environmental conservation

AMA with Adrian Grenier. Wednesday 2/4 at 7:00 PM CT

Entourage star who at the top of the Hollywood game pivoted to an integral spiritual path and farmstead

Flowing down the Salt River. If you ever get a chance to paddle board the lower Salt River in Arizona just east of Phoenix, DO IT!!!  

What is it? It's a beautiful river in the middle of the arid Sonoran Desert.  You would not believe there is a flowing river just 30 minutes from a big city in one of the hottest dryest places in this country.  The drive out there is full of Saguaro cactus and the land looks dry as if no water can possibly be anywhere nearby.  Once you get to this Oasis, it's so lush and green, behind you are beautiful rocks that glow at sunrise and sunset.  But the best part of all are the WILD HORSES.

There's something so magical about seeing wild animals with such massive size and living this dream life in 110 plus temperatures, cooling off in the river and eating the river grass (looks like kelp).  Their freedom feels like our freedom.  It's like tasting freedom watching them roam, swim, eat, and often times, they are simply still just looking at you. Their stillness is like nothing I've ever witnessed in the wilds (not yet been to Africa, but something about this unique experience reminds me of my imaginations of a safari).

This river has changed me. It connects me to ancestors who didn't know roads or have vehicles, but created floating vessels to flow down rivers to discover new lands and new homes into the unknown. Every time the river is different, the water level, the power, the positions of the rocks, the wild life, all is always changing.  Like the saying goes "You can't step into the same river twice".  

There is a real magic of healing horses, no secret they are healers for the disabled, the lonely, and everyone. Their hearts are LARGE and they are emotionally intelligent.  You can feel their healing heart energy as you gently pass by within feet of their glory.  It's like being in the painting. It's like living in a nature documentary.

This experience is one of those things that words can recreate the experience, pictures and videos are not the thing. The feels are the thing that make it magical. Feeling like an explorer and witness wild and free creatures who feel you as you feel them.  Makes it feel like the whole world is OK.  It's hard to imagine the real world issues going on when you are quietly gently passing through a wild horse tribe.  They swim across the river, they run, they play, they even do the deed, most of the time they just take you in.  And sometimes when you're lucky, you'll see a beaver building a damn, a cute family of sea otters being cute like puppies.  The birds are all over and the bats come out as the moon rises.  Been down the river almost 30 times since May and it never gets old and it's never the same river twice. 

If you're ever near Phoenix between May and October, get to the river, there are board rentals, there are meet ups and many ways to make it happen, or just ask me and i'll get my spare board ready for you!

Fun to be back on Uptrust!

Thanks for the call to reconnect here Jordan.

Essential human skills/trainings? I'm taking a Wilderness First Responder course with NOLS right now (hybrid online/in person). It's the first training I've done in a while, and I'm doing it because I think first aid is an "essential human skill" - i.e. everybody should probably know at least a little of this.

I'm considering what other essential skills I should attempt to acquire to be a Good Human who can do Basic Things that Help Myself And Others. I've already got some project management, rationality, and conflict training, which feel like they're on that list. Tossing around:

• Woodworking/basic building and repair (of what?)
• Gun training
• Permaculture and food production

What skills are "essential" obvs depend on our environment (I live in more rural areas). They are also based on beliefs, like mine that the world's essential services for food, water, laws, and emergency care may be disrupted in the next few decades. But I think I'd consider skills like first aid important for Good Humanship even if I lived in a city and thought hospitals would always be around.

What, to you, feel like "essential human skills"?

When it comes "the global warming debate," there are often third ways that are ignored. Often the framing is global warming and climate deniers or something like that.

but it seems like there are obviously multiple perspectives here, and these two black and white boxes keep us from really seeing potential solutions.

Bjorn Lomborg for example believes in man-made climate change, but also doesn’t like the alarmism. Although he cherry picks data like he accuses others of, he also I think rightfully points out lots of flaws in the arguments that help us identify solutions. Much of the hurricane damage increase over time is because we’re building bigger and more expensive houses in hurricane alleys; for this problem, we can stop building there; everybody stopping flying altogether until 2100 delays increases the increase by a few weeks, so stopping flying isn’t the solution. Often the solutions are smaller, more local, less sexy: want less polar bears to die? Increase regulation on poaching. (Polar bear populations are up over the past decade because of this, apparently). I would love to identify and popularize these solutions, so they are spoken in the same breath as global warming rather than it being all gloom and doom and end of the world.

There are real tricky questions about what we’re trying to preserve and for whom, as well. If all we care about are humans and climate migration, then building infrastructure in places like Haiti and even evolving to coal power would be more helpful.

