Ripples

From the simplest local organic food purchase to socially responsible investments to supporting and highlighting emerging sustainable solutions in the outdoor industry, take the time to know where and how your decisions could matter more.

As we grow and share these visions with greater focus, power, and pizzazz, we become the vibrant catalysts necessary to transform this widespread public malaise into an unsinkable force of mindful masses eager to eat, breathe and dream into being the world we’d like to call home.

Each decision and relation reclaimed empowers us to further clarify and build our vision of the future—and to have a damn fine time while doing so.

Ripples

by Trathen Heckman

a few years ago, I began most days in a captivated state of awe as I rode the chair lift to the top of Mt. Lincoln at Sugar Bowl. Something in the still presence of the mountains always jiggled my insides about. Of course some of it might have been a touch of adrenaline, knowing I’d soon be hurtling my booty off jumps and cliffs, trying to master various spins and flips. At the time I was competing in a lot of Big Air and other such snowboarding contests, hoping to increase my meager sponsorship dollars.

For much of my life I’ve loved and enjoyed nature, but never really understood my connection to it or how my common decisions affected it. In pulling out of my brief snowboarding career in the interest of self-preservation, I gradually became more aware of the painful and often hidden costs of our fortunate lives. As I feverishly began seeking out solutions to transform the less savory ways I impacted the world, a universe of unseen possibilities opened up, landing me in the hills of Sonoma County, California.

While my snow time has declined these last several years, I still begin my morning with awestruck moments. Fortunately my career shift requires this reverence of me; that I take the time to write, dream, recalibrate and root into the majesty of each new day. As Executive Director and co-founder of Daily Acts, an organization that provides inspired and practical solutions empowering people to live rich lives that enrich life, I find it vital to cultivate a capacity to hold the beauty and hurt in our heart. We live in a time of extreme ecological devastation and social injustice. All of the inspiration we can muster is needed to gain the impetus to shift this cultural impotence, which disempowers and devalues the common actions and relationships that comprise our lives. Each ounce of our existence is alive and begging to be celebrated.

Author Deng Ming Dao defines reverence as the steadfast determination to make something of the materials and the moment. Reverence is probably some of what got you into this industry—love of the ocean, rivers, and lakes; those mountaintop highs. Wouldn’t you like to dive deeper with it all, to better understand how we relate to and affect nature’s dream, to better care for and advocate for her grandeur? So with that in mind, what I have for you is a touch of metaphor-savvy strategy as I wrap life’s majesty in a bit of verbal pageantry and ask candidly for you to find the time and capacity to live and act with a proactive audacity that ooooozes life’s appeal. What I’m talkin’ about is using each breath, act and organic, whole-grain decision to more clearly articulate how we wish to relate to ourselves, our communities, and each deed shaping this shared global village. From the simplest local organic food purchase to socially responsible investments to supporting and highlighting emerging sustainable solutions in the outdoor industry, take the time to know where and how your decisions could matter more. It’s how we embody and share this reverent reciprocity with life through all we do that determines the quality of our lives and the health of the world we hand off to our children.

The idea of an ecological sustainability in which society satisfies its needs without diminishing the capacity of the planet to provide for future generations is rapidly and rightfully gaining momentum. But to keep it from becoming a slippery catchphrase we can’t quite get a handle on, author Fritjof Capra roots the concept into nature’s ecosystems, where communities of plants and critters model sustainability with precision and grace. He defines ecological literacy as an understanding of the principles of organization that ecosystems have evolved over billions of years to sustain the web of life. This is a cornerstone in seeking to achieve sustainability. How this matters to you and me is that humanity’s long term survival requires us to reshape our lives, companies and culture to live within the means of natural systems and the principles of ecology that govern them.

I know this sounds like a tall task and a lot to ask, but it’s much simpler than you’d think. It’s about cultivating healthy relationships through each of our actions, with the communities we are of and the unseen ones we touch through the resources we consume and purchases made. There’s such a powerful richness available to each one of us lying dormant in our daily actions. And while life’s busy pull and your full plate won’t change, the world conspires to support us when we seek out this rooted-in-life connection expressed in a familial sense of stewardship which drives our every thought and act. So don’t be reluctant to dream and speak great dreams—even if you don’t know how you’ll grow into those ideals. It’s like Goethe said, “Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.”

We need to feel those mountaintop highs throughout each aspect of our lives, and so we need to stage constant reminders and set up reference points throughout our day and week to pull us back into awareness of the relationships we’re cultivating. It’s not just about occasional majestic views or conscious decisions. With the scale of planetary desecration we’re confronting, we need to pattern those insights and the feel of how we relate with life in those awestruck moments into habits of effectiveness that keep us inspired; thinking and acting critically to make something more of the materials and moment. It seems like one of the biggest challenges is the enormity of the issues we face. Many bury their head in the sand and the seeming comfort of complacency, while others get emotionally dismantled by the severity of the situation. But why not do what it takes to embrace the pain and be boundless enough to live in a steady state of praise, realizing like Joanna Macy that the heart which breaks many times is big enough to contain the whole world.

It’s time to create the space for us to focus on wholeness and hope and more often embody our ideals. When people are educated, supported and inspired they gain the impetus to live richer lives that enrich life. By embracing and re-creating the impact of our actions as they ripple out into the world, each decision and relation reclaimed empowers us to further clarify and build our vision of the future—and to have a damn fine time while doing so.

Archimedes said, “Give me a place to stand and a lever long enough, and I will move the world”. The place we stand and the lever we wield which moves this world is each choice made as our coffee, clothes and 401k’s reach into factories, forests and homes across the planet. Get to know your neighbors, your dreams, your farmers, the unaware decisions that inhibit your vision, your values, your investments, your world, the integrity of those who act on your behalf, the why of when your heart’s at half mast, the true cost of dependence on a fossil fuel past and the JOY of conscious acts amassed.

To refine our knowledge and skill within the context of nature and redesign our lives with these insights in mind will require creativity, support and tenacity. As we grow and share these visions with greater focus, power, and pizzazz, we become the vibrant catalysts necessary to transform this widespread public malaise into an unsinkable force of mindful masses eager to eat, breathe and dream into being the world we’d like to call home. Commit yourself more fully and feel the gift of enlisting your physical, spiritual and financial resources as you assess and set your standards high for the acts that add up to the sum total of this one precious life.

(If you believe, laugh or steam with anger, spread your conscious ripples and get involved with us. Become a member of Daily Acts Organization to receive copies of our award-winning journal with the inspiration, tools and opportunities to live richer while enriching life. www.daily-acts.org, trathen@daily-acts.org)