunteer one for known takers. Without that site analysis, more specific comments would be conjecture.

Som sagt, there’s a possibility that lugging in the 6 pickup truckloads of soil and then sifting it (Varför? To cull stones or remove glass?) on relatively short notice was a waste of effort because these folks were working under the incorrect premise and assumption that they have “bad” soil. I haven’t a clue why this mystifying judgment is prevalent. Los Angeles has buried some of the most fertile agricultural soils in the world under endlessly contiguous miles of asphalt and concrete. It’s not the soil’s fault that it’s been abused for almost a century. Hardpan due to compaction and ignorance is one of the least of the wounds inflicted on this land. If this family had not gotten greedy about availing themselves of freebies and if they had been patient enough to allow sufficient lead time working in tandem with the rhythm of the seasons without compulsively feeding their addiction to instant gratification, it would have been possible to use organic methods to condition that “hardpan” so that the soil would have been workable.

Drilling holes in the soil? I wonder if this carpenter and his wife ever considered that drill bits manufactured for wood aren’t made to bore holes in soil and 2) the inevitability that the drill bits (he’ll go through a lot of them) would strike unseen pebbles and rocks buried in the fill. Oops.

So many people find the idea of prolific, beautiful gardens bursting with color and life alluring and yet they’re not willing to put their backs into the effort of planting and maintaining them. There is no such thing as a free lunch. In spite of the eternal nature of this truth, people look for ways to circumvent the effort if they can’t get someone else to do the hard work for them for free (dvs. Gardens of Gratitude volunteers) eller, if need be, for cheap. (The quick excuse at the ready is “I don’t have the time” but when you consider how much time is spent watching TV and fiddling around on technological toys and dig deeper, the excuse actually translates to “I don’t have the interest or skills and besides, nature scares me when it’s icky”.) Gardening and landscaping are like so many other life endeavors – you get out of it what you put into it and there are no shortcuts to working with natural systems like gardens, which are human-designed and created pseudoecosystems, but natural systems nonetheless. Nature sets the tone through microclimate, geology, and climate and ultimately calls the dance. Get over it.

Personally, as much as everyone complains about clay, I’d rather work with clayey soil than sand. It takes a lot longer to build up the organic content and create good tilth in a sandy soil that leaks water and nutrients like a sieve.

• COMPOST:

In addition to our acquired topsoil, we need to enrich with compost, right? Om så, should it be in separate piles, or mixed in with the dirt? If mixed, what are the proportions, etc.? Where to acquire FREE compost if possible? We saw some sacks available on the Mar Vista Gardens tour, but didn’t note where they were from. Let us know.

• Same for MANURE: how much for our 12×20 space, and where to acquire FREE if possible?

• WOOD CHIPS, etc.: Should we have mulch piles on-site ready for spreading at end of the project?

     We’re running out of room. Could that come later? Also, where to acquire FREE if possible. Our official Culver City source seems to have closed…

Again, this family is working under the premise and assumption that they need compost, manure, and wood chips for their allegedly “bad” hardpan soil. How did these folks arrive at their conclusions about what soil amendment materials they need for this landscaping project? What were their assumptions and why did they make them?

Eager about and enamored by the prospect of dabbling in their idea of Permaculture, they didn’t research drought tolerant plants or edibles to determine what those plants need to thrive. By their own admission, they don’t know much of anything about Permaculture or gardening, let alone the horticultural needs of plants. That kind of reading isn’t as sexy as jumping onto the Permaculture trendwagon but the blunt truth is that a lovely garden is not the end result when all the plants are struggling to survive because their needs are not being met. Attractive home gardens and landscapes, especially ones that increase property values in the long-term, are not accidents of short-lived attention, fashionable interest, and design on aesthetic whims. (Hint: Designing a daisy-shaped garden for the sake of designing a daisy-shaped garden without considering the needs of the plants, the mature sizes of the plants, or maintenance is setting yourself up for failure.)

