Thoughts on a Dark Day

We hear the agonizing question constantly from activists of all sorts: How can we change our society and save our planet?

The short answer is, we can't. We can (and should) elect honest and decent policymakers to make minor improvements, of course, but these small gains are likely to be overwhelmed by the combined forces of greed, ignorance, hatred, denial, and despair. But over all, our global industrial civilization--the complex adaptive system I call "Glomart"--has become the Cancer of the Earth. And Cancer has only two possible outcomes: death (systemic collapse) or spontaneous remission.  The latter is very rare, however, and we have no idea how it happens. And the death spiral of our civilization and of Gaia, our biological support system, has already begun.

The cancer of our Earth began with the Agricultural Revolution, which resulted in a runaway feedback loop: the resulting surplus of grain fed, and thus engendered, more people, and required more people (as cheap labor) to erase diverse ecosystems in order to plant yet more grain. Cities, consumerism, specialization, trade, and empire all followed necessarily, as did the money system, an abstract transform of the inexorable recursive logic of maximization (more is always better). 

All of this accelerated with the Industrial Revolution and the discovery of seemingly limitless energy from fossil fuels.  And now, of course, it's far too late: Glomart (the Global Market Economy--our cancerous Agro-Industrial Civilization and collective "man vs. nature" mindset) has now colonized the entire planet, like a cancer spreading throughout the whole body, parasitizing its own biological support system in order to keep growing exponentially. 

We cannot stop the Glomart juggernaut (and Gaian death spiral), since we inhabit it. So what CAN we do? 

To this my answer is always the same:  (1) Breathe, Observe, Let Go; (2) Be well, Do Good Work, Keep in Touch; (3) Learn Gaia, Teach Gaia, Heal Gaia, Create Gaia. And finally--practice and propagate Permaculture: grow gardens, grow community, and grow awareness. And (with considerable luck) as Glomart collapses, enough self-sustaining Gaian communities will survive, amidst the encroaching chaos, to take root, propagate, and grow a new Gaian culture, gradually healing our ravaged planet.  It may not ever happen--probably won't--but it is a goal worth pursuing, something to live for, in any event. And this aspiration can sustain us in benevolence, compassion, joy, and equanimity--right up to our final breath.