Blue's blog

Enviro- Mental

The story of how I went mental and became Enviro-Mental.

I believe we must achieve the goals of environmental awareness and ecological sustainability responsibly and with respect for each other - that the environment within us and between us as human beings, matters more to the external environment we share than we currently credit it for. I feel the inner environment needs to be considered equally when generating and implementing solutions to the problems we face.

I feel that we must encourage each other, not continue to condemn, which is to distract us from our goals with blame and add more weight to each others lives. Instead we need to be compassionate, not approaching this issue with a violence or force that demands any one set of results; a fearful response. Rather we must act gently towards each other and simply live true to our most honest selves - as we are, right here and now. A loving response. As so within, without.

Solutions that involve financial purchases do have their place and their part to play in the bringing about of a new consciousness of the finite resources on our planet and our often violent and wasteful way of being on it. They provide people who are unable to participate in any other form, a meaningful  and valid way to contribute to the sustainability of our world. Whether it is a financial choice to do something or a choice not to do something, financial choices matter.

For me however, financial options, presented as they were as  the only' solution', caused me many personal problems; intellectually, physically, emotionally and psychologically.  As a person already environmentally aware and very conscious of the damage being caused ' in my name' by others and feeling that loss to life on an intimate level, I was already devastated by the state out planet was in. Being a person who is on a limited and fixed income I was simply unable to afford these costly changes to my household appliances, buy a new car or to make such costly energy choices. In personal desperation, I was quickly overwhelmed by my apparent 'lacks'  and despairing at my incapacity to affect change. 

As I experienced the downward social pressure to conform to new "environmental standards" of living and concurrently I also felt the desperation of the natural world under my feet pressing upon me. I was confused by this pressure and felt ' me in the middle' was being squashed. I felt myself personally being alienated and increasingly excluded from society and life, I felt powerless.

Living as I do only two blocks from a major oil and chemical refinery,  I also saw the hypocrisy and the responsibilities that were being abdicated, I got angry. I felt the fear and panic that was being generated and handed off as blame  to those least environmentally damaging people or those least empowered to make the bigger decisions or choices that could affect real global change. 

I felt 'abused' by this anger as much as the inferences being made, I felt manipulated and used as a scapegoat. And being a person who takes life personally, I resented the implications I felt were being made that just by the sheer fact of being alive, I was to blame for it all.

Being unable or unwilling to purchase new items like expensive mercury laden light bulbs or solar panels or any other term of fiscal quick fix, this external push to a higher more life affirming world seemingly coming from a world that had ignored its own overindulgence, became quickly internalised in me as a tangible guilt and despair that caused a terrible fear of loss and sense of futility and desperation. Ecological damage is a truth, but how it was presented to me, saw it become a 'truth', that instead of setting me free, led me into a serious clinical "climate induced"  depression. On top of an existing condition, this depression threatened my very existence.

I began to feel  that I was not just in part to blame for the problems but that I could not be a part of the solutions either. I felt increasingly excluded  because I had no money or seemingly, no power to change anything. I entered social and emotional entropy.  I could not act without grief blocking my path and catch 22 paradoxes were all around me. This twisted logic informed me that all I could really do then, was to leave the planet entirely and yes, I nearly took that "advice" on several occasions. I know sadly, that many already have or are contemplating this reaction.

Despite my deep desire to do good and not be a burden to any in this world, my mere presence in the world had come to mean that I was the burden.  An empathetic beings worst nightmare. In wrestling with this problem and trying hard to overcome its effects, it came to me one day that one environment was being overlooked entirely - the inner human environment. It also came to me that until this environment changed, the external environment would remain a "feed lot" no matter what we did. No matter how much we bought or changed out outside, if the inner world didn’t change, the  "psycho-biological basis" for the outer destruction would continue to cycle and spiral.

At first I was offended by this thought, and then the fullness of it hit me.

