Environmental Responsibility: Are We Doing Enough To Help The Planet?

May 23, 2022

MGU 347 | Help The Planet

 

Are we doing enough to help the planet? Is the responsibility on us to save the world from the climate crisis? What more can we do? In this episode, Whitney Lauritsen dives deep into the topic featuring articles that tackle environmental responsibility, begging the question of whether it is up to the individual or are there bigger powers at play? Join Whitney as she also shares her challenges and learnings while studying the climate crisis.

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Listen to the podcast here


 

Environmental Responsibility: Are We Doing Enough To Help The Planet?

Corporate VS Individual Responsibility

My friend emailed me a link to a protest related to the United States Postal Service. The USPS is planning to replace its entire delivery fleet with thousands of gas-powered delivery vehicles over the next decade. According to some sources, sixteen states have sued the postal service over these plans because the environmental analysis to justify spending $11 billion on these gas trucks, which are only getting 8.6 miles per gallon, is deeply flawed.

Some of these pieces that I am reading are coming from an article on CNBC.com. You can look this up, you can see exactly what is going on but it is alarming. I had no idea this was going on. I am reading an article but apparently, this has been going on for quite some time. In fact, one of the articles is from February of 2022, in which the postal service was finalizing these plans. It is upsetting.

I want to talk about that to bring more awareness and think about the impact that something as simple as our mail can have on the environment. It reminds me of a couple of things. One is from late 2021. I got this book sent to me from my friend, Brian Patton, who knows the author. It is called Can I Recycle This?: A Guide to Better Recycling and How to Reduce Single-Use Plastics by Jennie Rommer. It is a beautifully illustrated book. It is nice to look at. It is important because some of this can feel so upsetting, daunting, frustrating, and something that you might want to avoid, myself included, despite all the work that I have done to spread the word about environmentally-friendly things.

I have spent less time on that. Every time I started to talk about this, I feel my passion come back up, and want to get more involved. I like this book because it simplifies a lot of our questions around recycling but it also pointed out to me how many things I was trying to recycle, which is wishcycling and finding out they cannot be recycled, which to my knowledge, I have not read this book cover to cover.

From what I understand, that is creating more harm than good. It is putting me in a state of not full responsibility. For example, if I buy something and I think to myself, “I will put this in the recycling bin,” I am adding more work to the people that are sorting through things or causing issues with the machines when they are trying to recycle things.

Our recycling system is a mess but this book does give me some hope. The third thing I want to bring up along the subject matter is the research I have done about cryptocurrency’s impact on the environment. I did an episode on cryptocurrency. I talked about how I have become interested in it. I have been looking at it from financial benefits to global benefits to all the different things that cryptocurrency can do. There are pros and cons to that. I wanted to understand it.

I started digging into environmental research. I felt a lot of alarms coming up within me. I still have work to do. I am researching for an article, an episode on my show, Web3 With Whitney probably some TikTok videos. I feel like this is something important. It has been addressed a ton. I found lots of articles. I read through many sources to better understand it but I found myself thinking, “How did I go this long without realizing all of this?”

That is exactly why I brought up the recycling book and the issue with the USPS. Many, if not all, most people are aware that a lot of the things that we do and the decisions that we make have environmental downsides. Most people are aware that we are not in great shape with the environment but it is easy to turn a blind eye. It is easy to look the other way, even for me.

This is part of the reason I wanted to talk about this because there is this balance between the pressure we feel as individuals to do a lot and the frustration that comes along with that of feeling like, “We are doing so much, and it feels like we are still doomed. Maybe we are so overwhelmed. The best we can do is wishcycle. We feel burnt out by all this environmental news. It seems like nothing we are doing is making a difference anyway, so why even bother trying?” I have gone through all different versions of that. I have also swung in the other direction, especially early on in my online content career, where I was trying to do everything I could all the time and could not understand why other people were not doing it.

