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This Sustainable Life — Science & Medicine
This Sustainable Life

Do you care about the environment but feel “I want to act, but if no one else does, it won’t make a difference,” and “But if you don’t solve everything, it isn’t worth doing anything”?

We are the antidote! You’re not alone. Hearing role models overcome the same feelings to enjoy acting on their values creates meaning, purpose, community, and emotional reward.

Want to improve as a leader? Bestselling author, 3-time TEDx speaker, leadership speaker, coach, and professor Joshua Spodek, PhD, MBA, brings joy and inspiration to acting on the environment. You’ll learn to lead without relying on authority.

We bring you leaders from many areas — business, politics, sports, arts, education, and more — to share their expertise for you to learn from. We then ask them to share and act on their environmental values. That’s leadership without authority — so they act for their reasons, not out of guilt, blame, doom, gloom, or someone telling them what to do.

Guests include:

Dan Pink, 40+ million TED Talk views

Marshall Goldsmith, #1-ranked leadership guru and author

Frances Hesselbein, Presidential Medal of Freedom honoree, former CEO of the Girl Scouts

Elizabeth Kolbert, Pulitzer Prize-winning author

David Allen, author of Getting Things Done

Ken Blanchard, author of The One Minute Manager

Vincent Stanley, Director of Patagonia

Dorie Clark, bestselling author

Bryan Braman, Super Bowl champion, Philadelphia Eagle

John Lee Dumas, top entrepreneurial podcaster

Alisa Cohn, top 100 speaker and coach

David Biello, Science curator for TED

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Latest Episodes:

700: Matt Matern, part 2: Plant a Tree Jul 13, 2023

Show notes

Matt shared last time about the redwoods I keep hearing about in California that I've never seen but find they transform people.

His goal was to plant a tree. He ended up with a new tree, plus he planted other plants. Listen to hear the story. More than what he did, I recommend listening to his emotional experience. Did he have to do all the things he did? Could he do other things that are more mainstream but might pollute more if he wanted?

We talked first about the problems with what most people mean when they talk about teaching children, helping poor people experience nature, and a few other tactics people promote without thinking them through, as I believe. They sound great. What are they missing?

Matt has thought through such issues more than most and was patient enough to let me share some of my views.

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699: Robert Litterman, part 1: A Carbon Tax and Managing Risk Jul 12, 2023

Show notes

I met Bob at a conference on climate at my old school, Columbia Business School. He knew another participant, Gernot Wagner, with whom I recorded an episode I'll post soon, and was a peer with past guest Mark Tercek. I didn't work in finance, but I understand Bob and Mark were like dieties there.

Bob brings two huge new things to climate (he talks about climate almost exclusively among our environmental problems, though we touch on others briefly in the conversation). First, he knows risk management. Most of his career, he didn't think much about the environment, but when he learned about it, he identified that we have to manage risk, so he dove into the issue.

Second, he connected with a group of conservative politicians promoting what he sees as the most effective solution: a carbon tax. That he's working with groups normally seen as resisting climate action could bring people together.

Also, just after we recorded, the New York Times published a big piece on Bob: A Renowned Economist’s New Idea for Stopping Climate Change.

A personal note: I don't challenge his views because I'm learning them and meeting him. I agree our economic system doesn't account for pollution and depletion. Without proper accounting, no business can stay in business that long, nor can any government. So I consider proper accounting essential, but it's only extrinsic. It doesn't change our culture or the values driving it. Since our culture has abandoned, at least regarding how we treat each other when mediated through the environment, Do Unto Others As You Would Have Them Do Unto You, Live and Let Live, and Leave It Better Than You Found It, a tax won't fix a values problem.

I didn't challenge Bob in it in our conversation, but I find when people focus on climate and greenhouse emissions they nearly always "solve" them with "whack-a-mole" ideas that increase biodiversity loss, deforestation, and other problems. They claim they're solving one thing at a time, but I see them not addressing the culture causing everything.

I look forward to more conversations with him.

A New York Times piece on Bob: A Renowned Economist’s New Idea for Stopping Climate Change

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698: Chris Bystroff, part 1: Population Growth and Overpopulation Jul 06, 2023

Show notes

Population modeling can be hard, as is figuring out a prediction's accuracy, therefore how much confidence to give your conclusions. Many people can't hear talk about population without hearing things like eugenics and racism even when they aren't there.

