I am involved with a number of sustainability tinged projects that encompass many differing aspects and themes that I categorise all under differing aspects of sustainabuility.These activities are not all mutually exclusive ...but linked in my mind as differing aspects of the active exploration of what it means to live a lifestyle which encompasses both Personal ,private and professional choices and activities in the 'real' world .
For myself this means continually reflecting upon the meaning that such a concept has for me in these perceived interlinked and interwoven worlds of activity.I need a scaffold and view as to how all these many activities are linked and impact upon each other.
This has especially been brought home to me by being involved in many differing environmental,OHSE and social justice groups over the years...let alone the workplace circumstances and changes wrought by building relationships both personal and professional in an everchanging and tightly networked world and indeed diverse versions of community within which I must work ,operate and relate within.These are of course all various spaces...but they are more than that,... I am swimming in an almost imperceptible and confusing ecosytem of relationships,impacts and ties that are being created and made more and less visible by things like the internet and various ICT influenced activities as well as an increasingly important theme that is starting to grip people in all aspects of their lives...'world and local climate change'
All this of course requires a type of scaffold or analysis /working world view that moves and categorises quickly to understand at any one point where an individual or group is navigating in whatever circumstance where they are heading,living and expressing the type of lifestyle they want to live in,culturally,communally and politically...How to do this... a big ask ...I know!?
This question of where I sit ,what I believe and want to navigate to in all areas of my life becomes increasingly important as I try to understand the deep impacts of choosing to live a balanced sustainable and more integrated lifestyle with all my relationships and activities ...in some sort of harmony.Complicated stuff.
How does one live a'sustainable lifestyle" given some of the contexts I live in?
Lets have a look at what can be done to illucidate some of this stuff.
The contradictions and bizarre realities of existance at this point in time hit me as I reflect upon my own personal position.
I am involved in an organisation called SPA...Sustainable Practitioners Association on the management committee and its professional development sub committee.This activity I carry out as an end result of experiences in many fields but most recently my experiences as working within a OHSE team( Occupational Health Safety &Environment) advisor with my company TCC Group who operate as contractors to a large multinational... in BP Amoco's Refinery In Kwinana Western Australia(in the belly of the beast so to speak).Without the full experiential history which has led me to this place I am confronted with many ethical and challenging decisions and balances that I have to confront given all the realtionships I have and my view of the impacts of our oil based /industrial econmies and its excesses upon world climate change,poverty,land use and degradation of both land and worker alike to some aspects.Its not all bleak of course...but the way that we work impacts upon many balances being required and relected upon to put them back into some sane sense of growth and'sustainability'.
I need to accept that the personal is political and that now than ever before our individual and collective choices mean more and indeed mean less!?
I suppose what I mean to say is that things like the global digitising of our spaces/relationships etc has meant a shallowing rather than necessarily deepening of some of our understanding of the degree of influence we have on global and local impacts and politics and policymaking.
Things like the internet both give us great collective and individuals potentials for power and influence ...but they also shallow,trivialise and disempower us as a result of its faceless (at times) ubiquity and technology.
We are linked in many more ways that I can nor others I am sure appreciate easily today...and yet we are being asked and indeed I think it is essential we answer the question...who are we and what do we believe?What sort of world do we want to live in ...now and for our future generations.What will we leave of our relationships to the natural environment and to our own essential communal/individual and personal natures...what sort of culture are we creating?
Where are the links?we all need some sort of map to understand where we are heading?...even if we dont want to go anywhere in particular(might just want to know where we are now!).
thats why I am always looking for obscure links and signpostings to make sense and connecte and integrate my actions and life.Whats the map?
For me it more about socially just and productive /growthful relationships across the board...not just some highly impractical hippy,trippy green belief system(though I have always got a foot in their camp I suppose because they have signposts to the type of lifestyle,vision and world view they have for this planet).Its understanding the responsibilities and accountabilities of being connected,neighbours,influencing and impacting and interrelating in a world that needs atype of dynamic balance to function well in all aspects spheres of activty...both personal and global.
what does this mean for me?
In brief it means that OHSE is about creating safe,health and wellness balanced relationships with the industrial context that is sensitive to and accepts and promotes sensitive,growthful...but not toxic and wasteful uses of all environmental assets and aspects that we have responsibility for.It is also about quality...providing quality work that does not create destructive behaviours ,nor industrial,social impacts that are 'toxic'.Its about innovation as a result.!..that means organisational change that is more sensitive to such issues...It gets back to where we see that work even in its lack has a key role in this societal dilemma....that I and you and all are confronted with...its a challenge that has a high risk and price attached.
Some useful links;
David Suzuki Foundation
BP Environment /Sustainability
First Monday
AOIR
Fibreculture
Matthew Fox
Matthew Allen
WWF &Sustainability
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