March 2020 Earth Care World Report

As you've heard in previous podcast episodes, we're going to be taking time here and there to talk more about what's going on in the world, and how that's tied to sustainability and permaculture. In this first report, we're focusing on the Earth Care aspects of what's been happening in the world. In the podcast Josh identifies a number of topics going on right now, linking many to the recent fires in Australia. Here in the blog post, we'll dive deeper into four of the topics he brought up in the episode - longer summers, droughts, biodiversity and soil science.

Longer Summers

Josh noted in the episode that in Australia, they are experiencing summers a month longer than summers from 20 years ago. That's a huge difference! BBC noted that Australian summers have now become TWICE AS LONG as its winters! That's crazy! While Australia has been making some big strides towards sustainability and even permaculture, as a whole they...

Lessons from the Story of Pando

Welcome back everyone for Episode 025! So remember how our online course is called the Pando Academy Online Course? We today we're talking about why it has such a unique name and the lessons we've drawn from this unique, ancient organism.

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The Metaphor for Pando

What exactly is Pando? It is an ancient aspen clone forest in Utah that is the oldest living organism on the earth known to man dating 80,000 years ago. In permaculture we like to look at nature and learn from its patterns and interactions to mirror in our own environments. We're going to do that same thing here in the blog post. Josh talked about Pando and it's strengths and threats in the podcast, but we're going to address Pando more as a metaphor here, and draw applicable lessons for our individual lives.

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Living Through the Ice Age

About 12,000 years ago, we came out of our last ice age. Pando has been around since way before that ice age,...

What's the Story on Permaculture?

We have a few podcast episodes under our belt now and have been sharing some awesome stories of permies in action. Lately, however, we've been talking with a lot of people who aren't fully engaged in permaculture. Maybe they have knowledge and even a PDC completed, but don't feel like they are living permaculture really. Some used to be super into permaculture, and then migrated into the urban space to work on something completely differently. There are many different, individual cases of course, but at the end of the day there are a lot of permies who don't feel like they are really living a permaculture lifestyle, and oftentimes they feel alone in their sustainability efforts.

We've found that many permies feel this way because they are disconnect from the global permaculture conversation, the global STORY. But there's not really a central place we can go to get an idea of where permaculture is at and where it's going. So we're taking it...

The 5 R's of Permaculture Minimalism

We LOVE minimalism.

Seriously.

I mean, we sold our 2000 sq ft home and moved into a 240 sq ft Airstream trailer to go on adventures... with two kids, so we are all down for thinning the excess in order to live life more fully.

In this week's podcast episode, Josh and I are talking about the 5 R's of Waste Minimalism that David Holmgren brings up in his book, Permaculture Principles & Pathways Beyond Sustainability. Those five are refuse, reduce, reuse, repair and recycle. In the episode we go a little more into detail of our experiences with these 5, but here in the blog post I'm going to use this space as a jumping off point for you to gain further clarity on where you're at, and what you can do to improve. These questions are great for no matter where you are at in your journey.

So go through these questions and share any epiphanies in the comments :)

1) Refuse

- What products around you are obviously not great for the environment?

Timely Lessons in Slow and Small Solutions

This week on the Seeds of Tao Podcast, Josh and I are back on the episode to talk about one of the permaculture principles that seems so pop up everywhere lately, taking slow and small solutions. As permies, we love to dream big, which is great. But sometimes we get a little antsy and impatient and start biting off more than we can chew, and it turns around and bites us. We have to be really methodical about the progress we make towards our goals and the speed we do that so that we can allow space for necessary feedback along the way and create the sustainable change we desire.

Small and Slow Is the Way to Go

In the podcast episode we talk about how we had big dreams of going up to Montana and developing our 10-acre off-grid homestead, but (mostly my) overexcitement and impatience got the best of us, and we stretched ourselves too thin, which resulted in not accomplishing what we set out to do. 