I had found myself a method to contribute, one beyond money and beyond pointing out the problems or suffering their presence in desperate disbelief that external forces have the only answers. And so  I have chosen to adopt this 'reverse' method of environmental action and change; inner to outer - to test its durability, possibilities and its limitations and to observe and evaluate its effects in and to the outer environment of my life.

My method embraces my values so it embraces my sense of worth as a by product. It works for me and my world. It is simple, personal, spiritual and physical. Two main questions have aided me : What am I fearing? What do I really want? My most honest responses to those, filtered through my conscience, and common sense now determine my actions and the outcomes of my actions. This 'method' is now simply my way of living, it's no burden at all and began a healthy habit forming set of behaviours that I had already been living 'true' to anyway and added only that which I chose for myself.

It has involved examining my own inner contradictions and outer wastefulness honestly, and remaining willing to 'look differently', and to action what I learn. It has also involved freeing myself from the burden of emotional malignancies within myself that were generated by other peoples choices or my own lack of choosing - a release and relief that has led to a sense of not just of achievement but of doing the right thing..

I now live the results of that 'internal ecological' process and those results have cost me, society and the environment no more than my honesty. The results propel in me an increasing and genuine cyclic healing of my world, inclusive of the people and creatures in it - inner and outer- and fill me with the life affirming desire to continue to challenge my own beliefs and assumptions. It compels me to remain loving and aware and demands only a firm but flexible commitment to living truthfully and acting on what I have learned about my own self and becoming more aware of what my role and rights and responsibilities here on this planet actually are. My entire world view, not simply my environments has changed as a consequence.

In the environmental "struggle", I keep one quote firmly in mind, that:

"There is no tyranny so great as that which is practised for the benefit of the victim." 

And so I act accordingly. I don’t buy into “ for my own good” arguments that tie me in knots. I do what I know is right for me...right here and now. Not just for the planet or future world. In doing so, I reclaim my right to live and be here now as part of a solution, validated by conscientious effort and my own standards. I don’t buy into the messages of tyrants and work to ensure I don’t become one myself. I also and importantly - ceased to struggle. Period. The 'fight' was killing me.

So I write this today not to add to a struggle or to bring any more “down pressure” to anyone. Even if all you can do today is just get out of bed – your doing 'it'. Self care comes first! In fact..if you took every step I did and do, you'd probably fall over in the many potholes I had to make to ensure my road was authentically mine. I can only write it here and suggest to anyone that you can find *your* way and repeat to you what helped me most, that there is hope, that there is a solution...you are 'it'.

After looking at myself, and becoming more honest, I discovered that what I really wanted for myself at base was a planet to live on that was healthy and protected. For my innermost and my outer social self, what I wanted most was a simple life, an authentic life and the luxury of  being free of guilt, shame, regret and remorse. More, it was not just the feeling of those things I wanted rather I wanted to be free of the unproductive expression of them in my life entirely. Which meant examining how they operated inside me and the roads they took to imprison me. So my first stop on this road to becoming “enviro-mental” was me. I realised that it was time to do a bit of a life audit.  So I just up and decided one day that I really could " just do 'it'" and stopped waiting for permission! 

Incrementally, I noticed that as I began to do the internal audit, I had also begun to get rid of anything that didn’t support me or my actual needs and actual wants externally. Which was a lot! I had to discipline myself to not buy into peer pressure, fear or overzealousness and I became courageous enough to say ' no thank you' to other peoples ways of living seeing or 'doing'  choosing to focus solely on my own, accepting of those choices, even of they were going to prove wrong. Its a very hard thing to do!  Such was hte noise though, the pressure and voices and opinions and 'loudness' that I found I quite literally " couldn't hear myself think' and so had to do it this way. I had to spend quite a lot of time ' in nature' and 'in silence' just to hear my mind ticking and to make planned steps I could do for myself.

