Archives for April 2022

Let’s say you found the courage to ask for a time to talk to someone about something difficult. Let’s say that other person said okay. Let’s say the conversation went fairly well.

One area that is routinely overlooked is ending the conversation by having a conversation about what could be said (or not said) about the conversation to anyone else.

We all talk about each other outside of the times we are together. So, chances are you may have spoken to someone else about this person who you finally decided to speak with. Your own “supporters” may want to know how it went. Or there may be some more formal reporting out to a co-worker, team or supervisor.

A colleague of mine told me that in the newsrooms, there’s a saying “Define or be defined!”

Unless we pause at the end of our difficult conversations and discuss how you want to talk about your conversation, either of you may say things outside of your conversation that doesn’t work for the other. 

Take the time at the end of a meeting to clarify what each person thinks was agreed to and what will be said to others.

Sometimes it can also be like a breath of fresh air to simply admit there are side conversations going on outside the meeting – and then be able to come to some agreements about what will be said outside of the meeting going forward.

There are no guarantees the parties will “stick to” what was discussed. In fact, there are no guarantees that the parties will even remember or remember accurately what was discussed.

And, that’s not the point, per se.

The point is to raise the awareness that, when we do talk to others about each other, we do so deliberately – and hopefully with sensitivity.

That can be a good thing!

George Monbiot has a new book out called Regenesis – Feeding the World without Devouring the Planet

It’s inspiring to know there is some good thinking put into redesigning our food systems. This is from the introduction to the book:

“For the first time since the Neolithic, we have the opportunity to transform not only our food system but our entire relationship to the living world.

Farming is the world’s greatest cause of environmental destruction – and the one we are least prepared to talk about. We criticize urban sprawl, but farming sprawls across thirty times as much land. We have ploughed, fenced and grazed great tracts of the planet, felling forests, killing wildlife, and poisoning rivers and oceans to feed ourselves. Yet millions still go hungry.

Now the food system itself is beginning to falter. But, as George Monbiot shows us in this brilliant, bracingly original new book, we can resolve the biggest of our dilemmas and feed the world without devouring the planet.

Regenesis is a breathtaking vision of a new future for food and for humanity. Drawing on astonishing advances in soil ecology, Monbiot reveals how our changing understanding of the world beneath our feet could allow us to grow more food with less farming. He meets the people who are unlocking these methods, from the fruit and vegetable grower revolutionising our understanding of fertility; through breeders of perennial grains, liberating the land from ploughs and poisons; to the scientists pioneering new ways to grow protein and fat. Together, they show how the tiniest life forms could help us make peace with the planet, restore its living systems, and replace the age of extinction with an age of regenesis.”

Here are some of the reviews:

“Regenesis calls for nothing less than a revolution in the future of food – one that will literally transform the face of the Earth… This is Monbiot’s masterpiece.” … Kate Raworth

“A world-making, world-changing book.” … Robert Macfarlane

“Brilliant, mesmerizing, vital… a whole new way of thinking about our agriculture and our diets, our climate and our future.” … David Wallace-Wells

“Fearless and important.” … Greta Thunberg

“A harmonic vision of how changing our relationship to land use, farming and the food that we eat could transform our lives.” … Thom Yorke

I’m getting my copy from the library. Check it out!

A book I stumbled across years ago that gives me comfort from time to time is called Happiness is a Choice. It’s a challenging paradigm, as it posits that there are certain beliefs that support happiness and well-being and increase our “Happiness IQ” and certain ones that don’t.
 
In my eternal quest to both honour my animal body and increase my quotient of well-being, I offer you these beliefs they suggest can help us in our human quest for happiness.
 
There are 3 Happiness Beliefs that can either lower the capacity to choose happiness or increase our capacity to choose happiness. They are:

HAPPINESS IQ BELIEF #1:

• A low happiness IQ belief: “I can’t choose how I feel – it depends on what happens (the stimulus).”
• A high happiness IQ belief: “How I feel isn’t determined by what happens, but what I believe about what happens and I choose my beliefs, so in that way, I can choose happiness.”

HAPPINESS IQ BELIEF #2:

• A low happiness IQ belief: “I have to feel angry or worried to take care of something I care about.”
• A high happiness IQ belief: “I don’t need to get upset to take care of myself or others – I just have to know what I want.”

HAPPINESS IQ BELIEF #3:

• A low happiness IQ belief: “It’s only human to get unhappy when things don’t go the way I want.”
• A high happiness IQ belief: “There isn’t one per-determined way to respond to things.”

The whole premise that the book encourages is to shift from a place of feeling out of control to having a sense of efficacy when it comes to your own feelings. There is a more fundamental belief underlying the happiness philosophy which is shifting from:
 
“My mind just does what it does and thinks what it thinks and operates outside of my control.” To “I am the pilot of my mind and creator of my thoughts.”

This philosophy is easy to criticize, as we don’t really know where thoughts come from and sometimes we get an amygdala hijack that has very little to do with choosing! At the same time, finding our place inside where we feel more expansive than our little selves, can bring much comfort, joy and – yes – happiness!