But population is one of the most important factors in sustainability. Everything becomes easier when population isn't near or above what Earth can sustain and harder when it's above.

I came to Chris from reading his paper on modeling population growth, Footprints to singularity, which showed a couple things. It clarified that UN and peer projections lacked feedback mechanisms so couldn't show population decline. If your model can't show a population decline, it will blind you to the possibility and therefore keep you from preventing or preparing for it. It also leads you to ask, "how do we feed ten billion people" instead of seeing that we can't without causing a steep drop in population soon after, a pattern called overshoot and collapse.

Second, it showed a good chance that population would likely decline significantly soon. It and he also reinforced my confidence in Limits to Growth's dynamical systems approach.

Chris's paper prompted my contacting Wolfgang Lutz, and I recommend listening to his episode too. I hope to bring them together on one episode to see if they can reconcile their differences.

Oh yeah, I also enjoyed and learned from the class slides for his undergraduate course in human population.

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697: Dan Walsh, part 2: He sold his motorcycle and Playstation to gain freedom Jul 04, 2023

Show notes

In what looks to me like one of the biggest overcommitments of guests on this podcast and participants in the Spodek Method, Dan shares that to free his mind for meditation, he ended up selling his motorcycle and Playstation.

Then we spoke about coaching and leading people to reach their potentials, which he experienced on the receiving end in reaching the Olympics twice and does now with others, and he appreciates me doing in corporations and on sustainability. You'll hear we both admire each other and are learning from each other.

A curious note: you'll hear me puzzled at his tone, which I couldn't place. It didn't convey the sense of accomplishment and freedom his words did. We're still getting to know each other.

I also think he expects acting more sustainably to take more time and money, when I find it frees both.

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696: Anonymous executive from a fossil fuel corporation: A view from the inside Jun 29, 2023

Show notes

People who work at fossil fuel companies are people just like you and me. When you buy what the industry sells, you support it too. You rationalize and justify that your money supports lobbyists, advertising, extraction, pollution, depletion, making refugees, dictators, and so on.

Want to stop people working there? I suggest it helps to understand them. We can start by understanding ourselves. Stopping ourselves from supporting that industry is easier than stopping them, so I recommend starting with ourselves.

Note: we recorded this episode a few years ago, before I fully developed the Spodek Method.

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695: Dan Walsh, part 1: Two-time Olympian and Bronze medalist in rowing Jun 23, 2023

Show notes

If learning what it's like to watch your team win an Olympic gold medal from the sidelines isn't enough, and if learning what it's like to grow up in a family beset with poverty and addiction before reaching Olympic level competition isn't enough, and if learning what it's like after four more years to win an Olympic medal isn't enough, I'd say the best part of our conversation comes after all that. Then we talk about bringing out the best in others as a coach.

How do you find out how to coach each person, athlete, executive, or otherwise?

How to you lead a team to give to their potential?

How do you keep everyone motivated?

How do you keep yourself motivated?

We both deeply appreciate each other's experience. You'll hear us trying to learn from each other. I want to learn how to shift sustainability, which everyone gives lip service to, from trying to avoid losing to winning by having fun, giving everything we've got, learning our deepest values, and acting on them. Dan does those things.

Dan's home page

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694: Matthew Matern, part 1: Running for President on Sustainability Jun 21, 2023

Show notes

Matt invited me to his podcast, A Climate Change. We stayed in touch after recording. He shared that he ran for President, including supporting sustainability. A goal of this podcast is to bring elected officials of all stripes. While he didn't get that many votes, he ran for several reasons, including to run as a Republican opposing Donald Trump. Listen to our conversation to learn more of his motivation.

I wanted to bring him here not for the campaign alone but for his acting with integrity and character, even if not a huge campaign. How many pro-sustainability, anti-Trump Republicans do you know of? I saw determination arising from personal action.

I also learned he's trying some things, like buying a hydrogen-powered car. My research shows the science and engineering showing hydrogen cars won't work for most of what we use cars for, nor trucks, planes, or container ships, but he's acting on his values, not just pointing fingers. He will learn from the experience.