Part of my internal audit was question asking, ' is it mine?'. If it wasn’t, out it went!  Another part was sorting out *my* needs and wants from those that had been created inside me by other forces like fear or guilt, or outer media and other people and also through personal ego or vanity.  It took a while and loads of listening to hear through the noise to find out what those needs and wants really were..but it worked!  The result at the end of a few weeks was that I had 'simply', simplified my life back to being _my_ life.

My basic process was simple: I stopped beating myself up. I accepted that just maybe I had been being a burden to my self and my world, or at least, that I was carrying a burden for both that I could no longer support.  To resolve the dilemma this admission created, I got honest with myself. I asked myself honest questions and listened for my answers. It was THAT simple.

I also prayed. Yeah I know...but I did. I knew 'this' issue of living and dying ecology and sanity was to big an issue to deal with by myself and so  I knew I needed help and also knew that I wasn’t able to ask others for that help at the time..so I simply just asked the universe  God or the ' great big bloody whatever' to help me and guide me where I needed to go. It helped. It worked. I just took the 'next right steps' as they came, when they came...and come they did.

So I started listening to my own voice and needs rather than media induced hype and superimposed social demands of environmentalism and I just said " no" to what wasn’t mine, asking  " where did that come from" every time I felt compelled to act or be a certain way. In this way I "repossessed myself", at the very least, reclaimed myself from external and internally projected powerlessness. A very important thing. In the action sphere, I  literally just stopped buying what I don’t actually need or want and noted that the world didn’t end! Amazing how much difference that simple decision made to my 'carbon footprint'.

For example: I remember thinking all greeny one day and going to Bunnings for a garden box thing you plant veggies in.  As I stood there all altruistic and stoic, suddenly I was just looking at 4 pieces of wood selling for 99 dollars. So I just stopped. I asked my questions..' why, who, what for' and promptly walked out of the shop. In 'just stopping' before buying, I had saved myself a waste of money, I had admitted to myself that apart from herbs I am useless gardener and accepted that right now, I really am too tired and lazy to go learn, I had realised I only wanted the box to 'look good'  and 'feel good' not 'do good' and that I felt quite ok about sourcing my produce from my grocers and the social interactions that came with doing that. I had learnt that the 'want' for the box was a peer pressure induced purchase..not a choice I had consciously wanted to make. So I had given myself feedback, given myself back 'the' choice. Ditto with expensive mascara's and fancy feminine hygiene products etc...like I mean..who cares if it has pretty coloured box and wings? Hello? Who are we trying to impress? I'm am reasonably sure my vagina doesn’t need me to impress it! Really!

I didn’t realise it much at the time but I had begun by living this way, to take back my power where it mattered most, inside me, and from places within my mind  I had previously given it away or not noticed I had been giving it away for the luxury of mindlessness and copycat-ism or the appeasement of fears. I realised I had spent many years unwittingly doing what I 'thought' was right, but wasn’t right for _me_ or my environment.

So I stopped feeding this fear and stopped trying to impress people or my vagina! ( some worlds did end..new worlds came into being., my vagina hasn’t spoken yet) It was a great relief. It also showed me that *how* I did things mattered as much to me as the doing. Activity that doesn’t mean anything to me is meaningless to me..so I stopped seeking approval and seeking to impress others  'respectfully'. Stop feeding fear, responsibly. I also let go responsibility that wasn’t mine. I took up what was mine. An important step.

The next 'right step' was that I came to rely less on fiscally based economic systems period. I slowly developed a 'new' economy of usefulness and activity of meaningful caring and sharing - quite literally changing my own nature from contributing to the acceptance of despair, to contributing to the restoring and revaluing of  'life' 'peace' and 'happiness'. This change came about naturally, as a by product of redefining what these things meant, what they were and were not - to me.  Unknown even to me at the time,  I simply started aligning my saying and my meaning, what I said and what I did, what I believed with how I acted, what I really wanted, with what I was accepting.  As a result, the inner contradictions and personal hypocrisies became less, the 'struggle' between them ceased.

