When I first saw this Gus Speth quote I thought: “Eureka! That’s exactly it- we’ve got way better tech now, yet we don’t use it because established systems won’t budge. The industry leaders make money, and we ‘first world’ consumers are stuck in our comfort zone. DARN.”
How to get out of this mess? Hm.
In innovation, we are often confronted with the “a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush” phenomenon.
So, we might need to explain better that it does not mean “back into the cave” for us. It’s about a prolific, conscious change in our consumerism behaviour. Care and respect for products, the world it comes from, the people who make it. Even if things are *not* scarce. Yet.
The ones of us who can afford to choose deliberately, should. It’s step one. The next step is to make it so commonplace that we only have to choose based on personal preference, not on product quality in means of ecological and social standards because of selling price.
I’d love to live long enough to see that – not other things like the decline of our social conscience, unmet climate change consequences and war.
Yes, I am with » Greta Thunberg when she wants the people at the » World Economic Forum 2019 in Davos to panic. These are the people who need to get going, who can make a big-scale difference, and fast. Top down.
Yet for us “normal” people … well, we need a brave heart.
We may not get disheartened. We do the little things in our everyday life. Use public transport, avoid problematic waste, sort & recycle our litter, use water sensibly, buy local, strengthen responsible-minded companies by buying their products, eat well, mind to use but not squander energy, vote, sign petitions … whatever is possible.
And talk about it! Let’s make the transformation the norm. Bottom up.
P.S.
You may want to read my blog article on circular economy on via » biognosis.eu
P.P.S.
I’m transferring my old blog articles from ideentheke.at to biognosis.eu because they are *very* often about learning from nature. The plan is to start writing in German via ideentheke.at – let’s see how that works out *wink*
P.P.P.S.
Braveheart GIF made by » jbrophy13