The New Green Economy

Most people reading this article will have been raised their entire lives with a Newtonian world view – that is, the view that the world, and the universe by extension, is essentially a machine with moving parts and that if we understand the moving parts well enough (think the wheel, steam engines, atomic power, atoms, quarks, computing power) then we can harness or control the entire system.

Unfortunately, this perspective has been hammered into us since grade school and for most of us, the belief and all its corollary ideas are well wired into our thought processes.

In actuality, we are living in a dynamic, intelligent Field capable of instantaneous response to each one of us. (It may help to read that statement again.) Instead of living in a gigantic machine in which we are only a tiny cog, we have the opportunit to recognize and identify ourselves as something much more significant – something that the awesome and intelligent creative force that has created the plant kingdom, weather, human beings, this planet, and galaxies beyond, responds to.

Coming from, what for many in Western culture is a radically different perspective, our lives and the world we live in take on a much different tone. Sometimes we see scientists engaging in an unhealthy obsession with the Newtonian world view. We see this unhealthy obsession manifesting in ideas like genetic modification and lab meat for example. Here again, the thinking: if we can understand the parts, then we can control them (and perhaps even make a lot of money by owning them!)

A deeper understanding reveals that we live in an interconnected web. In this web, we recognize that our intentions are incredibly significant.

Making the Shift

So how does one practically function in the world if we are not inside a giant machine?

Since the dynamic Field which we live in and are a part of responds intelligently and instantaneously to us, how do we “speak” to it? The answer is with our intention. An intention is something that lies underneath our thoughts and feelings. It is more solid than either and feels as though it comes from a place that is close to the core of who we are. And perhaps easiest to discern is the fact that positive intentions feel good.

Now, here’s the tricky part. If I set an intention to say, have more trust in my life, the dynamically responding Field is going to instantaneously respond by creating circumstances to help me face and release vibrations within my body (which itself is wholly constructed from vibrations) which are not in alignment with my intention to trust. The same goes for any intention you might set. The less resistance you have, the faster it enters your reality.

It’s tricky because I might say, “wait a minute, I set an intention to trust and now these things are happening and I’m not feeling like I can trust anything”. This is where linear thinking and the Newtonian world view can cost one a lot of confusion and unnecessary suffering. The linear mind will say “this is bullshit, I’m not getting what I want.” However, despite the thoughts and feelings that are coming up, at the deeper level my intention is starting to manifest. As I am able to feel these painful emotions related to not trusting in this case, I am releasing them and changing my vibration to match my intention. And once my intention is able to resonate freely and powerfully throughout my being, whatever I have intended manifests abundantly in my life.

As we all know, living from the heart can be messy. It is also where the beauty of life is and will always be. The Newtonian world view offers the illusion of safety through a rationally understood and controllable existence. And this view is constantly being offered to you in the form of mobile phones, antibiotics, genetically modified food, nuclear power, military domination, and the other fantasies that science and the marketing industry (I include government here) offers to the world. They are doing their best to sell you a sense of safety and control. What's interesting to me is how often images of nature are used to sell us these fantasies.

Beyond the thin veil of fear, lies everything you have ever dreamt of. By setting your intention and compassionately holding space for what arises as a result, you are free to harness the most powerful creative force in existence (which is existence itself) and to play with it. That being the case, what is your heart’s desire today?

An important precept of The New Green Economy is the idea that we cannot buy our way out of environmental or social crisis. A basic reframing of the way we think is required if we are to continue building systems which will serve generations to come. For example, there are many sites on the internet that allow people to browse and purchase "green" products. While these sites provide an important service, they fail to include the larger practical vision which requires our culture to simply consume far less that it does now.

A relatively new site, www.LocalShare.org provides people with the ability to do just that - stop consuming new products. Users of the site can gift, share, trade, rent and sell items. These activities accomplish two things simultaneously:

1. A vast reduction of environmental impact.
2. Connection with others.

I was recently featured on a radio program "It's the Economy" where we discussed some of these concepts at length and responded to caller questions about what an economy based on sustainable values really looks like. The meat of the interview begins at about 9 minutes in. Click forward in the player below to jump to the interview.

Mac users, listen here...

After attending several events today that were part of 350.org’s Global Work Party, I came away with the following conclusions:

1. Learning about sustainability is perhaps the most important thing a person can do in today’s culture. Let me elaborate: There are approximately 80 million adults in the United states who are either passionately exploring the values-based cultural shift that is occurring in the U.S. and beyond or who are at least passionate about some aspect of the values that make it up. What was becoming clear today is that these people are onto something that is happening. And it’s something very big. They are not making it up. The concept of sustainability is based on a deeper reality that will wash over us as a values revolution defined not by consumer, pop culture, but by human evolution. There are deeper forces that are coming to the fore than anything that anyone has experienced in our lifetime. And these forces will completely reshape our culture from the ground up. And when I say completely, I mean imagine that there is no health care system, no money, or potentially even no government. That is the scale of what was being discussed today.
2. The predominant message that I heard today was about community. Over and over again I heard the message: reach out and connect with your neighbors. Connect with your community. Share food with them. Share your time and resources with them because in the cultural shift that is unfolding we are being reminded that we cannot “make it” alone.
3. We are living in a time of change and opportunity. Carolyn Baker, in her workshop “Forsaking the Destruction of Earth, Embracing a New Human Species” asked, “faced with the challenges that lie ahead, who do you want to be”? That question is becoming more pertinent than ever.
4. There are many practical steps that we as individuals can be taking, perhaps the most important ones relate to growing our own food, developing local sources of energy production (i.e. on your roof) and again, connecting more deeply with our communities.
5. Here is the big one and almost certainly the single biggest reason that people seem to operate in a drugged slumber when it comes to climate changes issues: asking people to change their behavior in relationship to climate change is paramount to asking them to change their very identity because they have grown up in a consumer culture. And so while they may intellectually understand the crisis, they are almost paralyzed because to take action goes directly against who they perceive themselves to be. How do we navigate that? Personally, I think the answer lies in incremental changes. For example, www.localshare.org provides people with the ability to start living differently just by making available the multitude of resources they have available in their home. With minimal effort, they can a small step of sharing or gifting something into their personal community and begin to experience the new paradigm that is unfolding.

The thought just occurred to me that climate scientists studying global warming is like a 10 year old riding in a car that is seconds away from slamming into a concrete wall and the child says, “hey, I think I’ll become an automotive engineer”. It’s just not going to work out.

What is really needed today is a change in culture, or more accurately a change in values. There is an emergent value set that is organically arising out of the current conditions of life on Earth (of which we are a big part). The key is that individuals, communities, and entire countries need to begin to understand those values and integrate them into their daily thinking and language.

Are you ready to advance your understanding of the values shift that is required of us now? If so, please read these three articles to gain a contextual understanding of the values evolution:

The Sustainable Value Set Series - Part I

The Sustainable Value Set Series - Part II

The Sustainable Value Set Series - Part III