I started to see that while cash gave me some sense of security and independence of choice, it wasn’t 'choice' or 'security' at all.  It had given me fear. When I had it, I gained the fear of making the wrong choices and received a false sense of power, when I didn’t have it, I gained the fear of not having choices and gained a sense of being powerless. When I had it to spare, cash often felt like it provided a sense of ease, of having a capacity to make choices, but the underlying reality is and was, that money cant 'do the work' of self determination. It, money, in itself is not self determination...just a fulcrum of it. 

So I got better fulcrums! I also somehow redefined self determination, choice, care, self preservation, honesty, truth, respect et al - for myself. I redefined what the word LIFE meant....in days and via decisions..not years in a therapists chair.

When I did at times relent to the need to rely on money to purchase, I chose to become informed where my food and goods come from. I read up and learnt who owns what and how it fits into the bigger inner and outer eco-damage cycle as I understood it. Because it mattered to me. Not due to outside pressure.

For example, wherever possible, I choose " non violent" foods...foods that have been raised in a non violent manner and are harvested in a non violent manner. As a victim of violence, this is an important issue for me, so it was also a simple choice that has led to an amazing set of realisations that continue to 'free' my insides up and protect me from projected guilt and helped me in learning about 'consumed' violence..the same helped me to make conscious consumption choices as well. Inner and outer...a self fulfilling healing process.

I know the end result for a free range chick is still a chicken nugget...its not a naive thing. I just eat and sleep better knowing that chicken was loved and cared for, and met its end respectfully. I can 'thank' my food...not just be thankful for having it. In this way I let go of needless self flagellating guilt and live respectfully of life and the processes that afford me my existence. As a conscious consumer in a growing pool of conscious consumers, I find I can also directly impact the way farmers raise and slaughter livestock and grow crops, so I don’t feel I am adding to the needless rush to consume mega amounts of food or over burdening those same farmers who know no better or would choose better if they could. I am helping to make a 'good' consumer environment for them to be able to assert their love of animals in an economically sound way. I became part of a cycle of life rather than just benefiting from its existence.

I also decided to choose actively which social and environment groups I want to support and made intentional decisions about why I separated from those who I wish no harm, but didn’t wish to support any more.

For example: One year I supported Sea Shepherd - I bought a shirt and signed all the needed petitions, gave donations etc. When they became violent, I stopped. When they asked why, I told them, so informing those I support of my choice for peacefulness and my unwillingness to share in any culpability for increased violence in the world.

The next year, I supported Brave Hearts, a group actively 'doing' the business of protecting children that I still support inspirit but even so,  with caution. When they started as a group to attack released prisoners, I made my views and voice heard there as well. I cant change them or their views, I can only live true to mine.

So, by reclaiming myself, I found I can exercise my voice today but I don't need to have the universe tilt to my viewpoint to 'feel good'. I can live, and let live and leave the consequences of my voice, the outcome of exercising it up to others to judge or not. I can let go of people and causes that affect my inner health negatively. I can defend myself. I also know why I support who I do today - making support real and meaningful to me not just jumping on a bandwagon of 'acceptable social groups' in some abdication of my responsibility or because " I should".

I do support my local and otherwise ecologically and politically incorrect IGA because they let small growers sell friendly and violence free farm produce in their stores but not the one down the road that doesn’t care where it buys or what it sells. These are very simple choices..but the power of them makes a huge difference. The overall important thing for me was to start making some - for myself.

I started free-cycling ( google it!) - a nice word for "sharing" and reducing landfill! and Fun too:)

I got to know the people in my community just by being friendly at checkouts. ( I realised I had a local community, that there was one!) I reduced my inner sense of isolation and started to see how much good was around me...and how many people were 'doing' good and came to see how fear and guilt worked to hide this view from me. Now, I reduce their effectiveness to 'lie' to me and drag me into hopelessness.