Of the three materials that this family is requesting free source information for, I’d only recommend the wood chips for mulch and I wouldn’t skimp by going for free material unless my back was against the wall. Chipped material can be acquired gratis from a cooperative tree trimming company but since beggars cannot be choosers, the recipient 1) would not be able to specify quantity (you take whatever they give you), 2) cannot request specs on the tree and shrub species in the mix, eller 3) expect to have a request for a minimal leaf litter to wood chip ratio honored. If you refuse to compromise on special requests and place conditions on the tree trimmings you are willing to receive, take a number and expect to wait until a tree trimming job that happens to meet your exacting specifications crops up. That wait could take months. If the need for mulch is time-sensitive, it’s best to just pay for it.

The vast majority of tree trimming jobs generate both leafy and woody material in equal proportions. Mix the finely chopped wet green stuff plus the moist woody stuff, leave it in a pile about a cubic yard in volume, and in a few short months you have…TA-DA!…compost! Pure wood chips that are coarsely chopped (dvs. pieces 2-4 inches in length) don’t break down as quickly as free tree trimmings and where mulch is concerned, you want that 3 till 4 inch protective layer on top of your soil to last at least a few years as opposed to only several months but no more than a year. Left to its own devices, nature generates its own mulch. It may be minimal or plentiful depending on the ecosystem and plant community, but it’s there.

Förresten, I didn’t put the word “free” in all caps for emphasis on how cheap and stingy this family was. The text and its formatting is how it appeared in the e-mail verbatim. I kid you not.

• SPRINKLERS:

We have sprinklers which we don’t use, but are still hooked up. We have not retrofitted to any of the low flow dribblers or whatever–don’t have the expertise (My husband is a carpenter, not a plumber). He doesn’t want to use auto sprinkling at all, but go to hose, and says he’s willing to hand-water. I think we need a FREE pro consult on this–If the workings are there, do we want to take advantage and make life easier?

I hope this family actually tested the sprinkler system to check to see whether it still worked. I didn’t offer up my services and don’t know what sucker, um, I mean person…yeah, if anyone, stepped up to the plate to offer professional advice to tailor the irrigation system. The type of retrofit would entirely depend on the type of plants chosen for the project and since the planned plant palette was going to be mixed, you can bet that the results would be as well.

Hand watering is often a good enough option but the system failure often lies in whoever handles the hose. For busy, scattered, distracted suburbanites, the committed intention to hand water the plants wears off in direct proportion to the garden project’s novelty. Remembering to deep water drought tolerant plants on a frequency of once every 2 till 4 weeks (actual frequency depends on time of year, solljus, jordmån, and weather) can be another challenge if the irregular ritual of watering doesn’t become a habit. More often than not, people forget. The other challenge with hand watering is that the tops of the plants usually get sprayed, leaving the roots where the water is really needed to slowly dry out after the last of seasonal rains. Few well-intentioned hand waterers bother to check soil moisture below the mulch layer, if one is present.

• THIRSTY TREE:•

Any tree experts out there who can help advise us about our thirsty parkway magnolia which is sending sausage-sized roots up to the surface of the yard, and blasting the sidewalk out of its way in doing so? Since we stopped watering our hardpan, it’s gone wild looking for water. We’re trying to coordinate with L.A. City about sidewalk repair, and hoping to talk to the city arborist, but much redtape and perhaps many moons before we get info there. So if anyone has info here. (This challenge is separate from the 12×20 area delineated for the workday…)

Any info is much appreciated!

Thanx from the Cheapskate Family (surname changed to protect the guilty)

Harry & Virginia & boys

Want to raise some sidewalk, maybe destroy a nearby cement block wall or even a building foundation? Plant a Ficus or a Magnolia tree nearby.

The City of Los Angeles Public Works has a warped interpretation of job security. One department is charged with planting and maintaining trees that destroy infrastructure so that another department charged with infrastructure repairs and periodic rebuilding never runs out of tree related damage to address. Too bad the City is going broke and like other fiscally stretched governmental entities is postponing repairs and maintenance wherever and whenever it can.

The poor magnolia was ill-chosen for its planting location and as a result there is no solution that this family could implement that wouldn’t cost them something. But seeing that spending anything – time, strenuous effort, or money – is almost completely out of the question, there wouldn’t be any point in anyone offering these folks any advice since they wouldn’t be willing to follow it anyway.

