A New Day, A Possibility of Better Choices
The choices we make in life always have consequences. Thinking through our choices allows us to identify our real values.
“Life presents many choices, the choices we make determine our future.” – Catherine Pulsifer
This is true whether it is a question of what we have for lunch, how we heat our houses, if we treat Democracy as disposable, or if we choose to be mean to the people we love or the neighbour that annoys us.
At this time in our history humanity has been making some unhealthy choices about our lifestyles. These choices have led to exceedingly harmful outcomes, especially for future generations. At present we are dealing with the effects of Climate Change, Loss of Biodiversity, Inequality, Racism, Loss of Democracy and War, to name but a few.
Equal Societies do Better
An interesting example of such choices can be seen in a fascinating book called The Spirit Level by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Picket.
The subsidiary title of this book is “Why more equal societies almost always do better.”
It shows that in societies where there is considerable inequality, everybody loses – there is more crime, shorter life expectancy, more mental illness, more distrust etc.
I believe this shows how the small choices made by each person can turn a society from one that works reasonably well for the majority into something much less functional. These choices might for example be: choosing to live in a gated community, not supporting the local school, not ensuring poorer people can live in decent environments. Or it might be as simple as buying your children expensive trainers. All, perhaps small choices, but with big effects. It is clear that the Nordic countries have made much better decisions on equality, and thus there is more trust and people are generally happier, i.e. better choices have led to a better life for many people.
A world where we are under threat from a dangerously changing climate is a world where each of us desperately needs to make better choices. Our personal and political decisions have led us to this point.
A Dangerously Changing Climate
Obviously this is a world where we urgently need to change our thinking. Casual decisions about being too busy or too scared to get involved will no longer do. The futures of the coming generations are at stake.
More than ever, with the threats to our democracies, we need to try to keep our politicians on the straight and narrow. It is easy to say, “I will write to them next week” or “I am too tired to go to that demonstration on Palestine.” I have done that myself, but somewhere along the way there is a knock-on effect, and something or someone suffers from our decision.
I agree that it is all really hard. We are being bombarded on all sides by bad and threatening news. Many populations are being held to ransom by politicians who have strange or bigoted ideas. It is easy to make the choice to bury one’s head in the sand. In the short term it is much less frightening. But in the longer term it won’t work!
Examples of Choices We Need to Consider More Carefully
Should we fit solar panels or buy an electric car or carry on as before?
To carry on using fossil fuels is very tempting. It is convenient. We may have a coal fire or a gas boiler in the house. We like the car we have and, besides, an electric car is expensive! We drive long distances and are perhaps not sure how convenient an electric vehicle would be. We all have excuses, and it is easy to say we will think about it next year if the prices come down.
All these choices have consequences. If we changed to using renewable energy our neighbours might change too. The whole neighbourhood might change. There would be less pollution, less childhood asthma, fewer cancers and it could be cheaper for everybody. If enough of us made this choice it would help to keep the temperature down, fewer animals and insects might die, and our children would lead better lives in the future.
Do we need more stuff? Or would being a part of a community be better?
We live in a consumer society. Buying stuff has become important to us. We think it will make us happy, or appear more successful, or show we are part of the in-crowd. In the long term it won’t. We are using up our resources faster and faster. UNEP says that we are gobbling up the Earth’s resources at an unsustainable rate. In a further report they say “ The world is in the midst of a triple planetary crisis of Climate Change, biodiversity loss, and pollution and waste. The global economy is consuming ever more natural resources, while the world is not on track to meet the Sustainable Development Goals.” (Or the climate goals either!)
The theft of resources from other countries leads to wars and long-term violence. So the choice to buy a new mobile phone can lead to the death or impoverishment of far-away people.
The Harvard Business review summarises that money over a level of sufficiency doesn’t make us any happier. “Likes” on Social Media don’t make us happy and “Stuff” doesn’t make us feel better for long. In fact, aiming for more of these things can actively make us lonely or anxious or depressed.
The Review says that these things do not offer the truly meaningful experiences in life like friendship, flow, a sense of purpose and love. [“Flow” is doing something with energised focus accompanied by deep enjoyment.]
It is clear that choices to go for more money, or being admired for what we possess, or more “stuff” can bring us unhappiness, and help to destroy the environment and its biodiversity.
Are We Losing our Democracies?
Loss of Democracy
This Guardian article shows that 90 million people did not vote in the last presidential election in America. If they had done so there could well have been a different outcome!
The newspaper interviewed some of those people and it is clear that many believe the voting system in America is not working. America may be a bad case, but this is true for other countries as well. People are less and less interested in politics. For many of them it has become irrelevant. They do not feel represented by their politicians. Most have no faith in their politicians anyway. Elections now increasingly produce right-wing autocratic governments that leave citizens with even less choice.
So a simple choice not to vote can produce all sorts of chaos in our lives. Usually these right-wing governments are not interested in a sustainable lifestyle or fighting for a different future for young people. An excellent example of this is a recent debate in the French parliament on the Ultra Low Emissions Zones in cities, where right wing parliamentarians are trying to cancel the use of these zones. This would cause many more deaths from pollution and Climate Change.
These are only a few examples of the bad choices we make. There are very many more.
Can we make better choices?
Perhaps the first thing to note is that not making a decision is still a choice. This troubled world needs us to make better choices.
These choices need to come from our values and from the things we care about. However, “A decision made from fear is always the wrong decision.” – Tony Robbins.
Not becoming a vegetarian because our friends might laugh at us cannot be a good decision.
So, we need to think about our choices, even the little ones. How will they affect the future? Will they make the world a better place?
I just love the fact that in 2015 Wales passed a Future Generations Act based on the Seventh Generational Principle of the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Confederacy in which they are required in their planning choices to think of the seventh generation coming after them and how they will be affected.
We all need to do that in the choices we are making. Please think of the future.
Thank you.
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Photos by Quino Al, NOAA and Elliott Stallion on Unsplash