“You cannot join monks until you are nine. You have to wait.” So I waited, and I became a monk. It was all my own desire. It was not forced by anybody. I wanted to be a monk to find freedom from death. It sounds like even though your father died when you were four, and you left home when you were nine, your parents had an incredibly powerful impact on you and on the way you went on to lead your life. Your father, who was a trader, said that profit was just a way to keep the business going; his true motivation was in service to the community. Your father was a social entrepreneur before the term was invented! Yes, exactly. And my mother was an environmentalist and ecol... posted on Sep 11 2018 (10,006 reads)

worths through our own experiences in the coming century of destruction, and proclaim them loudly, as the reason why nature must not go down. Illustration by Matthew Forsythe from The Golden Leaf That most unquantifiable, most precious value of nature to human life, McCarthy insists, is the gift nestled in the responsibility — the gift of joy. He writes: Joy has a component, if not of morality, then at least of seriousness. It signifies a happiness which is a serious business. And it seems to me the wholly appropriate name for the sudden passionate happiness which the natural world can occasionally trigger in us, which may well be the most serious business of all.... posted on Aug 22 2018 (9,989 reads)

no idea just how warlike the United States has become relative to other countries—even those we consider threats, or rivals, like China, Russia, Iran, Pakistan, and North Korea. Again, I know you’ve written entire books on this subject, but please share some facts to give us a more accurate view of reality. Swanson: Most countries on Earth don’t spend anything like what the United States does in terms of war and war preparations. Part of the United States’ war business is weapons-dealing to the rest of the world. Three-quarters of the world’s dictatorships, by the U.S. government’s own definition of dictatorship, are buying U.S. weapons. It&rsqu... posted on Jan 28 2019 (6,289 reads)

this essay are excerpted from the book with permission from the publisher. Have you ever wanted to speak up about an issue or situation at work, but were afraid to? Or wanted to share something about yourself, but worried people might judge you? Or pretended to understand something professionally that you really didn’t? If you’re anything like me and most of the people I know, you could easily answer yes to some of these questions. However, to truly succeed in today’s business world, we must be willing to bring our whole selves to the work that we do. This means showing up authentically, leading with humility, and remembering that we’re all vulnerab... posted on Sep 30 2018 (8,302 reads)

shattered his lifelong ambition Dr. Govindappa Venkataswamy chose an impossible new dream: to eliminate needless blindness. There are 37 million blind people in our world, and 80% of this blindness is needless -- meaning a simple operation can restore sight. By 1976 Dr. V (as he came to be known) had performed over 100,000 sight restoring surgeries. That same year, he retired from government service at the age of 58, and founded Aravind, an 11-bed eye clinic in south India. No money. No business plan. No safety net. Over the next four decades his humble clinic would defy the odds to become the largest provider of eye care on the planet. If you can’t come to them, they will c... posted on Oct 1 2018 (9,938 reads)

are lots of ways to lose your voice in this world...”   These words were spoken by Kevin Hancock,  an award-winning author, public speaker, and CEO of  Hancock Lumber, one of America’s oldest and most prestigious family businesses. Kevin is the winner of many distinguished awards including the Habitat for Humanity ‘Spirit of Humanity’ award, and the Boy Scouts of America Distinguished Citizen award.   In 2010, Kevin developed a voice disorder called spasmodic dysphonia.  As his speaking voice became quiet, the voice of his soul became louder. This new voice urged him to connect with the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, where h... posted on Nov 6 2018 (6,007 reads)

and scaling up of such relations possible. Thus, peer to peer enables a new mode of production and creates the potential for a transition to a commons-oriented economy.” The B Corp Handbook, Second Edition by Ryan Honeyman, Tiffany Jana  “B Corps are a global movement of more than 2,700 companies in 60 countries — like Patagonia, Ben & Jerry’s, Kickstarter, Danone North America, and Eileen Fisher — that are using the power of business as a force for good. B Corps have been certified to have met rigorous standards of social and environmental performance, accountability, and transparency. This book is the authoritative guide... posted on Apr 28 2019 (8,950 reads)

place. And then the place nurtures you and sustains you in a way. So how did Loving Earth come about? You arrive back in Australia from India. You must be, what? In your mid thirties? Yeah. Well, we went from India to Mexico. Oh okay. Why Mexico? This project that I’d been coordinating in India, it was a master plan for an area that involved quite a few building and infrastructure projects. And we needed funds to fund it. So we ended up doing a fundraising pitch to a Mexican businessman who we connected with at the time in the ashram. He had a very successful multi-level marketing company throughout Latin America. He really liked what we were doing and said, “Use bu... posted on May 19 2019 (5,611 reads)

women-led movement works to recruit, train, and support entrepreneurs who earn income by selling clean energy products directly to people without power. Since its founding in 2010, Solar Sister has reached over 1.5 million people across Africa with solar powered products and clean cookstoves, and kickstarted over 3,500 clean energy entrepreneurs. Solar Sister believes women are a key part of the solution to the clean energy challenge and aims to support those who aren’t reached by business-as-usual energy models. Solar Sister’s Communications Director Fid Thompson shares more about how gratefulness reverberates through this multi-dimensional approach to empowering women, ... posted on May 22 2019 (6,373 reads)

