complex shopping logistics

             Thirty, forty years ago things were simpler.  You'd go to the big supermarket to one-stop shop for most things.  We weren't worried about pesticide residue, we didn't think much about where our foods came from,  we didn't see the bigger picture of the conflict between profit and growing food sustainably, and the Western Diet hadn't blown up in our face yet.

            Nowadays I spend quite a bit of time running around to different places to fulfill my many food philosophies:  local food from local farmers to support the local economy and get the freshest possible food, produce that has not been sprayed or at least as little as possible, foods that are grown sustainably, pasture raised meat and sustainably fished seafood, eating more vegetables and lots of greens, and of course being cost conscious of the higher cost these types of food command.  It creates an intricate and more time consuming web of food related errands. 

            While we still do eat meat we eat a lot less of it and every few months I stock the freezer at a local farm where the animals graze outside all year round.  We get our raw milk and yogurt from a farm that is twenty-five miles away and have organized with several other families to take turns picking it up for the group so each of us only has to drive every other month.  Eggs come from the family whose place serves as the local weekly milk pick-up point.  Once a month our buying club gets a grocery and produce delivery from our food coop - we buy in bulk and share and save.  Some of the things I buy from the coop are bulk legumes, seeds and nuts, bulk tea and spices, condiments, nut and seed butters, also some personal care items.  Since the coop produce only lasts for about two weeks I fill in from a whole bunch of local farmers, and sometimes the supermarket.  I buy my recycled paper goods at Trader Joe's, where I also get some other organic basics such as vinegar and oils, chocolate, frozen organic spinach, and organic canned tomatoes.  Most of our supplements I order online as well as some specialty items I cannot readily find locally or through the coop (like our favorite smoky tea lapsang souchong, which our daughter humorously calls lapsang sooch).  And, believe it or not, I recently found a 5.5lb container of organic chia seeds at Walmart of all places (yes, I admit that I go there, too).

 

 

 

 

 

 

conquering negative thinking

             Are your thoughts helping to build you up, or tear you down?  That's the question Lesley Alderman poses in his recent NY Times article on conquering negative thinking.  You can think yourself into a spiral of negativity and only see gloom and doom.  You can keep moping.  You can believe that everyone is out to get you. But at one point or another it's neither fun for yourself nor the people around you.  Then it's time to pull yourself up by the bootstraps and do something about it.

            When you figure out and formulate what you want, and work towards it, instead of criticizing the present situation or what you currently don't have, you feel more energetic, more invigorated, more satisfied, and more inspired.   That's the beginning of hope.  Fear and anger can also spur an amazing amount of creative energy if put to good use.

            Complacency on the other hand, sitting back and hoping that others will do the work for you, waiting to see what happens, isn't going to get you anywhere. So put out there what you want, imagine it, "be the change you wish to see in the world," and make one small move in that direction today; and another one tomorrow; and the following day.  That is intent.  That is the only way to initiate change.  And it feels good because you make it happen.  You are in charge.

 

the new values

         A few years ago we hired a bright young man who left our company after only three short months.   He decided that he didn't want to work as much, and proposed to work less hours for less pay (which didn't work for us at the time). 

            There is a new set of values around, and it's quality-of-life based.  The younger generation, of which many did not vote in this past election because they did not feel heard, has a different set of values from the profit-based, fast-paced, career-track oriented hustle for the next promotion and bigger salary of the twentieth century.   The new values are not about chasing the next buck, but about a better quality of life, sustainability, trust and transparency, as well as sharing, cooperation and creating community.

            We get a glimpse of these new values in the many grassroots movements that are popping up everywhere:  deeper awareness about food issues (such as veganism, reduction of food waste by way of redistribution, organics, the local food movement); increasing awareness of social values (fair trade movement, raising the minimum wage, shorter work hours); the many environmental organizations, whether awareness raising or preserving land for future generations;  transparency (such as promoted by Wiki Leaks) and pricing information available on the internet; free sharing of music, education, and information on the internet.  Skills and things are shared and swapped, without the exchange of money, in hour exchanges, seed exchanges, repair cafés, tool libraries, cooperatives of all kinds, clothing and book swaps, and via Freecycle.  Some communities are experimenting with local currencies, some employers with job sharing, flex time, paternity leave, summer hours, and more time off.

            In an earlier blog post I introduced the Cultural Creatives, the name Ray and Anderson gave to these people, including myself and many of us, who share these values.  Know that these impulses are glimpses of a new cultural-economic model breaking through from underneath.  It's incredibly exciting to know we are part of something bigger, and that we are experiencing this shift to new values in real time. 

too cheap?

             A few days ago I saw a similar sign on the side of the road.  What came to mind was "Ok, so it's cheap.  But how would they actually treat my dog or my cat?  How carefully and compassionately is the procedure done?  If it's so cheap, which aspect of the experience suffers to make it so?   How well are the technicians trained?"  The reflections that ran through my mind had to do with quality.  Many things boil down to "how much" in our culture.  We tend to quantify, and we want it cheap. 