If the family whined and complained long and loudly enough to the City’s arborist, a crew might eventually come out, sever and remove the “offending” roots, and then repour concrete slab to patch the sidewalk. The operative word is eventually. The family’s sons will likely have flown the nest by the time L. A. Public Works slogs through their backlog, which even conservative estimates peg at a decade long wait. If that’s a bit much, Public Works suggests that residents take matters into their own hands by paying for a licensed arborist’s services out of pocket on top of a tree permit issued by the city, neither of which, I note for the record, will ever be FREE.

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Vilka mönster har jag märke i landskapet handeln? För en, Jag observerade ett beroende att samla in kunskap. Inte visdom – kunskap. Människor kan stoppa huvudet fulla av grejer och aldrig använda den för nyttjanderätt. Kanske mata detta missbruk gör att människor känner att de åstadkomma någonting även om inget är manifesterar på grund av en investering av verkliga svett och arbete. I Los Angeles, stad projekterade drömmars, turister och de rika och privilegierade (eller de som försöker se på det sättet) flock med idealiserade Simulacra av Los Angeles som City Walk i Universal City och Beverly Center. Det finns ett mönster och princip i naturen: "Det finns inget sådant som BORT."De sociala fantasier om Los Angeles är stödd osynligt på baksidan av låga lönearbetare som håller maskineriet illusionen fungerar smidigt. Skrapa den mjukade & målade faner av simulacra, tillåter arbetarna att hitta nya arbetsplatser som respekterar deras värdighet och mänskligheten i healtly löner, skala bort naturens "fria" subventioner på vatten och energi, och sedan fråga, "Vad finns kvar?"

När vissa människor räknat ut att jag vet mina grejer, De pumpade mig för information ... och pumpas .... och pumpas .... och pumpas. De ville de närmare detaljerna "vad" är ansluten till de dyrbara mekanik "hur". Beroende på sammanhanget, Ibland skulle jag generöst går alla ut för att jag verkligen ville hjälpa. Det är bra då och då, och jag gillar att vara generös, men endast upp till en punkt eftersom jag inte kan betala mina räkningar med Raving kompletterar och tackar andra gav mig för hjälpen de fått. I andra sammanhang när det var socialt lämpligt att kommunicera det, Jag lät folk vet att en hållbar trädgård och landskapsarkitektur var vad jag gjorde som ett proffs och jag konstaterade att munnar skulle gå på medan pocketböcker skulle Slam stänga med rungande slutgiltighet av en solid-state walk-in säkert. Av skäl som jag inte har listat ut, Väst L.A. publiken tenderade att vilja så mycket kunskap som de skulle kunna pressa ut men bara för ett minimum kunde komma undan med att betala, Om inte gratis. Jag är helt för att hjälpa människor att få vad de vill, men inte till priset av vampyriska exploatering - mitt eller någon annans.

"När du är bra på något, du inte gör det gratis. "- The Joker (Heath Ledger) i The Dark Knight

Den irriterande och hjärtskärande delen är att, oftare än inte, dessa människor skulle inte ens använda den kostnadsfria råd de beställt. Vad var mer häpnadsväckande är att andra inte ens skulle använda de råd de hade att betala för.

En kund i Big Rock området Malibu namn-bort och skröt över att ha hyrt Rosalind SKRYNKLIG för ett samråd. På den utsatta dagen, Wendy S. och Ms. SKRYNKLIG gick runt fastigheten, medan Rosalind sköt skräddarsydd rådgivning från toppen av huvudet. Snabbspolning framåt 2 till 3 år senare när Wendy S. anställde mig för några specialiserad arbetskraft. När hon tog min hjärna som vi gjorde rundor runt huset, Jag kunde nästan höra henne göra mentala jämförelser med Rosalind råd. När jag gav henne samma råd om hur du sköter sina övergivna container blåbär växter som Rosalind hade gett henne, Hon leds upp till säga så mycket. Ser du ironin ännu? Även efter saWendy Sed Rosalind SKRYNKLIG, Wendy S. fortfarande inte hade använt råd hon fått så många år sedan. Kundens vindpinade och försummade växter var inte bättre för att höra råd om igen från mig av någon anledning: Det var enkelt och uppenbarligen inte en prioriterad för att genomföra expertråd hon sökt. Jag önskar att jag kunde säga upplevelsen var synnerligen unikt. Det är en sak att förhandla om avgifter för att någon verkligen vill dina tjänster, avseenden vad du gör, och respekterar ditt yrke som en källa till försörjning. Det är en annan sak att mata ut någon annans liv energi som en symbolisk parasit när du inte respekterar någon annans måste göra en levande.

