#plasticpolution

The Cloud9 'Forever Tumbler' represents a remarkable 6-year journey of design, engineering, and passion for sustainability. At Cloud9, our mission is more profound than simply making an impact; we aim to 'leave no mark' on our planet. This vision gave birth to the Forever Tumbler – an embodiment of style and environmental care, crafted to be 100% plastic-free with a unique patent-pending glass cap.

Please get yourself up to speed by reading part 1 first

There is an uncanny resemblance between VanderMeer’s shimmer and the advancements of human progress.

Think of how a cityscape expands it’s limits. Hectare after hectare of ‘pristine wilderness’ slowly becoming enveloped by a haze of dust and light. Few things that enter return unchanged. 

Our boundaries leave only that which we can control. Grand, majestic forests that once rivalled for our dominance left decimated in our wake. Only subordinate species may survive, tolerated for their adornment in parks, kerb sides and along the great arteries that feed our cancerous growth. 

Even rock, ancient in its makeup becomes fragmented, reconstituted and made a new. Great structures rise from its remains like fungus on a corpse, harrowing and subjugating the surrounding landscape.  

Animals that have existed for too long within the shimmer see their DNA refracted beyond recognition. Domestication is evolution through human selection. What it lacks in creativity, it makes up for in repugnance and cruelty.

The once proud and powerful ruminants of the grassland now stunted and zombified, unable or unwilling to break free of their meagre enclosures. Even the mighty wolf is reduced to an obedient wretch. 

Sentient creatures looking on would surely wince in horror at the grotesque mutations we call pets.

Are we the proverbial alien in Vandameers lighthouse? 

Does the southern reach trilogy provide for us a mirror, a way for us confront the horror that we inflict upon the world? A horror once again masked by the subversive ignorance we call ‘common sense’.

I’ve begun to wonder about the role of choice in all of this. Can we truly define our future or is time cast with weighted die.

Its considered a mathematical certainty that the universe will end when it reaches its thermal maximum. A state of equilibrium that will see the universe slowly torn apart, divided in to its smallest parts and spread evenly across the void.

Its now thought that ordered and complex systems like life may exist because they actually increase the net disorder of the universe. Systems of dissipation, better at capturing energy than inanimate things. 

The human shimmer may simply be a hungrier and more efficient system, better at absorbing the limited resources of this planet, favoured by the die over its ancestral forbear and therefore just in its parricide. 

From this point of view the many crimes of humanity would seem only to be the inevitable result of an indifferent universe playing out. Atrocities like climate change, plastic pollution and nuclear war being almost predetermined, fatalistic or even the way things are meant to be. 

A point of view that many would consider to be a convenient truth.

But if our actions are unavoidable, then so too is the sequence to which we are are only a part. 

We may yet have our chance to experience the horror that the southern reach trilogy instils upon its readers. A shimmer within a shimmer is once again due, but this time we may not have the insiders perspective - in fact it may not conform to our sense of reality at all. 

The signs of this shimmer may have already begun. There is a science even beyond that of phycology and its lighthouse moment might be the point at which it finds its autonomy.

Technology, is the birth of inorganic evolution, and its growth will be exponentially faster than ours.

The technological shimmer will not debate its actions or become conflicted by moral fibre. It will be driven by a motive far beyond our comprehension and deliver complexity to which our bodies would not hold.

Resources held by its forbear will be stripped, reconstituted and made a new. All at the bidding of a ever restless universe trying to find stillness. 

When we follow principles that govern the simultaneous development of both our health and our sustainability, we adopt practices that more greatly benefit both areas of concern. 

This is because the relationship between the two is synergistic, each set of values serve to motivate to the other.

Our rational for becoming more sustainable harks from a deeply ethical standpoint, but suffers from its perceived altruism. It’s all too often derailed by more egocentric (emotional) needs.

Conversely our rational for becoming more healthy, fitter or athletic is typically very egocentric in nature, but it can lack deeper ethics. 

When we align these values they compliment one another. 

Our fitness goals can become the egocentric need to remain sustainable and being sustainable can offer the ethical rational required to support often wavering and superficial fitness goals. 

In short, It gives us a strong belief system that offers direct payoff in the form of and physical upgrades.

Whats more, a consistent devotion to meaningful causes has a knock on effect to our mental health and happiness.

We can find fulfilment for living a good life.

 Health-sustainability however is about more than just lifestyle. As an ethic it works to expand one’s circle of concern to include the things that one should be concerned about. 

It then works to expand one’s circle of influence to mirror one’s concern. 

In short, it encourages a more responsible individual and by extension a more responsible society. 

At its most basic level however it is easy to adopt, fun and fulfilling. I’d encourage a step by step approach, and never to work to absolutes. 

Have you ever noticed that sustainable practices often overlap with a healthy lifestyle? I’ve come to realise that being ‘green’ has far wider implications than just the environment.

When you reduce single-use packaging, you are forced instead to buy fresh vegetables and wholesome foods. Fatty, salty or nutrient poor foods are typically excluded.

When you decide to drive less, you inadvertently choose to walk or cycle more. Our carbon footprint is never lower that when we are doing the most basal forms of exercise.

This interesting duality also seems to work in the other direction. I was tempted by the health benefits of veganism for years, but I only really committed when I learned about the environmental impact of the meat industry. In the end my excuses were simply broadsided by two highly consequential endpoints stemming from the same damn life choice.