            But what about the quality aspect?  Fast food may be (relatively) cheap, but we all know about its quality - in the long run and in large quantities the stuff makes you sick.  Cheap clothes are exactly that - they won't last as long as a higher quality item, they couldn't possibly.   I could go on with more examples - cheap furniture, cheap kitchen gadgets, cheap tires.  They all don't last long.  It's not possible to make high quality items, or to provide a superior experience for cheap.  We need to weigh quality versus price when purchasing an item or a service.

            A summer or two ago my daughter wanted to get a manicure and we walked into a small salon on the way somewhere.  The advertised manicure was cheap.  We looked around.  The place was in a strip mall, the smells were overpowering and toxic, the furniture looked institutional, and the atmosphere was, well, cheap.  The whole thing about getting a manicure, at least to me, is to feel pampered, to experience a half hour of relaxation in a pleasant atmosphere.  This place did not provide any of those experiences.  We walked right back out and went elsewhere.  Sometimes too cheap is too cheap.

social transformation how-to

            Do you take for granted how our culture does things and thinks about things?  In other cultures things are done differently.  Twenty-six countries worldwide have banned GMOs, the US has not.  The US is the only Western country with capital punishment.  Do you wonder?  Are you curious why values differ from one country to the next?  Maybe you have wondered about the process to change such fundamental beliefs?

            Believe it or not, it boils down to this:  it all begins with you.  Change usually does not trickle down to us mere mortals because the government changes its policies in anticipation of your desires. The other way 'round:  the government changes its policies because of pressure from somewhere, whether consumers and voters, organizations, lobbyists, or corporate donors.  Whoever screams loudest and longest gets heard.  It's a critical mass thing.

            When you want change, the first thing to do is to look at your own actions and beliefs to make sure they are aligned with the change you wish to see.  Create the change in your mind and see how affiliations around you will shift.   The organic movement for example has grown exponentially in the past twenty years because individual food awareness has grown within so many of us.  That's why such change is called grassroots.  It begins at the bottom and grows up and unfolds from there.  Fracking was banned last year in New York State because of such from-the-bottom-up momentum.    What is your vision?

shift in consciousness?

          The internet and its content are changing the way we think.  First MTV, and now You Tube and Instagram have demonstrated that a picture, or better yet - a video, is worth a thousand words, and that we like them better than words.  Think emojis.  Pictures and videos convey at a glance, and often entirely without the necessity of words, what would otherwise take long to describe, decipher and understand.  Words are a go-between to conveying content.  Words are less direct because we need to use comparisons, descriptions, metaphors - and then we're still not sure our audience is on the same page we're on. 

            Think about how easy it is to understand a cooking technique or how to repair something by watching a video rather than having to read through a lengthy and cumbersome description of the process.  I remember the inch-plus thick Windows manuals in the early days of computers.  Nowadays nobody would read through the lengthy explanations of such instruction books any longer, you look it up on You Tube.  Quick and easy.

            This whole development is quite revolutionary because it changes the way we communicate.   We communicate more directly and faster this way, with less room for interpretation.  Is our consciousness changing, is the way our minds function shifting?  Will we eventually communicate via telepathy? 

 

where do you draw the line?

           A few years ago I bought a lovely linen summer dress at a second hand store for about $20.  I still like the dress but noticed that two seams were coming apart, which made it look a bit shabby.  I brought it to the local alterations seamstress, a lady from Europe who does superb work, because fixing it entailed a bit more than simply going down the seam with the machine.  She looked at it and said "Well, I don't want you to be surprised when you pick the dress up, but I have to undo both seems almost to the top, take the material in and then resew the seams, and it'll cost $60."  I thought that was a lot.

            Where do you draw the line?  Some things do, unfortunately, boil down to money.  I decided not to spend $60 to fix an old dress I bought for $20.  But it's a shame that fixing something should cost so much more than buying something new (since I buy a lot of my clothes at thrift stores I'm not used to $200 dresses).  When do you stop supporting your local business and watch out for your wallet?  I have the same issue with our local independent bookstore.  I support them however I can, but sometimes I just can't.  When a book costs just a few dollars more I'll buy it there, even if they don't have it and need to order it.  But what if I need to buy a bunch of books they don't have and would need to order, which would take at least a week, and their cost would be at least $30 more than if I ordered the books through a huge famous online store? 

            Where and how do you draw the line? It's a quandary.

why we need elders

            Children and grandchildren often lived either with or in proximity of their parents and grandparents, and in traditional societies still do, giving the younger generations access to older people they can trust, and who can guide them because they've been there done that.  Nowadays we don't always have access to that elder wisdom because parents and grandparents often live far away or perhaps we have excluded them from our lives because we were so busy. 

            But we all need mentors, guides, counselors, people who help us navigate our complex world that is going through huge changes.  The world is changing faster than ever.  Often the grandparent generation, even if around, is not keeping up with technology and social changes and is thus unable to help because they may feel lost themselves.  Heck, parents are often lost and their teens flounder and resort to drugs, alcohol, and the virtual screen world because they lack emotional support and wise guidance.  Between climate change, environmental calamities, changing economic paradigms and social structures, the refugee crisis from the Middle East and Africa, and violence and terrorism seemingly popping up anywhere and everywhere we have a lot to chew on.

            We need very special elders to guide us through these intense times so we don't get lost in despair, anguish, or aloofness.   They are around, I know some of them.  Intergenerational communication is more important than ever.