There's so much going on that we, as individuals and consumers, are not in control of because big corporations are profiting from a lot of this messaging. Share on X

Let’s dive into some of this stuff. I want to begin with one other article that I have been meaning to talk about on the show for quite some time. This came out in September 2021. It is from BusinessInsider.com. The title is “The Companies Polluting the Planet Have Spent Millions to Make You Think Carpooling and Recycling Will Save Us.” Talk about depressing. When you look at this article, if you do, there is a very unpleasant graphic of an oil slick that looks very evil and holding up signs that like, “Try all these things.” It is conveying the evil hidden behind all of these actions that we are encouraged to do to save the planet.

It reminds me, maybe this was intentional but there was this animated movie called FernGully. Have you seen that? If you have not, look it up. I loved the movie when I was little. It had this big environmental message, and there is a character made from oil. The concept of the movie is these fairies that live in FernGully. This big oil slick comes in from these guys doing construction. They are trying to extract the oil. There is a character who is the oil. He is slithering around and singing creepy songs. It did have a big impact on me because it scared me. It helped me as a kid understand what was going on. As a kid, you often feel so helpless. It is triggering this old memory.

This article talks about how plastic companies are spending tons of money to kickstart recycling programs. It is helping them avoid a ban so they can continue making money by selling you plastic products by convincing you that, “You recycle it. It is fine.” Decades later, fossil fuel interests spend millions to promote carpooling and reducing energy use, while activists and researchers say that this individual action narrative distracts from the biggest polluters.

This is a message that I have heard a lot. Many of us have been raised, trained, and educated about all of these things we should do. We hear things about recycling. For example, I grew up thinking a lot about recycling. We had recycling in our home. Anytime you drank a can of soda, you would put it in the recycling bin. Any bottle would go in there.

As I got older, I started thinking about paper. I loved printing on double size of a piece of paper for school so that I could save a paper. I would also take papers that had already been printed and print them on the opposite side. I had all those tactics in college too. People always thought I was weird for doing that but I was thinking a lot about that.

My career evolved into starting Eco-Vegan Gal, where it was centered around helping other people understand these things. Sometimes I feel guilty for not continuing that activism but I got burnt out and started to prioritize mental wellbeing, which is the theme of this show. Of all the things I described earlier, there are not just environmental consequences. There are also emotional and mental consequences.

We need to prioritize that because, given the state of things, it is possible that things are going in such a bad direction that we might not be able to reverse much of it. I do not know if that is the case. I am not trying to instill any sense of doom or fear but to continue to have a wakeup call. To the point of this Insider article, there is so much going on that we, as individuals, as consumers, are not in control of because there are big corporations that are profiting from a lot of this messaging. This article goes into depth on this. I have heard a lot of people share this and wanting to take the blame away from us. Part of the mental health challenge is not the state of things and climate anxiety that many people are experiencing but many of us feel guilty, “Have we done enough?”

Maybe that is purposeful, making us feel bad while these companies are profiting off of us, toying with our emotions, and sending us mixed messages. That feels upsetting. Even for me, when I bought my Tesla, the electric car. I have this big hope like, “Electric cars are the way to go.” I had spent years researching electric cars. There is that movie that killed the electric car. That was my big introduction to them.

I remember hearing about them in high school or even younger. I have been thinking about electric cars so much. I thought about it and felt like it was a good decision but the truth is that Tesla is a successful company. Other companies that make electric cars are also successful. There is a lot of financial incentive for them to convince us that that is a good choice.

MGU 347 | Help The Planet

Help The Planet: A lot of the things set up for us right now, when it comes to being more environmentally friendly, are not accessible to people in that state of mind.

 

I hope that the pros of an electric car outweigh the costs but I am also not under this illusion that having an electric car is the perfect solution. It is something I think about but I haven’t spent a ton of time and energy on. Looking at an article like this where it emphasizes things like carpooling, which is another thing I have heard so much. Take public transportation, ride with a friend or take a Lyft or Uber.

We hear this messaging a lot but how much of a difference does that make? The article also talks about things like, “Steadying thermostat at a place where you can be more energy efficient.” There are websites where you could go on and calculate your carbon impact but how much of that is making a big difference?