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693: Christopher Ketcham, part 2: The Green Growth Delusion Jun 16, 2023

Show notes

Christopher may be the most direct, accurate reporter on sustainability. Our last conversation treated his helpful and accurate reporting on the book Limits to Growth. Today we start from his (in my opinion) excellent article The Green Growth Delusion, in which he reports on the futility and false promise of chasing growth. It's tempting, alluring, and seductive to believe technology, growth, or economic trickery will save us, but wanting to believe something doesn't make it true, even if you really want to believe it.

As before, Christopher doesn't hold back, nor does he speak inaccurately. I recommend reading the article first, though you won't go wrong listening right now. Here's how it starts:

In the annals of industrial civilization, the Green New Deal counts as one of the more ambitious projects. Its scale is vast, promising to reform every aspect of how we power our machines, light our homes and fuel our cars. At this late hour of ecological and climate crisis, the Green New Deal is also an act of desperation. Our energy-ravenous culture cannot continue producing carbon without destroying the systems that are the basis of any advanced civilization, not to mention life itself. Something must be done, and quickly, to moderate the pressure on the atmospheric sink while powering the economic machine.

The consensus on the need for scaling up renewable energy is rarely disturbed by a disquieting possibility: What if techno-industrial society as currently conceived — based on ever-increasing GDP, global trade and travel, and complex global production and distribution chains designed to satisfy the rich world’s unquenchable appetite for bigger, faster, more of everything — what if that simply cannot function without energy-dense fossil fuels? What if, despite the promises of Green New Deal boosters, it is impossible to make sustainable the current system that provides billions of people sustenance, shelter, goods?

Christopher's article this conversation is based on: The Green Growth Delusion
Donate to Chris's nonprofit, Denatured (I did)
Less Is More by Jason Hickel
Small Is Beautiful

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692: Daniel, host of the "What Is Politics?" videocast, part 2: Is Changing CEOs Possible Jun 13, 2023

Show notes

The spiciest parts of this conversation come at the end. It's possible listeners may think we were annoying each other, but I think I can speak for both of us that we enjoyed the repartee.

Anyone who has talked to me about my work since I started watching and listening to Daniel's What Is Politics? videocast knows it's shaped how I view politics, meaning how groups make decisions. If we want to change culture, he covers much of the core. If we want to undo some people dominating others, it helps to know how dominance hierarchies form. The core is in anthropology, which shows how humans have related to each other going back hundreds of thousands to millions of years, and current material conditions.

We talk about creating videos versus writing books. Daniel shares a lot of backstory to his creating What Is Politics?, including his goals and greatest hurdles.

At the end things heat up as I share what I want to do, which he sees as impossible and a waste of time. Do you think he's right? . . . or that I should keep trying? I will be the first to say I lack experience explaining myself in this area. I just haven't had the chances, which is part of why I valued this conversation so much.

The Do the Math blog
Michael Albert's Wikipedia page and videos
Jane O'Sullivan's World Population Day Presentation that debunks population myths
My sustainability leadership workshop
Robert Carter III, who freed 100 slaves starting in 1791
The largest B corporation to date was led by Lorna Davis, a guest on this podcast. Here are her episodes.

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691: Oliver Burkeman, part 1.5: Embracing Our Inevitable Limitations on Time and Energy Jun 07, 2023

Show notes

I've been recommending Oliver's book Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals a lot. When people ask about it, I have a hard time explaining what it says, only that it's valuable. He has a way of communicating important things about values, time, intent, decision, and related concepts that are hard to express otherwise. In this conversation he shares more.

One thing I can express that I value: what he says about time parallels what I say about energy, specifically energy as physicists describe it, not emotional energy. We don't have infinite amounts of time or energy. If we see life as missing out on what we lack time or energy for, we'll crave what we lack. We'll be insecure. If instead, we recognize we don't have time or energy to do everything we'd enjoy, we can construct the lives we want, which will be abundant.

Being an episode 1.5 means he only started doing the commitment from last time, but is gracious enough and a leader enough to share, regroup, and if we can find another way forward. I bring leaders to sustainability because they have learned not to hide vulnerabilities, at least not all of them.

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