Tag Archive for 'Abundance'

Heather’s Journal: Rich vs. Poor

heather published on December 12, 2010 in food, superforest journal and zeitgeist. 8 Comments Tags: , , .

A photo I took of a farm that produces maple syrup…

Hello SuperForest!

I received this little story in my email inbox recently, and upon reading it, I immediately thought of SuperForest. We have talked about redefining wealth and success before, but this is a simple story that illustrates the common thread of abundance and gratitude that often shows up in our SuperForest universe. Let’s share this story with our loved ones, especially during this holiday season, as it is important to remind ourselves to be grateful for what we have, and look at wealth in a different way:

One day the father of a very wealthy family took his son on a trip to the country with the express purpose of showing him how poor people live. They spent a couple of days and nights on the farm of what would be considered a very poor family. Returning from their trip, the father asked his son: “How was the trip?” “It was great, Dad.” “Did you see how poor people live?” the father asked. “Oh yeah” said the son. “So tell me, what did you learn from the trip?” asked the father. The son answered: “I saw that we have one dog and they had four. We have a pool that reaches to the middle of our garden and they have a creek that has no end. We have imported lanterns in our garden and they have the stars at night. Our patio reaches to the front yard and they have the whole horizon. We have a small piece of land to live on and they have fields that go beyond our sight. We have servants who serve us, but they serve others. We buy our food, but they grow theirs. We have walls around our property to protect us, they have friends to protect them.” The boy’s father was speechless. Then his son added, “Thanks, Dad for showing me how poor we are.”

Yours in gratitude,

SuperForester Heather

Jackson’s Journal – Why S**t So Crazy?

jackson published on December 12, 2010 in food, superforest journal, technology and zeitgeist. 10 Comments Tags: , , , , .

(image via timothysschenk)

Goooooooood Morning SuperForest!

Wow, an exciting week so far! Wikileaks spilling the beans, getting folks riled up, Julian Assange arrested, 4chan hacking Visa, Mastercard, and Paypal. The Federal Reserve printing money by the wheelbarrow-full, unemployment on the rise, and goods and services more expensive than last year, and the value of the dollar melting like ice in a bowl full of hot soup. Americans going homeless in record numbers. College students graduating into a world where their degrees are worth the paper they are printed on, if not a bit less.

Why s**t so crazy?

The reason I mention this is not to bum you out. You’ve got the rest of the news and media to do that for you. No, I’d like to big you up! As SuperForesters, your positivity promotion skills are more important than ever.

So I’d like to stress how important it is to take care of one another. Do that by taking care of yourself, then your friends and family, then your neighbors.

What does “take care of yourself” mean?

Have food and water, at least a two week supply of both, on hand at all times, for each person in your household. You know those big plastic bottles for on top of water coolers? Have at least two of them filled with fresh water just for you. Go to the store, load up on some energy-dense, long lasting foodstuffs. Peanut butter, cookies, canned vegetables and stews. Get a whole cartload of this and take it home and stash it. Get some candles, first aid, kits, matches.

Here’s a great emergency stash supplies list.

Plant a garden. Grow some food. Learn how planting and growing things works. Get your hands dirty. Build a compost heap. Divert all biodegradable household trash into the compost heap. You’ll make less trash and it won’t smell.

Take a moment and really look at your life. Where do you live? Where does your food come from? Where does your water come from? What would happen if those systems stopped tomorrow? Would it mess things up? You bet it would. The idea is to make sure that you’ve got enough food, water, and medicine on hand to survive for two weeks at the very minimum.

I read the news from here on Kauai, and the world seems to get crazier and crazier. Take a few pro-active steps this week to better your chances of making it through some sort of system breakdown.

Good: You’ve got a few weeks worth of food and water and supplies on hand at home.
Better: You’ve got food, water, and supplies, and active systems for replenishing supplies of all three.
Best: You live in a system of abundance where food, water, and supplies are everywhere, constantly replenishing themselves with very little external energy needed.

(image via Patrick Smith)

If you feel up to it, I highly recommend moving to Hawaii. As the most geographically isolated spot on the planet, Hawaii and it’s sister islands are a warm, relatively safe, and highly abundant set of ecosystems where a sudden shut-down of food/water/goods/services could be dealt with without the need for food riots and undue suffering. Here there is enough to go around.

When America has gone bankrupt and the powers that be seem bent on crashing the plane into the mountain, it’s time to disconnect from the madness and start taking responsibility for your life. When the frogs, bees, bats, tuna, and thousands of other species are all up against the ropes of extinction, it’s time to learn how to feed yourself from your own garden. When neighbor turns against neighbor, and people are running out of options, it’s time to learn the lessons of Aloha.

I say this not to alarm you, (I would hope that you’re already alarmed,) but to encourage you to engage with joy in the systems of your own survival. Stop outsourcing your life to others, and start really living.

Come to Hawaii, SuperForesters. It is relatively safer here. Let us learn and grown and teach one another here, and create a new hybrid life, mixing ancient wisdom and new technology. Let us explore in peace the systems of abundance.