Insider said that, “Telling people to solve a crisis by changing their own habits is a tried and true corporate tactic pioneered by the tobacco and plastics industry. Fossil fuel giants like Chevron, BP, and ExxonMobil have spent millions to convince the public that consumer choices and lifestyle changes will solve the problem. At this point, personal lifestyle changes will not turn the climate crisis around. A report from the International Energy Agency estimates that individual behavioral changes will only account for 4% of the necessary reductions. To have even a 50% chance of stopping the world’s temperature from rising, 90% of coal and 60% of oil and gas reserves must stay in the ground.” This is why that oil slick is there.

This is the interesting thing too. That movie, FernGully: The Last Rainforest, come out in 1992. Here we are still hearing bad things about oil. I am not saying that FernGully should have changed the path like, “FernGully, now the world has figured out that we should be avoiding oil.” I am sure that so much was going on with oil at that point that it was a concern.

The creators, hopefully, made that movie to help kids understand what was at stake, yet how much has changed? Things have gotten much worse. In fact, the Insider in the next section talks about in 1971 TVs across the US blasted a heart-wrenching PSA. This is about the American Indian man. I remember this. He was talking about pollution. “The Crying Indian PSA” in 1971, I remember seeing that as a kid, too. I was born way after then, but it is so interesting.

Recycling and trash were told to us over and over again like, “You are the one that is polluting the environment. You have to start recycling.” As this article mentions, making recycling work is a way to keep products in the marketplace because it improves the image of the material. By 2015, the quality of plastic produced each year had increased tenfold from 1971. Less than 10% of that material has ever been recycled.

Spending so much of my life recycling, I feel like I was in the minority for so long. Now I feel like recycling is common. It seems like something a lot of people do but I do not know for sure. I am not watching all my friends and whether or not they recycle. That blows my mind. Maybe it is because I grew up recycling that I figured everybody did it, and everyone knew that it was helpful.

You look around any street, and you will see trash. You can look at a trash bin and how much is in there compared to how much is in the recycling. You can look at festivals. That image comes across my head. I saw a disturbing one from after Coachella. There was a bulldozer plowing through a field of tents that people left behind. I am like, “Are you kidding me? These just people left their tents.” I did not get the full context. I assumed that it was attendees that left those tents.

Maybe it was the festival’s tents that they left. I am not quite sure but a bulldozer was plowing through perfectly fine tents. People in the comment section of this video were saying, “That is a waste because there are plenty of people that do not have homes that would like a tent like that to be donated to them.” Yet, “It is easy to bulldoze over them.”

What if, instead of spending all this time and money purchasing electric cars and buying recyclable products, we turn our attention to politics. Share on X

Again, I did not see the full context. I do not know if somehow they were still going to save the tent or whatever the plan was but it is also the image I have seen in person. I went to the Bonnaroo Music Festival and did a whole video on that for Eco-Vegan Gal. A clip made it into that video that I made where I was standing in a field of trash. You can still see the grass but there was trash everywhere.

I have seen images like that of Coachella year after year. People go to these festivals and throw stuff on the ground. I cannot even imagine. My point being that there are still plenty of people that do not even recycle. No wonder the percentage is too low but to the point of this article, how much of a difference would it even make?

Plastic production is expected to double by 2040 and triple by 2050, according to the World Economic Forum. The challenges that many companies that, even most companies and many politicians, are still thinking in this personal responsibility frame and putting the emphasis on individual consumers. That keeps the conversation focused on solutions that cannot solve the problem.

The article gets into electricity usage, how each of us is encouraged to heat and cool our homes efficiently, and improve our gas mileage. We have been marketed more to purchase electric cars, as I have. I noticed since I got my first electric car, which was in 2015, It is becoming more common in the ads. Even during the Super Bowl, there were a ton of electric car ads out.

You see that but you got to imagine that companies are willing to spend the money to make a Super Bowl ad. They are profiting off of people buying electric cars. How do they get powered? Through electricity. There are ways to use solar power to power your car but it is not a perfect system. A lot of the places that I go to charge my car are powered by coal. That is depressing. I have looked into some of the data that Tesla put out, and there were some things I remember. I cannot articulate it off the top of my head but there are some benefits to electric cars, at least in the terms of how they were making them, that seemed to offset enough.

