I listened to a podcast of By Design with Alan Saunders. He was speaking with Elizabeth Shove who is a Professor of Sociology, University of Lancaster and Visiting Professor, RMIT and Swinbourne, Melbourne.They were discussing life choice changes that are necessary to accommodate climate change and asking the question “How are our habits standing in the way of real change?”
We acquire habits from observing other people and adopt shared conventions in terms of our habits and these show themselves in our daily practises. These conventions dictate our daily rituals and show up in the processes we follow, from getting out of bed in the morning to eating, work and social habits and bedtime rituals.
Our choices are constrained by the infrastructure design of our cities which tend to dictate that we generally have to live in one area and work away from home. This design hardwiring resists the sort of changes and choices that might address climate change considerations. While infrastructure design is a more difficult thing to change there are still many things that can be changed and that are already changing.
There is a greater awareness of the need to live a life that responds to the seasons. This involves the knowledge about living in a particular house: when to open and close the curtains; insulation and shading; which native plants to have; the best building materials to use; and efficient resource use. The international standard of setting air-conditioning systems to 22 degrees everywhere means the seasons have gone for many people’s lives so they have to relearn how to adapt best at home.
Alan mentioned that Harold Magee in the US pointed out that people in the US could save energy just by cooking their pasta in less water. This infers that many small changes by lots of people can potentially influence things in a big way.
I believe that the best way to bring about change is for everyone to make better, more informed choices about lifestyle issues. As consumers, we are powerful directors of the decisions that governments and manufacturers make. If, for example, we decided only to buy goods in environmentally-friendly packaging then the companies not doing this would have to change or go out of business.
What outcome do you want and what decisions are you making?
3 comments:
Hi Lena,
greetings! thankyou for becoming a follower of my very newly created blog...thanks to great coaching from chrissie. With her help I stopped being intimidated and got on with blogging!....and also karin's prompting (and filling me in on your avid divas group.)
When I looked at this blog you are doing i thought it would be great to follow...all the radio national references and books and so on...things that I am very interested in coincidently.
I have thought a lot about change and habits and such this past decade when I found life circumstances requiring dramatic adaptation to change coming at me from every direction for a few years repeatedly around 2000.
In the end, with the house i had just moved into in Melbourne burning down one night I felt suddenly extremely amused...like the cosmic joke had just become very clear...despite the destruction to the house I had my things miraculously left unscathed, I was OK and it was clear it was time to head north and completely re-organise my life down to the very last detail!
After that i made a kind of pact with myself to always, after getting over the initial shock of the unexpected, try to get enthused about whatever new thing was presenting itself to me for attention, even the panful stuff!
And so...looked at in this way i have been finding it far easier and more productive to see upsets of all kinds and degrees as opportunities for re-orientation and new ideas. This has been such an energising lesson...
I checked out your other blog so I think you have been dealing with some big challenges and changes...and I noticed your post on Norman Doidge's "The brain that changes itself" ...which I have also loved.
Its all wonderful food for thought......and a great focus for this blog....
I could say much more but enough for now.
Keep informing us about all this wonderful stuff Lena. Thankyou!
Hi Sophie,
Thanks for your comments. It sounds like you've had some very interesting prompts to change old habits.
When the Victorian bushfires were in the news recently I was wondering if anyone was able to look at their personal crisis as a challenge rather than a tragedy and it looks like that's possible, as evidenced by you. It seems to me to be a far better way of dealing with loss than feeling like a victim and powerless.
There are 2 inevitable events in this life: change and death. We may as well rise to the challenge of the first and enjoy it, rather than slide uncomfortably directly to the second.
Enjoy keeping up your blog.
Lena
Hi Lena,
...I forgot to say something about the actual article on habits. My brother Russell presently works 2 days a week as an electrician with "Climate Smart" for the Brisbane City Council/ Qld Govt initiative to send electricians into homes to educate and orchestrate some changes in the way consumers are using their power supply.
I have been amazed these past few months with every aspect of this service. One challenge he has is time allowance...40 minutes were set for tradesmen to come into each home and replace up to 12 light globes, monitor all aspects of the home use of power, explaining the tracking/monitoring device being issued and pass on all other education factors and deal with questions from residents.
Although we all use power every day I am amazed at what I have been learning from him that is not obvious or well-known about power.There a lot to be said for education and from someone with long industry experience...not just lists of info in the newspaper of whatever. He is finding people receptive...if only he has the time to focus on the important information to share with them.
Every day he sees the penny drop...he is a good teacher actually...I think he's taking his job seriously too. There's probably not enough of this real information getting across to people. He has been explaining the difference it will make if people turn their air conditioners to 24 instead of 22 or lower. People are shocked! He is also coming across homes where air conditioning is both installed centrally throughout the house and then various rooms have extra reverse cycle air conditioners as well.
I think there are endless ways for us to shift our lives without major re-organisation even. And then there are the big questions about what do we actually need to live well...and what are we in the habit of buying, doing, thinking?
There are a lot of homes in this country with not much happening in them. I would like to see a far greater return to people aquiring experiences and sharing what they have,rather than consuming to show off but not share what they have!
great posts Lena...its got me thinking!
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