With love and compassion,

-Jackson

Jackson’s Journal (4/24/10) The Miracle of Self-Assembly

jackson published on April 24, 2010 in food and superforest journal. 5 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

(image via jscneid)

Gooood Morning SuperForest!

The sun is shining here on Kauai. The roosters are crowing. I’ve been here three days now and each day has brought adventure and growth on an expanding scale.

I arrived in Lihue on Wednesday night. My lovely mother picked me up, with a car full of doggies, and takeout ramen from my favorite noodle shop. I slurped noodles as we drove through the darkness to the North shore of the island, chatting and catching up.

The next morning I woke up early, had a coffee and drove up to the land that will one day be Zero One. Justin and Mea, the delightful couple who have been living there since April 1st, were not there, so I was free to wander the grounds, unpack my boxes and the teepee, and soak in the land on my own.

My intention was to do nothing. Just observe in a patient and protracted manner. Several hours later, having flown a kite, napped in a hammock, gardened, wiped down shelves and surfaces, put all my clothes in the closet, moved the tv into storage, and eaten lunch, I left for home, feeling warm and tired. A bit more got done than I’d planned, but that’s life.

Drove home to my parents house via Princeville shopping center, where I applied for my Makai card, which is what the locals use at the supermarket to get tasty discounts. I was pleasantly surprised to see that Foodland, the local grocery store, was having a sale on rice, and that $8 would buy me 20 pounds of white rice. 20 pounds of rice would last me months. They were also having a sale on miso paste, so conceivably if I ate a lot of salads and rice and miso and had chickens and did some fishing, I could eat very well while living verrrry cheaply.

To live very well and very cheaply sounds great to me. If I can reduce my energy usage greatly, and help others do the same, win. But slowly! Slowly and softly. This is a waltz, not a mosh pit.

I’m reminded of a quote by Robert Heinlein, one of my favorite authors, which I must paraphrase:

“Revolution is an art that I pursue, rather than a goal I expect to achieve.”

Softly, softly, the revolution. I was asleep by 11PM.

Yesterday I woke up with the chickens again, had brekky, kissed mummy goodbye, and went and met up with SuperForesters Jordan and Aaron, both of whom are here on Kauai for a while. We sat by a pool in the sun and laughed and caught up. We toasted our good fortune and gave thanks and praise for the opportunity to give thanks and praise.

After the pool, a trip to my Auntie Mimsy’s house to say hello and reconnect. Arrived to find Mimsy hula-hooping with her daughter-in-law, the lovely Miss Sari, and Sari’s two wonderful children Luke and Django. Luke, (who is six) was busy hosing some toads on the lawn, so I borrowed him to help me collect eggs from Mimsy’s chickens. After carrying Luke across the grass (at his insistence) to protect his feet from sleeping grass (pokey!) we found 9 lovely eggs, still warm, and we put them in a basket to carry back to the house.

Then I ransacked Auntie’s shelves for how-to books, coming away with a mighty stack of titles ranging from: “The Care and Feeding of Poultry” to “Hawaiian Flowers” to “Japanese Gardening in Small Spaces.” As Auntie put her names in her books, Jordan, Aaron and I picked oranges, filling a large cardboard box with the happy little juicy ovals.

I had been to the market earlier and bought a length of sugarcane (which is member of the grass family.) Luke and I hunkered down in the shade and I used a machete to peel it and split it into lengths. Sugarcane is wonderful! It’s like sweet bamboo. You chew it up and the most wonderful flavor fills your head, and then you spit the husk out and compost it.

Having laden the car with the books, oranges, and 18 eggs, Aaron and I decided to drive over to Zero One to unpack and see if Justin and Mea were around. As we went to leave, a woman pulled into the driveway offering to sell us a huge box of pre-packaged frozen steaks at a great discount. I couldn’t resist.

Aaron and I went to Zero One, and there met the incomparably lovely Justin and Mea. We all exchanged gifts and stories, and talked about the land, and our intentions for it. Mea brewed a pot of ginger lime tea, and we sat sipping and swapping information. The sun had begun to set and Aaron and I were both hungry. As if she had read our minds, Mea asked if we wanted anything to eat, and reappeared a moment later with a plate of insanely tasty veggie/sushi rolls. I grilled a quick steak to chase the veggies down and Aaron and I ate and laughed once more at our incredible fortune.

Earlier in the day, on the way to Mimsy’s, Aaron and I had stopped to give a hitchhiker a ride. The hitchhiker’s name was Ezra, and we learned that he was a recent transplant from Florida, and that he was a raw food chef. He seemed a decent fellow. He had a great mustache! On the way to drop Aaron off last night, we passed Ezra again walking up the same stretch of road we’d found him on earlier.

Ezra jumped back in the car and we drove to Mimsy’s guest house (where Aaron is staying) and there the three of us got properly acquainted, telling stories and chewing big mouthfuls of sugarcane. As it turns of, Ezra is another traveler of the path of spiritual ascension, a kung fu practitioner, dancer, musician, DJ, and all around cool cat. He’d been living in a tent in a bramble patch on someones land, paying $350 a month for the privilege.