I got to be honest. I still feel ignorant about it. I do not want to live in denial as if a brand new car is not contributing to this. It is tough. The article gets into how Chevron, BP, and ExxonMobil are all saying that they are trying to reduce emissions. They are investing money into energy transitions. They are claiming a lot of stuff about even reducing plastic waste. BP says they do not want to comment on it but it is pointing to a net-zero goal and acquiring solar energy projects. It seems like they are increasing but how much of that is going to be done soon enough? That is one of the biggest questions here. Is it going to be done in time?

Turning The Focus Towards Politics

The article ends with a section about a million dollar distraction and how we can feel so much responsibility and feel paralyzed that, that prevents us from taking the political action that we need to take. I am not somebody that gets that involved with politics. This is why my friend forwarded over this article about the postal service. Thank goodness that I have some friends that are more active than I am in the environmental world these days. I would not even know about some of these things that are happening.

The Insider article ends with, “How do we balance the personal responsibility with the larger structural and political questions that take? What is the role of the fossil fuel industry? Riding our bikes is important. Turning off the lights and not cranking the AC with the window open but it pales in comparison to the political activity to change the rules about how our energy system is structured. Who the actors are? Who benefits? Who pays?” Part of me feels depressed about this. another part of me feels like, “It is not simple but what if instead of spending all this time and money purchasing electric cars, recycling, buying recyclable products, and doing all that stuff, what if we turned our attention to politics?” That is something I have never done.

Recycling And The Accessibility Of Environmentalism

I have done the bare minimum of understanding politics, mostly around elections. It is like, “How do I decide who to vote for? What is going on with them?” I pay more attention during the big government elections but I have no idea what is going on in between those few years. I know I want to vote. I feel extremely ignorant. That is a great place for me to switch my focus. It is nice to know about recycling but after reading that article, I am not saying, “Do not recycle.” This book has been helpful. There is a section I wanted to read here about, “What does recyclable mean?” It is a term that we see on things and gives us a feel-good feeling to make us make purchasing decisions. A lot of that term is used very broadly.

MGU 347 | Help The Planet

Help The Planet: If such a fraction of people are taking the time, money, and energy into the stuff, and it’s still barely making a dent, there is a bigger problem at play.

 

The author, Jennie, recommends using the guidance of the Federal Trade Commission, the FTC. They have marketing guidelines of what can be recycled. The easiest definition is accessibility. At least 60% of consumer have access to recycling facilities, sortability sorted by existing infrastructure in end markets, and sufficient market demand to convert material into another item.

I always felt so confused about terms like compostable and biodegradable. They seem so promising but I do not know if she gets into this in the book about what that means. I did see a section in here about that. A lot of times, it is not composting. We think we are buying something that is better for the environment but if we toss it in the recycling bin, it is going to end up in the landfill.

All this ignorance we have or lack of access to where things could go is frustrating. She also has a page in here that says, “Wishcycling is not helpful. All the time, money, and energy spent on collection and sorting, and bailing of recyclables are for nothing if no one wants to buy the bails of these recyclables. If there is no buyer, the recyclables are essentially garbage and go to either landfill fills or incinerators.

When consumers put non-recyclable items into their recycling bins, these materials take a long and continuous, and expensive route to the landfill. Avoid being part of the problem by not wishcycling. Wishcycling is when you are pretty sure that something is not recyclable but you put it in your recycling bin anyway.” I do that. I used to do that a lot more. After reading books like this, I have stopped.

If you know an item cannot be recycled, do not put it in your recycling bin. For example, include tiny pieces of plastic, a plastic film like carry out bags, polystyrene foam, and multi-layer packaging like juice pouches and paper napkins. Better yet, whenever possible, avoid buying products that you know are not recyclable. This is the thing. That last statement comes back around to how hard it is to avoid buying products like that.

That is where I have been. I am going to admit something that gives me a lot of guilt. Overtime I have stopped paying attention. Not out of a strong, conscious rebellious way but it feels too much sometimes to go to the store and look at every piece of packaging. I used to be so passionate about buying things in bulk and buying fresh food without labels or packaging on it.