Likewise, with any...

This week on the Seeds of Tao Podcast, we circled back around to a previous guest on our podcast, Alan Rafael Seid. Last time Alan talked to us about the importance of people care, and generally what he's doing with his project called Kalapa. We discussed in the blog post the importance of manifesting and how to manifest your permaculture dream. This was before the official launch of the Kalapa.

Now things are moving and shaking with Alan and the Kalapa is started, so we brought him back on to discuss what is happening within the Kalapa right now in the North section, which focuses on Integral Theory, and in the Northeast, focusing on Personal Practice. Here is a visual representation of the compass Alan refers to.

Instead of taking topics that he brings up and running with it in this blog post, this time around we're going to put forth all the amazing resources that Alan brings up in the interview. So go check that out if you haven't already, and here are more resources for the...

For our 20th episode on the Seeds of Tao Podcast, we have the fantastic Sarah Vito. She’s a master at permaculture and project management - a permie after our own hearts! We are project management junkies here at Seeds of Tao. In the episode, she shares all about her story of finding a win-win between her passion and income source. Lately, we’ve found this struggle to be pretty much across the board with permies. They’re full of passion, but don’t always know how to turn that passion into an income generator. That’s what we’re going to go into more detail here in the blog post.

Where’s the Money At?

WWOOFing. Ecovillages. Volunteering. Community action. Gardening. 

These are fairly common terms and practices in the permaculture realm. They are also really good at NOT generating a reliable income for people. What’s a permie to do?

Some will have an aversion to anything related to currency, and totally throw...

Allowing Space in Community Projects to Observe and Interact with Claire Henkel

We have a really inspiring change-maker here on the podcast this week. Claire Henkel joins us for Episode 019 of the Seeds of Tao podcast where we discuss creating change in the community while allowing space for organic feedback. Claire is an awesome example of someone who adapts to changing environments and finds a way to leave a place better that it was when she came. Here are some links to her fantastic permaculture non-profit out of Guatemala, the Garden of Hope.

Here’s the website of Jonathan Engels and his wife Emma Gallagher, who helped build the Garden of Hope… https://jonathonengels.weebly.com/ 

The Garden of Hope fundraiser... 

https://charity.gofundme.com/o/en/campaign/garden-of-hopes-garden-to-kitchen-program?utm_campaign=oc&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=crowdrise

Garden of Hope's Facebook...

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Creating Resilience Within Ourselves and Our Village

This week we have the amazing Nicole Bradford on the podcast, where we talk with her about creating resilience within ourselves as a necessary part of being an active part of a village. Lately, in the permaculture and sustainability spheres, there’s a big move towards trying to separate from traditional urban or suburban living and moving to an eco-village of some sort. Ideally in that type of environment, you would be around like-minded people, and create a culture around what matters most to the group. While this is a worthy pursuit and lifestyle, we must be careful to jump into that type of environment, without taking care of and strengthening our own mindset first.

Getting Along With Ourselves

In the episode, Josh and Nicole talked about how in order to get along with others, we must first get along with ourselves. This is so incredibly important. 

If we come into a village without our own head and...

Manifesting Your Permaculture Dream

On today’s Episode 016 of the Seeds of Tao Podcast we have Alan Rafael Seid with us, a master of mindset and creating harmony in the permaculture space. He’s got a beautiful piece of property in Washington State, and a wonderful story, as you will hear in the episode. In today’s blog post, we’re going to dive into a big topic that Alan brought up and kept circling back to in the episode - manifesting. But first, Alan shared his amazing endeavors with his business Kalapa, which you can learn more about here. He also talked about the compass rose he created related to Positive Change Agents and Positive Change Agents ...

What Exactly is Manifesting?

The term “manifesting” is kind of a crazy buzz word lately. Honestly, it’s not my favorite word. Oftentimes the term is directly related to the Law of Attraction, which definitely has its merits and value, but also often leaves...