New Job at the ABCRC

Today I attended a discussion on how to make a better Calgary. The first part of the talk was dominated by the subject of the road ring from the perspective of a native living on the Tsuu T'ina reserve and it was very eye opening. The second part started with a discussion, started by me, about Calgary's waste management systems, the lacking of recycling infrastructure around the city, forcing people to throw it all away or simply throw it on the ground. This evolved into finding the causes of consumerism and how we can shift the collective consciousness towards a smaller, sustainable mindset. We talked a lot about 'Transition towns', small self sufficient communities built on cooperation, on borrowing rather than buying, growing and composting rather than throwing away. In smaller communities it would be more obvious to see all the fine workings of a system, and with this awareness of our surroundings people would lean away from consumerism, from the commodity of convenience, and more towards community. When our worlds become smaller we become more aware of our actions.

Picture globalization as an ocean, and consumerism has created vast and powerful waves that travel far far away. We send out all this energy, all this waste, and since there's no observable walls or limits on our system, we don't realize all our waste is just washing up on every shore of this planet. But now, if we shift to smaller self sustaining communities, our ocean now becomes a pond. and each wave we send out creates ripples that are visible to all. The limits of our system are clearly visible, and if any waste washes up, no one can ignore it. We become directly accountable for our actions, and it can allow us to live with a deeper rhythm to nature.

So that's the idea, but how to implement it? It's hard to say. No one is willing to downgrade from their big house in the suburbs, people don't want to do anything inconvenient. The idea was tossed around that the downfall of capitalism, crazy inflation and mass chaos will be what it takes for the shift to happen. Since our way of life is unsustainable, eventually it will come to an end. And when it does, there will be chaos to create a new way of life more in tune with nature. That brings me back to transition towns. People are starting to create these self sustaining communities, so that when the change occurs there will be this infrastructure and knowledge already in place to ease the change.

I really want to start one of these communities. My goal in life right now is to build an eco passive home, have a huge garden, chickens, ducks and a goat, and to live completely off the grid. One day it will happen I know, because I am determined and I am passionate, and these two things are nearly unstoppable.