When it comes "the global warming debate," there are often third ways that are ignored. Often the framing is global warming and climate deniers or something like that.

but it seems like there are obviously multiple perspectives here, and these two black and white boxes keep us from really seeing potential solutions.

Bjorn Lomborg for example believes in man-made climate change, but also doesn’t like the alarmism. Although he cherry picks data like he accuses others of, he also I think rightfully points out lots of flaws in the arguments that help us identify solutions. Much of the hurricane damage increase over time is because we’re building bigger and more expensive houses in hurricane alleys; for this problem, we can stop building there; everybody stopping flying altogether until 2100 delays increases the increase by a few weeks, so stopping flying isn’t the solution. Often the solutions are smaller, more local, less sexy: want less polar bears to die? Increase regulation on poaching. (Polar bear populations are up over the past decade because of this, apparently). I would love to identify and popularize these solutions, so they are spoken in the same breath as global warming rather than it being all gloom and doom and end of the world.

There are real tricky questions about what we’re trying to preserve and for whom, as well. If all we care about are humans and climate migration, then building infrastructure in places like Haiti and even evolving to coal power would be more helpful.

When it comes "the global warming debate," there are often third ways that are ignored. Often the framing is global warming and climate deniers or something like that.

but it seems like there are obviously multiple perspectives here, and these two black and white boxes keep us from really seeing potential solutions.

Bjorn Lomborg for example believes in man-made climate change, but also doesn’t like the alarmism. Although he cherry picks data like he accuses others of, he also I think rightfully points out lots of flaws in the arguments that help us identify solutions. Much of the hurricane damage increase over time is because we’re building bigger and more expensive houses in hurricane alleys; for this problem, we can stop building there; everybody stopping flying altogether until 2100 delays increases the increase by a few weeks, so stopping flying isn’t the solution. Often the solutions are smaller, more local, less sexy: want less polar bears to die? Increase regulation on poaching. (Polar bear populations are up over the past decade because of this, apparently). I would love to identify and popularize these solutions, so they are spoken in the same breath as global warming rather than it being all gloom and doom and end of the world.

There are real tricky questions about what we’re trying to preserve and for whom, as well. If all we care about are humans and climate migration, then building infrastructure in places like Haiti and even evolving to coal power would be more helpful.

When it comes "the global warming debate," there are often third ways that are ignored. Often the framing is global warming and climate deniers or something like that.

but it seems like there are obviously multiple perspectives here, and these two black and white boxes keep us from really seeing potential solutions.

Bjorn Lomborg for example believes in man-made climate change, but also doesn’t like the alarmism. Although he cherry picks data like he accuses others of, he also I think rightfully points out lots of flaws in the arguments that help us identify solutions. Much of the hurricane damage increase over time is because we’re building bigger and more expensive houses in hurricane alleys; for this problem, we can stop building there; everybody stopping flying altogether until 2100 delays increases the increase by a few weeks, so stopping flying isn’t the solution. Often the solutions are smaller, more local, less sexy: want less polar bears to die? Increase regulation on poaching. (Polar bear populations are up over the past decade because of this, apparently). I would love to identify and popularize these solutions, so they are spoken in the same breath as global warming rather than it being all gloom and doom and end of the world.

There are real tricky questions about what we’re trying to preserve and for whom, as well. If all we care about are humans and climate migration, then building infrastructure in places like Haiti and even evolving to coal power would be more helpful.

When it comes "the global warming debate," there are often third ways that are ignored. Often the framing is global warming and climate deniers or something like that.

but it seems like there are obviously multiple perspectives here, and these two black and white boxes keep us from really seeing potential solutions.

Bjorn Lomborg for example believes in man-made climate change, but also doesn’t like the alarmism. Although he cherry picks data like he accuses others of, he also I think rightfully points out lots of flaws in the arguments that help us identify solutions. Much of the hurricane damage increase over time is because we’re building bigger and more expensive houses in hurricane alleys; for this problem, we can stop building there; everybody stopping flying altogether until 2100 delays increases the increase by a few weeks, so stopping flying isn’t the solution. Often the solutions are smaller, more local, less sexy: want less polar bears to die? Increase regulation on poaching. (Polar bear populations are up over the past decade because of this, apparently). I would love to identify and popularize these solutions, so they are spoken in the same breath as global warming rather than it being all gloom and doom and end of the world.

There are real tricky questions about what we’re trying to preserve and for whom, as well. If all we care about are humans and climate migration, then building infrastructure in places like Haiti and even evolving to coal power would be more helpful.

What do you think are the biggest planetary potentials? I want to think of it in a bunch of ways, but one is through the lens of things we want to improve, eg:

1) What are the biggest problems/threats/embarrassments? and another is

2) What are the greatest potentials? I'll post some examples in the comments