Kunden gick igenom tvätten listan med uppgifter hon ville gjort runt huset. I korthet, Hon ville ha henne egen gård & trädgård arbetare och Fyndkällarens löner. Faktiskt, Vid närmare eftertanke tycker jag att hon verkligen ville var fördelarna sådan arbetstagare skulle ge med alla romantik och bounty landet lever på en gård anropar utan hårt arbete, kroppen värker, eller besväret med att få sina egna händer smutsiga. När jag berättade för henne hur mycket det skulle kosta en rimlig, hon backpedaled, gjort ursäkter till varför hon inte hade råd tjänsterna, och kämpade för att rädda ansiktet efter att jag kallade henne på hennes orealistiska förväntningar och hennes hoppas att utnyttja mig för billigt, kunnig arbetskraft. Eftersom denna kvinna inte var villig att betala vad jobbet var värt, hon försöker fortfarande att rädda ansiktet indirekt genom ett intresseföretag långt efter att jag skiljas från henne.

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När bevarande, biologisk mångfald och livsmiljöer bevaras ideella grupper att främja deras orsaker, de vet mycket väl att människor tenderar att relatera bäst att karismatiska djur som passar deras subjektiva standard “attraktivitet”. För de allra flesta, fladdermöss låter inte det ‘awwww, hur söt!’ faktor lika mycket som de inspirerar ‘ewwwww, hur äckligt!". Det är olyckligt eftersom fladdermöss är okända hjältar. Nästa gång du är omgiven av en svärm av mygg, Kom bara ihåg att om du levde ett område som skulle värd fladdermöss att du skulle spendera mindre tid banka bort blodsugande insekter och njuter av naturen om fladdermöss dina grannar.

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Check this out:

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Den 28 juli, the New York Times published an article about the rise of microlending (http://www NULL.nytimes NULL.com/2010/07/29/business/smallbusiness/29sbiz NULL.html?src=me&ref=business). För år, microlending has been considered an economic staple in “developing” countries. (Naturligtvis, the next question is, what are developing countries developing into?) When you consider that the same “structural adjustment” (renamed “Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility (http://www NULL.imf NULL.org/external/np/exr/facts/prgf NULL.htm)” but soon to be replaced by the “Extended Credit Facility”) imposed by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund on Africa and third world countries is very likely in the karmic cards for the United States, the time is nigh for small towns and communities to save themselves economically.

Varför? Vem annars ska göra det? US cities (http://pengar NULL.cnn NULL.com/2010/05/28/news/economy/american_cities_broke NULL.fortune/index NULL.htm) (Vallejo (http://articles NULL.latimes NULL.com/2010/jul/27/local/la-me-bell-cuts-20100727/3), Bell, och Maywood (http://latimesblogs NULL.latimes NULL.com/lanow/2010/06/sheriffs-dept-to-patrol-maywood-while-city-employees-now-face-lay-offs NULL.html) in CA for starters) are going bankrupt and most of the states are very close to going bankrupt (http://www NULL.huffingtonpost NULL.com/2010/06/25/state-budget-crisis-46-st_n_625285 NULL.html). I en smärtsam twist, states are passing budget cuts onto city and county governments (http://www NULL.huffingtonpost NULL.com/2010/05/29/states-local-budget-cuts_n_594630 NULL.html). Som (http://www NULL.google NULL.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gPcuKLCFev6Vg7ZRNE7asQid3CtAD9GSG7303)me states have appealed to the federal government for financial help (http://www NULL.google NULL.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gPcuKLCFev6Vg7ZRNE7asQid3CtAD9GSG7303) medan country itself may very well be on the road to bankruptcy (http://www NULL.telegraph NULL.co NULL.uk/finance/2943328/US-could-be-going-bankrupt NULL.html). Hela tiden, the DOD can’t account for $8.7 billion in Iraqi oil funds (http://www NULL.tid NULL.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2006708,00 NULL.html) och bank bailouts starting in 2009 skulle kunna kosta $4 trillion (http://pengar NULL.cnn NULL.com/2009/01/27/news/bigger NULL.bailout NULL.fortune/). Obviously that’s a lot more than the initial $700 billion handed over on a silver platter to the banks through a blatant financial coup d’etat in late 2009. While the exact pathways of the money trail may be obscure, many of us viscerally feel the corruption and graft even if we can’t necessarily name names and pinpoint addresses of the thieves.

