7gen Bloc

The latest issue of the highly recommended Rachel’s Precautionary Reporter leads off with an interesting note about the new Bemidji Statement on Seventh Generation Guardianship, which was released on July 6 as part of the proceedings of the Indigenous Environmental Network’s 14th annual Protecting Mother Earth Conference in Bemidji, Minnesota.

Over the past month, I’ve been reading Presence by Peter M. Senge, C. Otto Scharmer, Joseph Jaworski, and Betty Sue Flowers. Those of you who have come to know me probably realize by now that I’m a pretty obsessive reader. Yet unlike most of what I read, Presence was more like a wonderful meditation than the acquisition of information. It is one of the most important and valuable books I’ve read over the past 5 to 10 years. Over the next few posts I make I’ll try to explain why.

I got back last night from a week in Portugal. It was our annual immediate family-only trip. Every year, Chiara, Alexander, Meika, my wife, and myself take a week alone somewhere to get reaquainted. It’s amazing what happens when we spend two hours having dinner rather than 2 minutes, and talk about world events rather than who’s going out tonight and what time they have to be home.

Does this sound familiar: You read the papers. You watch the news. You surf the blogosphere. And with every new bit of eco-reporting, you just keep thinking… This is freakin’ nuts. There’s got to be a better way. And of course there is. We don’t have to be chained to the toxics treadmill. With a little creativity, we can break the cycle and end our chemical addictions. A brand new study from the Toxics Use Reduction Institute (TURI) at the University of Massachusetts Lowell shows just how possible it is.

Ever wonder what it's like in the bowels of Seventh Generation? I am starting an ongoing series of V-logs to reveal who we are beyond the leaf. And on. WR

I just saw Al Gore’s movie. I know why he named it An Inconvenient Truth. Because much of what we can and must do is in fact inconvenient. The movie left me deeply saddened and depressed since so much of what I can and must do I have left undone. I have been complacent, left this challenge in the hands of others, and failed to take adequate responsibility for my own actions. That is now over. While I can say I already knew much of what Gore had to say, seeing all the facts and implications assembled together in such a powerful way has moved me to commit to the actions I have left undone.