I felt very passionate and determined to do that but here is the issue. Those items are not always accessible, even for me in Los Angeles, which is a very environmentally-focused and passionate city. It still takes effort. A great example is I wanted to start buying dish soap, shampoo, and conditioner in bulk. I wanted to buy a dish soap bar, for example. I had heard about them and got very excited about it.

I went to buy this dish soap bar from a company called No Tox Life. When I saw the price tag, I was like, “Are you kidding me?” First of all, to find this bar, I had to go to so many stores. I eventually found it twenty minutes away. The store did not have parking. It was such a big obstacle for me to get there. I went out of my way but I was determined.

It was over $10 for this bar of soap that I had never used before. I am like, “How long is this going to last me? How well is this going to clean my dishes?” In my head, I am thinking, “What average person is going to spend however much it was to buy this bar of soap?” Not many people. A lot of people shop at dollar stores. That is where they get their dish soap. They go to the cheapest grocery store in their area or to Costco. From my awareness, most people are not going to go out of their way to some inconvenient store. Most people do not live in a city like Los Angeles that provides stuff like that, nor would they even want to buy it.

So much of environmentalism is centered around privilege. Share on X

You can get it online. I am sure there are other competitors out there. You could even make it yourself but how many people have the time and determination to do that? That is my point. Even in Los Angeles, where I live, the area of LA I am in has so many walkable stores, none of those have this dish soap or another competitor. Most of the dish soap is the standard type that is in a plastic bottle. When I am feeling stressed, when I do not want to spend a lot of money, when I do not have a lot of time, what do you think I am going to do? I do not think I am alone in this. This is not to excuse that behavior. It is to understand it and talk about the access side of it.

The average person I talk to directly or I see online through social media posts seems so stressed, burnt out, overwhelmed, stretched thin for time, feeling busy, and not having a lot of money. A lot of the things that are set up for us now when it comes to being more environmentally-friendly are not accessible to people in that state of mind. This is exactly why my focus has come to mental health, inclusivity, being anti-racist, and focusing on what is going on in people’s lives and where the barriers are for them. Much of environmentalism, to me, is centered around privilege. It is centered around people that have access to information, access to but environmentally-friendly things, access to time it takes to go out of your way to get these things, and access to an area.

Even organic food is out of reach for people. Not just from cost but from the location. The food desert, sometimes even getting fresh food, is out of reach for people. The best fresh food that they can get is nearby but it is at a store that only carries poor-quality, fresh food, and they have tried it and do not like it. Not everybody has the privilege to live in Southern California, where you can go to the farmers’ market and get a good deal on things. Even at the farmers’ market, I rarely go. There is one walking distance from me. From a mental health standpoint, I am usually too overwhelmed to go to that market.

As silly as that sounds, I will be fully transparent. I have not been to that market in a long time. Granted, COVID played a big role. I did not feel comfortable going to a crowded market for a long time. I would go if I had the energy to go, mentally. A lot of days, I would much rather get in my car, drive to the market, do a quick trip and not have to walk around and deal with the farmers’ market environment. Maybe it is an LA thing. Going to the farmers’ market in LA feels like an ordeal for me. For somebody else, it may be easy for them. My point is that it is not always emotionally accessible for us to make these seemingly simple decisions.

It is not always financially accessible, location accessible, on and on accessibility. Coming back to the information, how is it that so much of what is going on in the environment and politics goes right over my head? I do not even notice it because I have got all these things going on in my life. Spending the time to slow down and pay attention to new information can feel challenging, even for someone like me, who has been passionate about it.

Having access to the internet is a privilege. Having access to friends that are passionate about these things is a privilege. I see so many things through the lens of privilege now. We have to look at the general population. When I started my career with Eco-Vegan Gal, I was in a bubble. Eco-Vegan Gal started because the high-end grocery store in Los Angeles that I shopped at had a programming event that I went to and saw some vloggers talking about their environmental work.

