Download the PDF: A New Way of Life (from Promise Ahead)

A Quiet Revolution

The second opportunity trend that can make an enormous contribution to an evolutionary bounce is a voluntary shift toward more sustainable and satisfying ways of living.   This is a promising development for, in order to meet the coming evolutionary challenges successfully, I believe that we will need to make major changes in every aspect of our lives—including the transportation we use, the food that we eat, the homes and communities we live in, the work that we do, and the education that we provide.  Although it is appealing to think that marginal measures such as intensified recycling and more fuel efficient cars will take care of things, they will not.  We need to make sweeping changes—both externally and within ourselves.  A sustainable future will demand far more than a surface change to a different style of life—it requires a deep change to a new way of life. 

Download the PDF: Choosing Simplicity from the book, Choosing Earth.

The magnitude and speed of climate disruption now underway is astonishing and will require dramatic changes in how we live on Earth. For the past few hundred years, consumer-oriented societies have exploited the global resources for the benefit of a fraction of humanity. The goal of this approach has been to find happiness through consumption and to satisfy our material wants without conscious regard for the needs of a livable Earth. This self-serving approach brings ruin to the Earth and humanity’s future. Instead of asking what we humans want (what we desire, crave, or hunger for), we are being called to respond to a far more important question: what does the overall ecology of life need (what is essential, basic, necessary) to build a regenerative future for the Earth? To live sustainably on the Earth, we need to choose ways of living that match our consumption with the regenerative capacities of the Earth and the needs of the rest of life with whom we share the biosphere. Instead of a wealthy minority pulling humanity down, a generous majority can live with moderation and kindness and bring tremendous uplift to living on Earth. 

Download the PDF: The Value of Voluntary Simplicity

Originally published in August, 1936 in the Indian Journal Visa-Bharati Quarterly
By Richard B Gregg

Download the PDF: Voluntary Simplicity: Toward a Way of Life That Is Outwardly Simple, Inwardly Rich 

By DUANE ELGIN 

–REVISED, THIRD EDITION— 2009