Had enough of the bleak economic prospects? Du är inte ensam. The local food movement gained momentum because people wanted tastier, more nutritious fresh food but that food was more than mere sustenance for the body. Det var mat för själen. People reconnected with farmers through farmers’ markets and direct purchases on the farms themselves. Through food and a growing sense of extended community discovered through personal connections cultivated with small farmers, folks reconnected with the land itself. If locally grown food is possible, why not localized loans with full transparency? There is no reason in the world why communities should NOT invest in themselves. Why should communities continue to export their wealth into the hands of banks, stora lådan butiker, and other corporate and governmental institutions that do not have those communities’ best interest at heart?

Rädsla, anxiety, and depression are clouding the minds and hearts of so many Americans but no one can save us except ourselves – not President Obama or his admininistration, certainly NOT Congress, and forget about the judicial branch of government. I själva verket, ge upp falska förhoppningar om att någon politician can save us from ourselves. With their picadilloes and frailties, our elected officials are just as human as any of the rest of us. Nothing except ourselves can stop us from developing local cultures that meet social and economic human needs without further compromising the opportunities of future generations and the planet’s ecosystems. We’re at a point in time when ordinary people are being called to accomplish extraordinary deeds. Will you heed the prompting of your heart and conscience or run to silence both?

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Att arbeta i och runt Los Angeles fortsätter att föra oss i kontakt med dem som affiliate med “grön” moniker, vad det kan betyda för dem. Gör inga misstag – som socialt skiftande som Los Angeles är, det är fortfarande en segregerad stad, om ingenting så flagrant som israeliska muren runt palestinska byar eller väggen resa barriärer delen av den södra gränsen av USA har rest (Ännu). Gränserna är förtingligade via socioekonomiska skiktning. De som verkar vara out of bounds behandlas snabbt, och ofta brutalt, av brottsbekämpande.

Klyftorna mellan rika och de som inte har i USA har ökat under de senaste 30 år, förstärks av ännu en massiv överföring av rikedom (http://Solari NULL.com / Arkiv / missing_money /). Greenwash på asfalten beskrivs socioekonomiska apartheid som om att köra hem den grad att arbetarklassen samhällen i färg helt enkelt inte har sin skit ihop tillräckligt för att vara miljövänlig hip (som om det var något att sträva efter).

Om vi ​​inte har gjort det mycket klart, tekniska korrigeringar kommer inte att rädda mänskligheten eller spara andra arter från utrotning. Avsaltning kommer inte att lösa problemen sötvatten brist i södra Kalifornien. Vi måste lära oss att känna igen överflöd i vad vi redan har på handen och att använda sig av lokalt tillgängliga material.