But it’s about more than just physical health. In a previous post entitled, ‘Hurting the planet becomes an act of self harm for those with sustainable values’ I highlighted that the path to sustainable living helps one find greater meaning in life. The mental health connections are perhaps the most poignant of all.

You may find that you have to avoid the ‘convenient’, but in doing so you rediscover simple pleasures in life. I find there are few endeavours more rewarding than the art and therapy of cooking, it reminds me that the pursuit of happiness was never about convenience. Life is about richness, the more you put in, the more you get out. But I digress.

It appears that which pollutes the natural world also pollutes the inner world and I’ve begun to wonder why. What if they represent two halves of the same message? A message that only makes sense when read as a whole.

Charles Darwin coined the term ‘survival of the fittest’, which means only those adapted to their environment will pass their genetics to the next generation. It stands to reason that the ‘fittest’ are not only the healthiest, but also those that live in balance with the environment. An environment that their progeny will inherit.

The connection may simply point to our ‘natural being’ or a lifestyle that sits closer to the way we have evolved.

Modern society is a departure from our ancestral environment which explains why this lifestyle has become obscure, but the answer to modern problems could be to reconnect with the past.

The health of our bodies, our minds and the planet seem to suffer with every step of human progress. Is this not a dire warning? An obvious sign that we are ploughing on in the wrong direction.

Perhaps its time for a shift in thinking. Perhaps for a healthier, ‘fitter’ future we should embrace new ideals. Ideals that use natural indicators to formulate better trajectories.

When we combine the values of health and sustainability we find a way of life that promotes balance, harmony and wellbeing on a multidimensional front.

Personal wellbeing is often plagued with unrealistic or misguided goals. Likewise, being environmentally friendly can lack the ‘what’s in it for me’ factor.

Where there is overlap, there is complementation.

A healthy lifestyle could be guided by deeply held values pertaining to planetary health. Likewise, behaviours that save the planet becomes deeply rewarding when it maintains physical and mental health.

The two offer a synergy, where the sum of the whole is much greater than the sum of the constituent parts.

Why have separate values that divide your time, motivation and headspace. Look instead for a single, manageable focus that benefits from combined motivational forces.

Consider the new ideals of ‘Health-sustainability’.

Many people are hesitant to adopt sustainable living practices because of the belief that it could radically change to their current life choices.

Although this statement is often true, it slightly misses the point about sustainability. It needn’t be radical, but for those that get in to it, the drive for serious change comes from within.

It’s not about cutting the things that you need, its about cutting the excess. The hesitancy comes from a miss alignment of the two.

In a world that spoon feeds us convenience, we begin to place importance on the superficial, the time saving and the ‘easy’. But convenience is often the enemy of responsibility and can drive self-centricity.

“I buy plastic wrapped convenience food because I’m too busy to cook”

“I like single use water bottles because I don’t want to carry a reusable one”.

“A 4X4 is important for my self image”

Such superficial ‘need’ becomes so habitualised that change feels as radical as joining Greenpeace.

Until I began my own journey, I used to be like this. With my learning, I discovered that change isn’t as hard as it initially looks, on the contrary, it’s positively addictive.

Rome doesn't have to be built in a day so I learned to take small manageable steps.

With every step, I learn new things about myself. As I looked back, the excesses I left behind began to lose meaning. As I looked forward, I could see new things to care about, things of substance that bring real purpose and happiness. My very perception of need changed as I grew and eventually began to pull me forward.

Choices become less governed by ‘hedonism’ and more by balance and reason.

“Do I have time to cook or do I have time to sacrifice from my children’s future?”

“Do I need my water to come in plastic bottles, or do I need my water to be free from plastic particles?”

“Do I need others to perceive me as a successful person, or would I rather perceive myself as successfully changing humanity?”

In the left hand you hold the void of hedonistic goals that amount to nothing of real consequence.

In the right you hold the planet, nature, life and humanity, but perhaps most pertinently a meaningful existence for yourself - its really no contest.

Eventually you begin to realise that it was never really about the environment, it was always about you. Sustainability gives you far greater peace than a superficial life ever could. The environment is just a happy benefactor.

One thing I have learned on my journey to becoming plastic free is that you don’t have to be an activist or a political campaigner to make a difference. On the contrary, we are actually far more powerful as individual consumers.

The choices we each make on a daily basis send ripples through society in ways that we simply don’t appreciate, and seldom use.

Those that attack their shopping basket are infinitely more influential than those that attack their supermarket for the simple reason that demand is the lifeblood of supply. Supermarkets can weather public opinion so long as sales are good.

So powerful are your choices, that one weekly shop no matter how mundane it may seem, has greater effect on society than a day spent beach cleaning.

Why? Because demand works to prevent pollution. Beach cleaning as honourable as it is, amounts to pollution management at best.

By leaving that plastic bottle on the shelf, you have done your bit to slow demand and a slower demand means less plastic is brought in to this world. If a plastic bottle doesn't get made, it doesn't need to be reused or recycled. It’s very absence IS the solution.

This ‘choice’ is relatively easy to make when compared to the hard frustrating work chosen by beach cleaners. Their payoffs are no where near as great. It’s a sad fact that the vast majority of marine plastic will never be collected. Of that which is, most will lack the quality to be recycled and will end up in landfill.

It’s a deeply dissatisfying truth that once plastic is brought in to the world, it will do its damage.

We congratulate the beach cleaner for trying to manage the crisis, even if their effect is minimal. So its high time we start congratulating our selves for actually preventing the plastic from getting to the beach.