I don’t know about you, but I usually feel confused and overwhelmed when thinking about the Problems of Peak Oil, Global warming and the present and impending environmental and economic implications. I know, like most of us know, that a change in the Western standard of living is necessary. I know that the answers lie in community efforts and self-dependence… However, sometimes it can all seem so massive, so many different changes to be made and so, so many problems with almost every aspect of the modern lifestyle… Enough to just make me want to stick my head in the sand and pray that it will all go away. You know what I mean?
Well, thank goodness for so many people in so many places that are working towards sustainable solutions on many levels. I try and post about them on this blog when I hear about them. (Because, like I say in FTY’s Mission statement, it really all does come down to what we eat and how we nourish and sustain ourselves, and doing that in a way that is balanced and integrated is the yoga [or union] of our minds, bodies, intentions and environment.)
And the truth of the matter is, it hasn’t been so long since we knew how to sustain ourselves. It’s really only the last hundred years or so (a very insignificant amount of time in the whole scheme of things) that industrialization has brought about such “advances” in technology that we have become more dependent upon outside, finite resources than one another and good Mother Earth.
The Arthur Morgan Institute for Community Solutions is a non-profit organization that educates on the benefits and values of small local community living. The Community Solutions program is a national resource for knowledge and practices on low-energy living and self-reliant communities. Community Solutions seek alternatives to both non-renewables (hydrogen, large scale coal/gas-to-liquids, carbon sequestration, tar sands) and renewables (large scale wind systems, biofuels, solar) that are risky and intended to maintain inequitable and unsustainable levels of resource consumption.
Community Solutions produced a wonderful documentary on Cuba’s response to drastic fuel shortage in the early 1990′s after the fall of the Soviet Union. The Power Of Community is part of the solution when looking at what is really required of us all NOW. Community involvement, safe, sustainable and fair food practices, taking care of the ‘global village’ by taking care of our immediate neighborhood first.
“Peak Oil will call into question our growth-based economic system. Thus the rising standards of living to which we have become accustomed may actually begin to decline after the peak. At the same time we believe that our quality the life may actually rise as people become more interdependent and cooperative within their local communities.”