Ett möte med grundare och VD för ett Echo Park gröna ideell illustreras eko-hip punkt väl. Lättad över att finna sig i sällskap med vad hon trodde var en sympatisk publik, Hon beklagade att fattiga och arbetarklassen samhällen i färg inte förstår värdet av värde grönare sina liv. Jag kontrade med att samhällen av färg faktiskt har miljöhänsyn på sina radar, men svada skiljer. Av problemen och prioriteringarna skiljer sig åt. Om “trevligt” vita berörda miljömässigt liberaler och sociala progressiva ödmjukt betalas uppmärksamhet och lyssnade för en gångs skull i stället diktera villkoren för samtalet genom att insistera att språket var användningen på samma sätt för att erkännas och höras, De kan lära som är lika giltiga perspektiv finns i tandem med sin egen. Detta är narcissistisk fåfänga många inom den gröna rörelsen – ett skenheligt nedlåtenhet mot dem som inte konsumerar sig in ett “grön” framtida.

Men detta är problemets kärna: att lösa sammankopplade problem överkonsumtion, ett globalt ekonomiskt system baserat på skuldsättning och cancerogena utbyggnad, och miljöförstöring medför att tänka annorlunda för att få olika resultat. Problemet är inte bara tillverkning av materiella varor, det är hur vi gör dem och vad vi gör dem. Det innebär att ha saker kopplas från att göra för att skapa ett önskat tillstånd av att vara.

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Have you ever watched someone play the entitlement card to get what they want? Do you ever play the entitlement card when you think you can get away with it? How about consciously squeezing someone to try to get something for nothing? C’mon, be honest about it. How far did you push? Did you see how far you could take things? Did you get frustrated and angry when you encountered resistance? Did you even go so far as to retaliate when you didn’t get what you wanted? What’s worse, did you feel justified in applying your own selective “justice” for the slight?

What made you believe that you were entitled to getting what you wanted at someone else’s expense? What is behind your anger and outrage? Now that the economy is at the worst most people can remember in living history and the whole world is feeling the crushing consequences of a dysfunctional, catabolic economic system, do think that squeezing others is the way to go, now more than ever?

Ever wonder what’s the current fascination popular culture has with vampires? That may seem like a non sequitur question out of the blue, but hang in there with me for a minute. Vampires have a prominent place in our consciousness as charming, sexy, seductive creatures of the night. Think about the symbolism, though. Vampires have no reflections, dvs. they can’t see themselves. Their parasitic existence cannot withstand exposure to light. They need to drain life in order to sustain themselves (and if you willingly consent to being “food”, all the better). Worst of all, the act of feeding upon others makes more vampires in the process. Popular culture and media have latched on the attractively sexy aspects of vampirism without examining either the substance of the symbolism or the meaning of the prevalence of the imagery.

Everyday encounters with real life vampires aren’t as sexy. You can identify them by how you feel after being around them – drained. (And if you’ve noticed that you’re driving others away, perhaps you’re one of these bloodsuckers.) Hang around a vampire long enough and maybe you’ll even feel sick to your stomach, depending on how heavily the vampire has “matad” on you. Vampires take and don’t give back much in return. When they give, they give just enough to make you perceive reciprocity without the actuality of its existence. Snarare, they take as much as you permit them to and leave you feeling worse for the encounter. Vampires can only feed on you with your consent.

My view may be skewed because I currently live in Los Angeles, but a new acquaintance who was a project manager in the construction industry chimed in that this megalop0lis has throngs of people who are out to get something for nothing. Med andra ord, this place is overrun with vampires, or at least people who act like them. Yeeech!

What kind of hole in the soul, what deep unmet need, drives this kind of entitlement? From what I’ve observed, the most virulently dangerous vampires are deeply unfulfilled individuals missing something fundamental. Some lack meaning and purpose in their lives. Others are missing a connection to something bigger than themselves and pieces of their own humanity, like conscience or even chunks of their souls.

Some individuals are sh*ts for the sake of being sh*ts, being rotten to others just because they can. This facile kind of vampire uses people up and discards them afterward. Other vampires, such as child molesters and abusive spouses, groom their targets and use their victims over a period of time. Other vampires have psychological and relational disorders that warp their personal relationships to the individuals they’re closest to. Still other people are not vampires to the core, but they exhibit behaviors that are draining to others around them. An attitude of entitlement is but one symptom – a clue about the nature of the vampire in question.

