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...

...

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...

Entrepreneurship in Permaculture

This week on the Seeds of Tao Podcast Episode 016, we have the amazing Adam Jastrzebski on the show. We’ve known Adam for a little while now in our Slack community, and he is an amazing source of knowledge and experience in a number of different fields. One of the big ways we connected is through our love of marketing and entrepreneurship, which is exactly what we both agree that the permaculture needs a little more of.

Permaculture and Business

The permaculture scene is an amazing source of grassroots efforts to create positive, regenerative change in the world. Everywhere we see people healing the land, fighting for food freedom, and coming together over community garden initiatives. Permies are amazing at banding together to create change, and that’s exactly how we’re going to see real change start to happen. 

However, we also see a lot of permies almost pushing themselves away from the...

Starting with Understanding Yourself to Create Regenerative Communities

This week in Episode 015 of the Seeds of Tao Podcast, Garden Jane joins us and shares her amazing journey to becoming a Regenerative Community-Builder. Through a number of different avenues and adventures, Jane boils down what it really takes to create prosperous, regenerative communities - amazing individuals. Jane tells us, “We need to take the time to do our own work,” and we couldn’t agree more. That’s exactly the direction we’re going to go in this blog post, doing your own work and what that can look like. 

Why Start with the Self?

We found it fascinating that originally when Josh and I were putting together the systems and approaches for Seeds of Tao, we believed it was imperative to start as Jane suggested, with the “self.” 

But why not just head out into the community and start throwing ourselves into service projects, grabbing a shovel...

This week on the Seeds of Tao Podcast Episode 014, we interviewed the amazing Levi Gardner, an environmental educator, Non-Profit Executive, father, musician, and aspiring writer. Levi has an amazing knowledge of the mindset side of permaculture, and especially maintaining hope when things get dark - and really that’s what permaculture is all about, creating regeneration in the face of destruction. In fact, we here at Seeds of Tao would argue that Hope is the 13th Permaculture Principle, and we’ve found that those permies who do not apply this principle, are greatly handicapped in terms of creating the change they wish to see in the world.

Hope vs. Fear

When it comes to environmentalism, there are really two camps, the fear-mongering camp, and the hopeful, enhancing camp.  You will find both in just about every community of sustainability, and even within the permaculture movement. 

Why is hope so important?

For one, people aren’t...