Tag: sharing

When round and round the same circle is good

Posted on by philipdodson

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Often we think when we go round and round the same circle that it is a bad thing. Like we are stuck and in the normal way we think about this, then it is true.

Doing the same thing again, and again, gives us the same outcome which does not enable improvement.

However, on day 2 of the OuiShare Fest 16, I listened to a talk about the circular economy given by Luisa of the Ellen MacArthur Foundation.

Cabaret Sauvage, Paris - OuiShare Fest 16 by Philip Dodson
Cabaret Sauvage, Paris – OuiShare Fest 16 by Philip Dodson

Over the last few hundred years during the industrialised age, we have become increasingly conditioned to the linear process of taking raw materials from the planet and industrially processing them into stuff for us to consume and then throw away into an incinerator or landfill.

This process has lead to the complete depletion of resources, destruction and poisoning of the planet in which the 7 billion of us live.

The circular economy is a process of regenerating and restoring by re-using and by cutting out waste. Essentially don’t take new resources when you can use what is already there.

This is a challenge to our culture of throwing everything away and this is a threat to the industrial economy that has created the throwaway culture. For example, ‘use by’ date codes on food that has made many throw away perfectly good food due to believing the myth that we are all going to die from deadly bacteria lurking.

We have been sold this myth of throwing away rather than properly recycling or reusing or repairing something. Why because it makes money and that is what has driven us throughout the industrial age.

Thankfully the industrial age is dying and this means that we now have to look at what will replace it and how will we live, work and govern ourselves beyond this age.

Going round and round the same circle with our resources is a truly essential process for the future of the human race.

Sustainability, openness, collaboration, sharing, self-governance, cooperation, and many more themes are coming out from this OuiShare Fest.

This is hope and this is the circle to be going round.

That one voice

Posted on by philipdodson

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We create something, we refine it, we polish and then we share it with the world. We have that feeling of accomplishment and pleasure in having finished it and shipped it.

We have overcome our doubting voices and then we hit the ‘publish’ ‘send’ ‘tweet’ and we wait. Or we do a talk and the audience clap and then we wait for the feedback.

We get a like, a favourite, a re-tweet and we’re happy. We get a lovely DM to say ‘really loved your talk’ or ‘a great post’ in the comments.

Often though, what we are really waiting for is the negative feedback, there must have been someone who didn’t like it.

Then it comes, either a comment after our talk or a negative feedback, a critic.

Then we go off into a spiral of doubt and we say I knew ‘I shouldn’t have said that’ or ‘included that section’, and so the list goes on.

There may have been 25 likes and one ‘dislike’, but it is the one dislike that we focus on in our heads.

Two things I have learnt.

1. not everyone is going to like our stuff, and that’s great as we are not here to create bland stuff for the masses.

2. the one voice does not matter, as the critics are sitting on the sidelines, while you are in the ring taking the ‘punches’ and being brave enough to do it.