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INSERT - Join me with a batch of wonderful guests in a special pop-up live musical gathering Monday, January 1, New Year’s Day, at noon US Eastern time! Join on YouTube here:
Also streaming on Facebook, LinkedIn and X/Twitter (no advance link in X; just join us at @revkin at showtime).
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Another year down, full of extreme heat and turmoil, success and peril - both climatic and societal. And the year ahead could make this year seem boring.
I could do a “top 10” list of insights or events in 2023 or predictions for 2024, but won’t. Instead I’ll offer the song abov, which I began writing during the last great recession but that feels like a good fit on lots of days in this unfolding century. In it I suggest we all “start each day with a prayer and end each day with a toast.” You can listen or download an mp3 on Bandcamp here. The lyrics are at the bottom of this post.
For blow-by-blow posting, there are amazing aggregators out there like
with the or on , prolific deep divers like on and climate-campaigning media innovators like and prolific data-centered analysts like , (A World of 8 Billion) and . The self-described disasterologist can keep you apprised of losses and efforts to stem them.I do chase the news and sometimes still try to get ahead of it both here and on X/Twitter. I’ve decided to keep X as my main outlet for daily reality-seeking. I’ve laid out my reasons quite a few times here. (I am still testing out Threads and Bluesky but sense they are deeply constrained both technologically and in terms of who’s there and why. Please follow me on X for that kind of output.
Why Sustain What
So what is this Sustain What project for? Why should you subscribe and, for those who can afford it, chip in?
Here I’m trying to identify, utilize and convey modes of thought and action that can help you not only navigate the polluted fast-forward media and social media environment, but contribute to improving it.
In 2024, I’lm going to try to center on this goal even more, and pull back from realtime news dissection. At age 67, with book and documentary projects in the works, I don’t see an adequate return on my time investment - or yours - in simply supplying more news. I’ll be posting more of my video webcasts as podcast posts here.
You can be Thriving Online - really
My Sustain What series called Thriving Online has dozens of conversations holding insights and ideas from fantastic guides. Here’s the playlist. Please suggest future guests and subjects!
Watch words before you use them
My #Watchwords series, which I’ll be organizing better in 2024, is my effort to identify words and phrases that get tossed around far too freely in climate and sustainability communication and - like the word sustainability - only have meaning when you pause to examine your definition and those of others. Sustain What? For whom?
I wrote a post on a particularly overused word - WE. This little video snippet captures why that word fails when someone proclaims what “we” need in the context of energy.
So I hope you’ll help support me financially if able. This is particularly important now that I’m unaffiliated with an institution.
I’m deeply commited to keeping almost all of my content open to all who need it instead of only those who can afford it.
Have a productive, creative and safe year!
As promised, here are the lyrics to Prayer and a Toast.
Prayer and a Toast © 2023 Andrew Revkin
Fluky doesn’t even begin to describe the way life feels these days.
Crisis a minute has become the norm.
Worries just won’t go away.
Bills are piled high, windows are barred, tread on my tires worn thin.
Got such an assortment of problems,
I don’t know where to begin.
So I take my old dog for a seven-mile walk. Stare at the clouds in the sky.
Sit on a rock on the top of a hill
and just simply wonder why.
Why am I here? Where am I headed? Is there an end to these woes?
Then the sun peeks out and a rainbow appears,
and my dog licks me on my nose.
That’s when I realize things aren’t half as bad as they seem to be.
I’ve got two good legs. It’s a beautiful day,
and at least my dog loves me.
I’ve decided to take it all a day at a time. Made myself a little oath.
I’m going to start each day with a prayer
and end each day with a toast.
I’m going to start each day with a prayer and end each day with a toast.
I get back to my house, pay one of my bills. Write a new resume.
Call an old friend I haven’t seen for years.
He says I made his day.
He’s behind on his rent. His roof has a leak. He’s fighting with his wife.
I say it sounds like you could use a little dose
of my new approach to life.
You see I realize things aren’t half as bad as they seem to be.
I’ve got two good legs. It’s a beautiful day,
and at least my dog loves me.
I’ve decided to take it all a day at a time. Made myself a little oath.
I’m going to start each day with a prayer
And end each day with a toast.
More on my music:
A Song and Mission for Years Like These