The power behind words - Sustainability

Sustainability is an interesting word. Recently a classmate of mine broke the word down into the two words that are inherent: sustain and ability. The ability to sustain--what are we trying to sustain? In Portland, I have heard a community leader often mention that poor people are not trying to sustain their current impoverished situations. But sustainability is not about maintaining. It is about sustenance, the basic nourishment and support we need to get through life. So what do we then define as basic. Of course food, clothing, and shelter fall under this category. but those are outcomes of something else.

I believe that our sustenance comes from healthy community. I am not talking about just a neighborhood or a church or what we usually jump to when we think of community...because they may or may not be examples of a HEALTHY community. In healthy communities, hard problems are tackled with open decision processes. All people interact on an equitable level, because each person's perspective is valuable to the whole. The goal is the betterment of the community, not the individual, and thereby every individual is uplifted. Poisonous behavior and destructive behavior is self-policed. The key to a healthy community is around communication...it is that which must be nourishing and supportive, not judgmental and destructive.

So sustainability is derived from healthy communities, which are rooted in good, democratic communication, where all voices are heard and valued. Healthy communities also seek self-preservation in balance with the natural environment, by practicing stewardship. If one sees their individual responsibility to protect and nurture others and their environment, in return they will feel whole and fulfilled by the gifts they will receive in return.

Brown people have been taught to be dependent on an economy that takes advantage of us. We are disempowered daily through the myth of scarcity. This has been destructive in our sense of community, as we've strived for independent wealth and power, at the expense of those around us. When truly we are abundant. We have talent, skill, ingenuity, compassion. We can choose to not participate. Seeing participation in this vacuum economy (where the money goes up, but it doesn't come down)as a calculated choice, rather than a necessity. But it can only be done in community.

Sustainability is sustaining our ability to thrive, not just survive. And that can only be done when relationships to one's full environment where both nature and people are in balance.

There is power in this, by claiming sustainability as one's own right, you are claiming entitlement to your health and your happiness for today and generations to come.

How I see it. A note on privilege, environment, and race.

To be completely transparent, I am a highly educated woman. I am middle-class, and have lived a life of immense privilege. I shy away from this fact...believing that it in some way people of color will feel that they cannot relate to my life, and vice versa, that I do not understand the pain of poverty, and injustice enough to relate to the experience of many people of color in this world. Further, by me believing in sustainability and environmentalism, I subscribe to the hugs trees, chastize people mentality. To put it more bluntly, it makes me feel that I lack street-cred. I was told once that it takes 21 instances to  break an initial perception. So let's consider this instance 1.

I believe there are two types of privileged people in the world. Those who take it and run, and those who take it, turn around, and share. Privilege for me means a responsibility to make change and take action. Privilege has meant that I understand aspects of our social system and have learned to take advantage of it rather than be taken advantage of. This does not mean in all realms, but I've had the luxury of a family line that has been able to succeed against expectations. And in those realms, I benefit from their experiences. I am privileged to be able to have had parents that believed in me to be a change agent which has created an intense drive to apply my skills and talents to some greater good. Privilege in my world, is a synonym for responsibility.

So what is it that I feel responsible for? I've called it infiltration, I've called it cross-communication, I've called it building bridges, I've called it breaking down barriers. Essentially I see myself as responsible for taking all the knowledge and experience I've been exposed to in life to build power, confidence, and strength for disadvantaged communities, particularly black communities. WHY BLACK? because if we can build social equity for black people in this country, and get to the point where we can talk openly about the systematic subjugation of black people throughout our history...we can begin to heal wounds and achieve equity for everyone. Native Americans are the only other group to have experienced worse. So much so that their lives are often completely ignored in society. I do not want to be an example of exclusion, I acknowledge that there are much more talented people with cultural knowledge and experience to be able to advocate than I can currently. That will hopefully change in time. So for me the starting point is the black community.

My passion for environmentalism starts here. It is rooted in my desire to preserve natural assets because I believe that the core of our culture lies in a balance with nature. And in fact, the destruction that our communities have felt is paralled in nature. We have not yet made this connection. The civil rights movement is the basis for much of what is right in the world today. Unfortunately, those who were most threatened by it (those who have power in this country) were successful in making sure that it did not address the economy --one that in its basic structure is socially and environmentally unjust. The work of civil rights and social justice is not done, and we as people of color cannot be led to confusion that living in abundance materially equates to the freedom we have always sought. We have been taught that convenience, style, independence and material wealth define our value in society, and in return we have chronic health problems, and dysfunction in our communities.

People and environment are not disconnected. We are part of an ecosystem. Let us redefine what is success, what is wealth, and remember what used to be most valuable to us. Then, let's arm and equip ourselves to make strides towards a new vision for our future.