I decided to start Eco-Vegan Gal because I had the time and energy to start it at the time. I had the privilege of working for someone who was encouraging, who had let me spend some of my time at work studying these things. I had the privilege of extra time during my lunch breaks to work on Eco-Vegan Gal. I had the privilege of making enough money at that time to go to the store and start investing in some of these environmental things.

The beginning of Eco-Vegan Gal was privileged. Going back to my roots and learning about recycling, I had the privilege of parents who encouraged that and set things up for me. I could trace back so much of that to privilege. Now that I am seeing that, it makes more and more sense when you look at these statistics. If such a fraction of people are taking the time, money, and energy into the stuff and it is still barely making a dent, there is a bigger problem at play here.

Even going back to my comments about cryptocurrency, which I touched upon, to summarize quickly, cryptocurrency is set up with miners. It is a fascinating system. They are run on these processors and computers where they are sucking up a ton of energy. They are also often in places that take a lot of coal power to power of the machines that they are using to create cryptocurrency like Bitcoin, for example. It is very confusing. This is why I had to spend hours researching this because I was like, “What does this even mean?”

MGU 347 | Help The Planet

Help The Planet: The community itself is key to our well-being, knowing that we’re supported and not alone in finding like-minded people.

 

People are using hardware to verify transactions because that is how this decentralized blockchain works. The way things are set up, they have to verify a ton of things. They have to solve these mathematical equations. It is fascinating, complex, and confusing but it is very energy-intensive. It is the greatest way to say that. It is emitting a lot of CO2. Also, there are people all around the world that are incentivized to create this cryptocurrence. It ties into what I am saying here.

You might think, “I am buying a coin.” It is digital, and you do not think twice about it. When we look into what goes on behind the scenes, to even run the internet. You reading this, in a way, is causing emissions. I do not have all the details on that. I should look that up too but using your computer and the internet, your own personal electricity, and the storage it takes to host a podcast. There are all these figures built into this but many of us are used to that.

We do not think twice about it because we are not taught to think a lot about it. We have these things like cryptocurrency, which are creating even more emissions that are irreversible. There are ways that I am researching that could offset some of this but it is very complex. There are also some ways that are working on associating cryptocurrency with renewable energy sources but that is very complex.

Mental Well-Being While Taking Action

There are people trying to design better systems that do not involve as many people or as many machineries. It is insane how much is going on. One of the articles I read said, “There is no way around this topic. Let’s not find excuses or try to buy off our guilt but focus on reducing our impact now.” That is a good place to start in addition to better understanding things like politics.

I hope that this has not created more overwhelm, frustration or sadness in you. If it has, that is okay. While it was not my intention, feeling those emotions is a natural result of discussing this and perhaps even beneficial because when we feel those low emotions, it gives us an opportunity to think about a way to work through this. You might get low and not be able to get out of it. It is important to examine ways in which you can pull yourself out. Sometimes that is only something that you can figure out. Depression is a very complex thing, anxiety, and stress.

I do not think that we should avoid it though. I do not think we should avoid talking and thinking about this because while we may not have as much power as individuals, collectively, there are things that we can do. If politics is one of the best things that we can do, especially for those that are in a democratic society, we do have a say. We can vote on things, sign petitions, attend meetings, call, and encourage our friends as my friend did.

In fact, once I finish this episode, I am going to go take a better look at what she sent me and better understand the situation with the post office. We can stop and think about the systems that we are part of. I sent some mail. I do not send a ton of letters or receive them but I do get packages. Those are sometimes from the USPS. I can think about how the workers are being treated and what is going on behind the scenes. How does my mail get delivered here? What packaging? I think a lot about packaging but not just recycling that or choosing companies that have a good system in place. A lot of that is more in our face like reducing how much we buy online. If we are going to shop online, what companies we support.

A lot of us do not think about the delivery side of it. We do not always think about the workers involved and the people running the companies. All of that stuff can be very political too. We are often encouraged to vote with our dollars. I do think that is a great place to start but it is complicated. This goes back into what I was saying. Sometimes I do not have the mental energy or bandwidth to do all that research.