I’m thinking that he and his skills would make an excellent addition to the work at Zero One, and I mentioned this to him. We shall see…

I am taking deep breaths. Sucking in my belly, and breathing into my chest. I am concentrating on each moment as it arrives. And yet, from within my sphere of tranquility, all around me wonderful things are springing into existence. I have set the intention for Zero One, and now my every breath brings it closer to fulfillment. All I have to do is breathe and watch.

It is amazing, this self-assembly. It happens faster than I’d ever thought possible. I would think that after all the miraculous things that SuperForest has shown me, I’d be more blase about it, but just the opposite is true. The more SuperForest reveals itself to me, the more astounded and child-like I must become.

The world feels brand new. Old ways have fallen into the ocean, and new ways are pushing them there. I feel reborn and strong and so thankful. Here we are free to create a new system! One entirely to our liking. Take the best parts of everything and leave the rest to compost. Freedoms abound here.

Love to All,

Jackson

The SuperForest Game

jackson published on January 17, 2010 in technology and zeitgeist. 4 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

screen-shot-2010-01-17-at-110944-am(“Spring Cleaning” via flickr user sharply done)

Goooooood morning SuperForest!

Let us play a game, shall we?

Okay, here’s the game: The are roughly six billion humans living on planet Earth. There are resources enough on Earth to ensure that every human being and their offspring could be totally provided for, forever. Every person and their friends and loved ones, as a member of Team Earth, is entitled to a slice of this resource pie, simply by merit of being born into this marvelous human clan.

So, the game is: How do we transition from our current status of SCARCITY (i.e. there’s not enough to go around, some folks gotta starve,) to a sustainable status of ABUNDANCE, where there are energy and resources enough for all in perpetuity.

Here at SuperForest, we are learning the rules of the game, introducing you to the players, and most of all, imploring you to jump in and play alongside us. The more you play, the better and more hopeful you feel about the future.

The key question is this: How can the “Haves” successfully hybridize their lifestyles with the “Have Nots”?

How can we rig the system early so that if the institutions we rely on for our survival break down, we all don’t turn on each other?

Best answer to that question wins the big prize: a 1977 Chevy Caprice Classic! (Hot! Kidding.)
And there are no wrong answers! Either you’re busy trying out solutions and sharing them or you ain’t playing.

Come and play the SuperForest Game. If you were the environment and the environment was you, what would you change first?
Let’s decide as individuals to “save the environment” and then come together to share our results on our blogs, here on SuperForest, or by telling someone not to mention it to Perez Hilton.

Sound fun?

Yayyy!

Be excellent to each other :)

-Jackson

P.S. Wanna read an incredible book that will totally give you a leg up on playing the SuperForest Game?
Check out “Ishmael” by Daniel Quinn. SuperForester Jordan wrote a lovely review of it. Get it and read it. If you like this site, you’ll LOVE this book.

Frank Chimero: “The Secret to Your Unhappiness [or Happiness] is in Your Toothpaste”

carla published on January 8, 2010 in celebrity and zeitgeist. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , .

Good morning, SuperForest!

A few months ago, I started following Frank Chimero‘s blog and from time to time, he drops some crazy wisdom that makes me so appreciative of his insight. I only wish he posted more often. Weeks ago, I shared with you his 10 principles that make your work better, today, I share with you his secret to happiness!

Let’s juxtapose snippets of information and come to a hypothesis. I’ll call it a 1 + 1 post.

Beyond the age of information is the age of choices. —Charles Eames

PLUS

In one study, participants were asked to choose an art poster. One group was told that their decision was irreversible, while the other group was told that they could exchange the poster they chose for another one at any time.

Later, participants were asked to rank their satisfaction with the poster they chose. The people who couldn’t change their decision were more satisfied with their posters than the other group who were allowed to swap. — from a study by Dan Gilbert

EQUALS

We live in an age of options. We perceive having choices as something that is good. But, as much as we think options make us happy, they sometimes actually do the opposite. Having too many choices can be paralyzing and may turn us fickle. Worse yet, too many options may leave us unsatisfied and unhappy, the exact opposite of what we think they’ll do for us.

We’ll consider the opportunity cost of just about any decision. It’s why we’re paralyzed in front of the 47 different kinds of toothpaste in the aisle at Walgreen’s. Do I want my mouth to smell like a wintery mountain top or a citrusy rush? Tartar control or extra-whitening?

On the other hand, if you’re stuck with something, you’ll find a way to like it, even if it means changing how you think about it.

People talk about the new era we’ve entered and how it requires a completely new skill set to thrive. So, let’s add this to the list: we must prepare ourselves a way to approach not a scarcity of options, but rather an abundance of them. Our happiness depends on it.

Amazing! Much love goes out to Mr. Chimero for those fabulous words. Each time I brush my teeth, I will be reminded of them.

Hope everyone is having a fabulous Friday!

You are loved.