What else do vampires do? They complain. They don’t want solutions to the problems that lead to their complaints, but rather sympathy and attention. Speaking of attention, they want it – all of it. It’s all about them. Vampires want to be lavished with your life energy, tid, pengar, love, expertise, etc., and they feel entitled to what they need from you. Whatever it is that you have of value that a vampire wants, he or she wants it in spades and will raise hell if they don’t get it. Forget reciprocity or equality because neither fundamentally exists from a vampire’s perspective. You’re fodder. What you need and want as a sovereign person don’t figure into the picture because you exist to feed the need.

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Ibland en idé måste kokas ner till dess ursprung, så att den kan återfödas med ny vitalitet och styrka.

Urban / Suburban Ecoliteracy har nått en av dessa choicepoints. Det är osannolikt att verkstaden kommer att fortsätta att erbjudas varje månad i södra Kalifornien, men inte för att innehållet i workshopen är irrelevant och överflödig. En vän kommenterade nyligen att denna workshop kan vara före sin tid. Det kan vara. Sedan igen, eftersom verkstaden finns och eftersom gudomliga timing alltid plats på, Urban / Suburban Ecoliteracy kan bara vara precis där det måste vara rätt nu. Workshopen behöver bara existera i ett annat format.

Jag hade hoppas att verkstaden skulle få positiva momentum och samtidigt underlätta nya sociala kopplingar mellan verkstäder deltagare som de lär sig tankesättet som gör att hållbarheten att slå rot. Med andra ord, lära människor systemtänkande är skenbara målet för Urban / Suburban Ecoliteracy men en av de viktigaste avsikterna med seminariet var att bygga stort behov av socialt kapital.

Här är en snabb test för att se hur mycket socialt kapital du har i ditt grannskap. Hur många av dina grannar vet du? Av grannarna du har träffat och gillade, hur väl känner du dem och hur väl de vet att du? Hur många skulle du lita på att titta på dina barn? Hur många kunde du är beroende av att ha ryggen om skiten träffar fläkten berömda? Hur många av dina grannar kan räkna med att du har ryggen? De flesta av oss vet inte våra grannar, än mindre lita på dem. Förtroende är ett mått på närvaron eller frånvaron av socialt kapital. Den psykologiska, emotionell, och fysisk säkerhet och välbefinnande hos barn (och andra utsatta i samhället) i sina egna bostadsområden och i deras familjer är ett annat mått på socialt kapital.

Det var också en del av den inneboende utformningen av workshop-formatet att materialet skulle skräddarsys för sin locale. Varje samhälle skulle, i själva verket, värd för en unik workshop som syftade till att skapa eller förstärka en känsla av plats. Med tanke på de olikartade samhällen som de deltog i workshopen har kommit från, skapa en känsla av gemenskap ansluten till och jordad i en plats var inte att ske genom workshops. Metropolitan Los Angeles sprawls för långt. Det är en plats utan en riktig center, som kan sägas vara överallt och ingenstans allt på en gång. Även om mellanmänskliga samhörighet kan kännas hos workshop deltagarna, äkta gemenskap är svår att främja utan ansikte tid i realtid. Det kan såra allt du Twitter och Facebook-användare, men behovet av ansiktet tid är vårt gemensamma sociala verkligheten. Det är bara hur vi fast som sociala varelser.

Som en nyligen syrade relation med en tidigare kund har påmint mig, Vi är kollektivt långt bort från där vi behöver vara och där vi längtar efter att vara. Oavsett politiska rand, Jag vet ingen person ganska bra karaktär som inte vill vara säker och att att säkerheten skall utvidgas till älskade vänner och familj. Vi längtar efter att lita på och ändå är vi är omringade mina meddelanden som Överös oss dag ut och dag in om att 1) Vi är inte säkra, 2) Vi är aldrig bra nog, 3) Vi kan aldrig få nog, 4) vi omgivna av galna människor och rovdjur, och 5) världen är full av knapphet, hård konkurrens, ständiga hot, och ständigt närvarande fara. Du måste få “dem” före “de” får du, vem “de” kan vara.

Är detta ärligt den värld som du vill använda för dina barn och barnbarn? Är detta den värld som du vill ha för dig själv?

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