That is where I think another opportunity comes in for us, which is to support each other. What if we started calling on one another to help get through this together and to hold each other accountable? This is where community becomes more and more important, and my growing passion for community, places like Beyond Measure, my private community.

While we may not have as much power as individuals, collectively, there are things that we can do. Share on X

If you want to join, we can get into an environmental-focused conversation. That is something at this moment I feel very motivated to do because every week on Beyond Measure, we have a group call centered around a theme. We have yet to do anything environmental related. What if once a month, we all came together, held each other accountable, and talked about things that we were doing?

Even if it was something small, we talked about where we needed help and support. We asked each other questions. That is exactly what we do in Beyond Measure with things like our finances, our food choices, and other things that contribute to our well-being. It is funny how I never considered adding in the environmental component but I love that idea because maybe somebody in the group is already educated on something.

You do not have to do the research. They can answer your questions and help guide you towards the right way. This is where community comes into play. We can spread out the work, divide and conquer, and know that we are in this together. That improves our mental well-being that can reduce the stress, anxiety, and depression. This is the power of community.

In fact, community itself is key to our well-being, knowing that we are supported, knowing that we are not alone, and finding like-minded people. When we start to think about how depressing, sad, frustrating, and we feel out of control. It can cause us to spiral or numb out. I have been there. I am there often. I am blessed that I have not felt like dark and depressed but I have certainly felt overwhelmed because there is a lot to be done.

I want you to know that you are not alone. I am here in this with you. We can talk through the hard stuff, we can rally and learn together. I feel something like politics is so daunting to me because I have never been that into it. I have never been that interested but knowing how much of a difference it can make for me to better understand politics in terms of taking more action for the environment, motivates me. Sometimes we need to find the trigger. We need to find the purpose behind something that we are not interested in.

Once we learn, we can pass that knowledge on to others. I imagine, like other things that I do, that once you get into something, you will start to meet incredible people that are into it as well. That has been a benefit of learning about cryptocurrency and Web3. I have met amazing people that are deeply passionate. Cryptocurrency is a great example of how I went from feeling incredibly ignorant and overwhelmed about something, to learning enough to spark my passion. If I can do that with something brand new, I can certainly add the politics of environmentalism into that. Hopefully, I can get the ball rolling. I plan to add that into Beyond Measure. I would love to have you part of it as I often say.

I want you to know, regardless, I would love to work on this with you. I would love to feel more connected to you. That connection is such a driving force through these hard times. I am going to leave it at that. This is the tip of the iceberg, which is a little bit of a pun. Given the icebergs are often a visual for the way the climate is headed.

I would get like to get back into the rhythm of talking about these things because I feel like I have put them on the back burner for too long. Thank you for reading. Thanks for holding space for me. Thanks for thinking this through with me, even though I cannot hear you. I would like to hear you. Please send me a direct message or an email. Join Beyond Measure if you want to connect in real-time. Reach out to me however makes sense.

Social media is great too, publicly or privately. I am @WhitLauritsen. The show’s social media is @Wellevatr. When it comes out, you can see my messy background, which is all set up for an upcoming road trip, which by the time this episode comes out, I have already come home from it. Stay tuned because I intend to talk about the road trip, and hopefully, it gives more thought to the environmental issues along the way.

Oftentimes, seeing the state of the country that I live in helps me stay motivated to be mindful of all sorts of things, myself, other people, and the planet. Being in nature helps me. I love going to national parks. They are beautiful and sad at the same time because they are so preserved but there are many people that visit. There is often traffic, trash or people breaking the rules and causing damage to things. It is fascinating on a lot of different levels but they are there to keep parts of this country well-maintained, flourishing the plants and the animals. They are so refreshing for the most part.

Spending that time in nature, especially for someone like me, who lives in a big city, is important to get out, have some clean air and clear skies, and see some beautiful parts of this world to remember why I want to preserve it as much as possible. I will likely return refreshed and even more passionate. That is it for now. I hope that you found a way to feel uplifted and motivated too. I would love to know what is going on in your heart. If you feel like writing me a message, please send it over. If not, I hope to learn from you soon. I will be back with another episode with a special guest. I am wishing you all the very best between now and then.

 

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