The fastest—and perhaps only—way to fully reverse climate change is neither the retooling of the energy sector nor the retrofitting of every building on Earth, supported by an all-electric fleet. The answer is literally underfoot (and overhead), and the numbers are stunning. — Bill Reed is the co-founder of the LEED green building rating system and one of the world’s leading experts on the environment. Several years ago I invited him to speak at an event I hosted. Chatting privately, he said two things that changed my perspective on sustainability.

‘Enough’ is anti-consumerist. For one, it espouses limits. For another, it looks at needs, not wants. And above all, it values long-term societal health over short-term personal gain. It just might save us. — Enough isn’t a sexy doctrine. Far from the life of the party, it’s the rational voice that tells you skip the nightcap and get a good night’s sleep. While everybody knows it’s right to espouse these things, nobody enjoys the reminder.

The world today is one suffering from multiple narrative-driven crises. Whether what happens next is our long-incubating chrysalis or our inevitable annihilation remains to be seen. If we continue to believe in ‘false gods’, however, I fear this may be our last dance with the devil. — To look at the Great Apes — the ones Jane Goodall famously studied—is to glimpse Eden before the Fall. They are, for all our feelings of superiority, mirrors to our intrinsic humanness. …

Humans evolved to be generalists: to learn anything and everything, then make connections between things to harness knowledge powerfully. Today, we largely ignore our own origins in favor of monetizing isolated scraps of it, robbing us of our innate ability to make sense of an increasingly complex world. — We humans are inherently curious creatures. For as long as we’ve been endowed with the faculties to do so, we’ve searched for understanding that is both tactical (who, what, when, where, and how) and existential (why).

The cost of living is, in truth, inherently deflationary. In spite of this, we continue to push a 150-year old agenda to grow GDP at great cost to human and planetary wellbeing. With the accelerating revolution in technology, It’s time we embraced a different paradigm. — “Technology is deflationary, [and] we are entering into an age of deflation unlike any the world has ever seen.” So writes Jeff Booth in his excellent book, The Price of Tomorrow.

Social and conventional media are jubilant about the resurgence of the workplace—the re-filling of office buildings, the collateral uptick in retail spend, and the resumption of daily commutes. What a travesty. — To begin with, I am an architect—one who is ardently committed to making and enjoying places of creative incubation, social immersion and yes, productive purpose. With that said, the office was—and remains—utterly broken as a typology. Or, at the very least, due for a massive upgrade.

Modern medical science has succeeded in forestalling death, to great effect. In the process, our traditional relationship to end of life has broken, and our actions have undermined the natural order of things, at a cost. — When my brother, Jordan, died at the age of 38, leaving his only sibling, our parents and three grandparents—each approaching 100, at the time—behind, it understandably destroyed the family. Within three short years, all three elders had slipped away, following Jordan into whatever it is that ensues a life.

In most global cultures, meat is associated with wealth, virility and power. Unfortunately, it is also wildly destructive to both body and planet, and until Colonialism, a rare treat. While we are willing to sacrifice the planet for our dining pleasure, the high cost of meat seems to be gaining an audience. — The case for a plant-based diet—by which I mean the prioritization of non-animal foods over animal sources, not their wholesale replacement—can be made on the basis of three topics:

In a shift pod in the desert, under the influence of an “ally”, fifty years of trauma poured out in a deluge, freeing me from a lifelong cage and returning me to wholeness. This is the story. — Ted was gently insistent. “I felt bad that you didn’t get to have the experience two years ago.” He was referring to the fact that two years earlier, while on a retreat in the California highlands with 30 other people—after a life-changing evening under the influence of Cambodian mushrooms, followed…