Do That? The Possibility of Rapid Transition, Andrew Simms and Peter Newell tell the story of Iceland’s 2010 Eyjafjallajökull eruption, which sent fine dust into the sky that spread for thousands of miles and grounded most of the world’s planes. Then what happened? People adapted. Quickly. Supermarkets replaced air-freighted goods with local alternatives. People discovered other, slower ways to get around, or decided they didn’t really need to travel at all. People held business meetings online. The Norwegian prime minister, Jens Stoltenberg, ran the Norwegian government from New York . . . with his iPad. This isn’t the only example. We might be focused these d... posted on Mar 19 2020 (10,763 reads)

in difficult times even more than ordinary ones — break the habit of separation and are a powerful reminder of our interconnectedness. Let us “be the change we wish to see in the world,” as the famous Gandhi quote goes. 4. This is an opportunity to go inside. When you can’t go outside, go inside. With the coming of corona, many of us have moved into a state of involuntary retreat. People have new-found pockets of time that were previously filled with rush and business. Despite Netflix, now it is a little harder to find distractions and avoidances. It is harder to run away from yourself. We are presented with a unique opportunity to stop, look at our lives,... posted on Apr 5 2020 (64,583 reads)

a significant widening of what is known as the Overton Window: the range of public policies that the mainstream population is prepared to consider at a given time. This is an unprecedented opportunity to rethink how our beliefs, values, and institutions shape our relationships. While there is an almost universal desire to move rapidly beyond the COVID emergency, the spectrum of what we want post-pandemic is broadening. Many are articulating that they do not want to simply return to business as usual. In the United States, for example, we see the need for: A system of health care accessible to everyone regardless of income or documentation; Just compensation and job securit... posted on May 2 2020 (7,931 reads)

precisely the people who have this ability to change, when something does not work, they simply change it. We know how to do teamwork. Then, when something does not work, it is because it’s flawed. It’s what great entrepreneurs do. It’s what Henry Ford did. The microcredits that Yunus devised work. But, obviously, you have to adapt your application to each place.  There is much talk about the changes that capitalism is undergoing. This summer, big businessmen from the United States signed a declaration in which they promised to work for the good not only of their shareholders, as they have done so far, but for that of consumers and workers. Wha... posted on Jul 29 2020 (3,710 reads)

past, many didn’t mind that decent outcomes were reserved for the fortunate. In a delightful twist, however, the seeking-out of new approaches—done in the spirit of correction—tends to surface bold new alternatives that don’t only serve marginalized people better. Bold new alternatives serve everyone better. In the middle of some of the most massive demographic shifts we’ve ever experienced (both globally and locally), not only is there the moral and business case against monocultural, homogenous views and policies. There is the strategic case. We do this or we die. We can either demonstrate a lot of bluster (the hare) by throwing more and more... posted on Sep 15 2020 (6,129 reads)

we identify is “Business as Usual,” by which we mean the growth economy, or global corporate capitalism. We hear this marching order from virtually every voice in government, publicly traded corporations, the military, and corporate-controlled media. The second is called “The Great Unraveling”: an ongoing collapse of living structures. This is what happens when ecological, biological, and social systems are commodified through an industrial growth society or “business as usual” frame. I like the term “unraveling,” because systems don’t just fall over dead, they fray, progressively losing their coherence, integrity, and memory. Th... posted on Oct 1 2020 (20,702 reads)

himself to Deo in French. His name was Muhammad. He said he came from Senegal. Muhammad asked Deo the agents’ questions and also some questions of his own. For the agents, he asked Deo, “Where are you coming from?” When Deo said he had come from Burundi, Muhammad made a pained face and said to him in French, “How did you get out?” There was no time even to attempt an answer. The agents were asking another question: Deo’s visa said he was here on business. What business? Selling coffee beans, Deo told them through Muhammad. Just keep smiling, Deo told himself. He could tell them anything they wanted to know about Burundian coffee. But they ... posted on Oct 8 2020 (4,518 reads)

and, like, what a terrible thing it is for non-Indigenous people in Australia that they don’t get to feel that and be a part of it. That’s how I understood two-way strong. I understood when you said it more as belonging to one another, that I can belong to you and you can belong to me and that we do that by staying in conversation with one another in real time. It’s both and. It’s on the everyday plain and then on the spiritual plane. So I’m at the frontline of business and industry. And I actually think even racist people and people in the fossil fuel industry and all kinds of people who are in all kinds of head spaces and heart spaces, if we were to watch ... posted on Dec 19 2020 (4,366 reads)

like, I could understand why they’re saying this.” And looking over the fence through his lenses, ‘cause we all have our lenses, what he thought he saw was that most of the early writers who wrote about indigenous people in what we now call the United States were English aristocratic men. What he saw was that these guys up until the age of five in their culture were allowed to sing, dance, play, pretend, et cetera. But at the age of five it was time to get down to the serious business of being an educated man. At that point, all these other activities could be hobbies, but the primary activity became the honing of the intellect. And that’s how it pretty much remained... posted on Jul 27 2021 (4,157 reads)

tools to communities in need, including at-risk youth, prisoners, veterans, and those in developing countries. If you’d like to learn more or feel inspired to become a supporter, please visit SoundsTrueFoundation.org. You’re listening to Insights at the Edge. Today my guest is Paul Hawken. Paul Hawken is an environmentalist, an entrepreneur, author, and an activist, who has dedicated his life to environmental sustainability and changing the relationship between business and the environment. Paul Hawken is the founder of Project Drawdown, a nonprofit dedicated to researching when and how global warming can be reversed. He’s written eight books, includin... posted on Sep 29 2021 (3,034 reads)

What is that about the passage of time? MS. PARKER:I sometimes think about aging. That as we’re born, everything is new. So we have all of this experiences we have to go through to begin to have some idea of about what’s going on. So you have all these learning years, and in your teens, you’re beginning to learn about relationships with other people, and emotions, and all that that leads to. Then you’re 20 to 50 — maybe 20 to 60, you are so caught up in the business of living, in the business of being a parent, in the business of being a teacher, or whatever your occupation is, that you don’t have time to look at it as a whole. And it seems to me, ... posted on Oct 24 2021 (3,646 reads)