I do discipline my own wastefulness - For example I buy 20 dollars worth of petrol per week. That’s it. If it cant be done on that..it doesn’t get done. My son has a train card weekly for school  and I have my feet. Apart from a few weeks of major events, I have managed to stick to this method. It involves thinking..what, where , when and how.

I also USE the recycle option with garbage each week at home, every day..rising tins and sorting out plastics etc because I do care. To get past my cynicism, I relented to the fact that if councils aren’t living up to their end of that commitment - that is NOT my problem, it is what I do that matters to my world, mind and spirit. I own what's mine to own and stop self flagellation.

Whenever sanely possible ( sane because some weeks I have no choice and I refuse to be obsessive so I have to just accept that) I support locally owned, local businesses and the people in them. I located a small independent butcher, grocer, hairdresser. Utilising them makes me *feel* good and knowing I am helping out a specific individual makes me part of the goodness and the sharing economy.

I started more and more to use the local library....cd's dvds' magazines etc.. I don’t buy magazines at all today. Why harm a tree if you don’t have to right? I also started haunting second hand book stores..taking my old away and getting a whole new library I can settle in to read when I want rather than hanging on to old stuff or buying new 'trees' - letting go the old. embracing the new. I also read books online.

I wanted desperately to do something for the literally powerless and voiceless in our world so my response was twofold and came about after thinking about who was actually helpless and voiceless and who wasn’t and then, who was doing the job of helping those people the most effectively, using best methods, politics, resources etc. I also knew intuitively that joining the planet or other people in their misery doesn’t help...if anything, it only adds to the burden of misery. So I stopped comparing or trying to  justify my comparative 'wealth' and started helping out instead - I became part of the solution.

We now support Doctors without Borders, giving just 10 dollars per fortnight but giving it consistently over a year means they can count on it, and now that miserly ten bucks means  50 kids a month eat every day!  MSF is an organisation I *can* wholesale support because of HOW they do what they do..not just that they do it. I know too well that often our best intentions can lead us to make bad decisions and this is how I work that one out. I don’t give to charities or when I feel emotional or to non vetted groups that just want money. MSF wants me involved, not just my money...they are a group of workers not a charity group. Simple.

Also, being deeply saddened by the natural environments destruction I chose not to sit in that sadness any more. Knowing next to nothing about wildlife to begin with, I became an animal foster carer and then 2 years later, started up my own small wildlife shelter using only donated goods, loving friendship resources, will and determination. At first, admittedly, this choice it was 'for me' and about me in that it was great therapy but now, years later and by committing to doing this even when I don’t want to do it..it is definitely 'for them' and sure I get some side benefits too - guilt free.

In one of those ' just do the thing in front of you' moments I was 'given ' my first possum to care for in the middle of a very deep depression..they helped me recover..why not help them recover too!

When I do need them, I buy recycled - computers - phones - cars - clothes - kitchen items - frames ( I'm a painter) etc.. I think the only actual purchases off the shelf and a give in to luxury I have made is a new bed! My house mate, a new couch. That's it, in ten years. We simply haven't  *needed* anything else. I dropped any 'ego' that said I "needed" to have high ticket and high cost stuff or have 'new' stuff in order to be 'a good and acceptable person'. I don’t.

I do look at the simple things....make them important. For example, I use candles at night with a low watt bulb lamp if necessary for reading and combined with incense from my local Indian small goods store, it creates an emotionally relaxing and soothing peaceful space in my home my son has grown up with and considers normal. It costs less energy wise too as when this practice is combined with full load washing only, no clothes dryer and a no air con until 40 degrees rule, my electric bill is under 200 every quarter, my water bill, under 100, my gas, under 100. I use less. Less of what I don’t need has become more of what I needed.

When I am cold I reach for a jumper before the heater...but I don’t beat myself for using the heater when I need to!  do recycle plastic bags every time..it just happens here now etc...little things that make a huge difference.

