Very few of us have our hands on the real levers of power. \u00a0We lack the money and influence to write policy, create tax codes, move resources around or start and stop wars. \u00a0Most of us spend almost all of our time going along with the macro trends of the world. \u00a0We might hate the implications of a fossil fuel economy, but everything we do is firmly embedded within it. \u00a0We might despise colonization, but we know that we are alos guilty of it in many small ways,<\/p>\n
The reason challenges like that are difficult to resolve is that we are embedded within them. \u00a0We are a part of them and the problem is not like something outside of ourselves that we apply force to. \u00a0Instead it is like a virus or a mycellium, extending it’s tendrils deep into our lives. \u00a0We are far more the product of the problems we wish to solve than we are the solutions we long to develop.<\/p>\n
Social change is littered with ideas like “taking things to scale” which implies that if you just work hard enough, the things you will do will become popular and viral and will take over the world. \u00a0We can have a sustainable future if “we just practice simple things and then take them to scale.” \u00a0The problem with this reasoning is that the field in which we are embedded, that which enables us to practice small changes is heavily immune to change. \u00a0Our economy, our energy systems, our governments are designed to be incredibly stable. \u00a0They can withstand all kinds of threats and massive changes, \u00a0This is a GOOD THING. \u00a0I would hate to have the energy system that powers my life to be fickle enough to be transformed by every good idea that comes along about sustainable power generation. \u00a0So that is the irony. \u00a0In the western world, the stability that we rely on to be able to “make change” is exactly that which we desire to change.<\/p>\n
We are embedded in the system. We ARE the system. \u00a0That which we desire to change is US. \u00a0You want a peaceful world, because you are not a fully peaceful person – violence has seeped into your life, and you understand the implications of it. \u00a0This is also a GOOD THING. \u00a0Because, as my friend Adam Kahane keeps quoting from time to time “if you are not a part of the problem, you cannot be part of the solution.” Real change in stable societies like Canada comes only from catastrophic failure. \u00a0That may be on our horizon, but I call you a liar if it’s something you desire. \u00a0It will not be pretty. \u00a0Living on the west coast of Canada, I sometimes think about it because a massive earthquake will strike here – possibly in my lifetime – and it will change everything instantly and massively and forever. \u00a0So, while climate change and economic collapse are probabilities, earthquakes are certainties.<\/p>\n
So let’s forget about prototyping new things and “taking them to scale.” \u00a0But let’s not forget about prototyping new things. \u00a0Because one of the big lessons from the living systems world view is that change happens in an evolutionary way. \u00a0It happens deep within the system and it requires two resources we all have – creativity and time. \u00a0It does not require hope. \u00a0Living systems do not hope. \u00a0They just change.<\/p>\n