As far as water use goes..I am sensible. I need my showers, they are essential to me as a part of ongoing self management of my mental illness not just personal hygiene, so I  will save up shower time on days when I am not out and about and no one cares if I smell, so I can have one long one when I need to....it is great for mental health, self soothing and better for the environment as it saves the community countless amounts in hospital costs and on better days, I sit there with a bucket if I need to so I can water plants afterwards as well...hence continuing the healing process and self care outside of the shower. 

Another choice during the drought was to fill my bathtub and to use only water from that one tub to a water plants at night when it wouldn’t vapour away. One tub lasted the entire 4 weeks of heatwave during the Black Saturday time. It was also used for rehydrating animals that came into care and boiling the kettle for exhausted and desiccated rescuers!

I choose to borrow more than buy - yes that horrible word that means you have to engage with people and make yourself vulnerable! I unashamedly borrow mowers, recipes, talents -  anything really that I don’t have, cant afford or don’t want a company to have to make 'just for me' I borrow.  Borrowing, so long as you take good care of the goods and return them promptly is a goodness imo...it allows others to help YOU..a huge form of love. What I must have or need to have of my own I do. This inst about dependency, but it is everything about interdependence - becoming an accepting interactive human again.

So I stopped worrying about what I couldn’t do. I did what I could, with what I have, right now. I stopped worrying about money and started focusing on and making the best use of what I had. I started to realise just how much money wasn’t the problem or the solution. 

It is an odd thing during the recent financial crisis recently was that I was not in a financial crisis. I have no personal debt, and yes, money got tight, we had to shore up our conscious buying and  personal disciplines, but there was no 'crisis' attached to the event. Just a readjustment. I felt no fear at all. I was in fact somewhat content that I had chosen to invest in my self and in people not goods and money and I was secretly happy that more people had through that crisis, come to see through the lies and fears, and to the value of living simply and sharing with each other. I also recognised how many people were like me, previously depressed about a system they felt they couldn’t affect, who are now bouncing out of their minds with how much we can do and have already done! 

Whether it is a personal recognition of my change, or my view of and attitude towards them that has changed, I'll probably never know. What I can know, now, is that I now see hope and faith ruling where once depression and powerlessness reigned..and that matters.

If it matters to know, then please do know that I live on a total income of $489.00 per week. With that, I raise a teenager who is an elite athlete and foot all the costs that go with that, I house share and pay private rent, pay equal share of all bills and I’m paying off the micro-finance loan for my car. I also pay for the upkeep of the animals in my care, paint and help to feed two other human households who occasionally need assistance or just a break. Yet my son and I have never gone without any single thing we have genuinely needed or genuinely wanted. In fact..we still often have 'too much'.

As I write that bit above, I am reminded that this not about boasting or about applying a pressure. Its not a 'look what I can do' or a finger point of how much you can/cant do.  I just did what I could do by choosing how I wanted to do it. So I’m just letting you know about my fiscal income because I wanted to share the result of  my non fiscal income. As those results came about only as a result of self possession and reacquiring my choices, not more or less money. 

This post isn't about judgements. You do what you can, not what I can. Nor is it a post to those many people who are already 'doing', be that by choice or through having no choice. The underlying current here is that “inside” ecologies matter. More, that the two ( inner and outer) when combined in harmony, fostered by respect and activity do more than one side can alone.

My cup is now quite literally overflowing enough that I can give more outwardly with much gain inwardly, and I can already see how I can do so much more as that overflow from my cup is not despair grief or tears but goodness, not a giddy hyper positivity born of a false hope, but a grounded rooted reality of real change that brings up excitement, peacefulness love and hope for the future.

Life - is good. Period.

I am living well and living sustainably today with an ever reducing carbon footprint I can love, because that process to comprehend just how good it is, began within me.

Good journey to you and thanks for reading!

Blueskylady

( this piece of peace was written for a dear friend who is doing an assignment on 'top down'  environmental economic policies and their effects.) <3