There Is No Other: Sustainability

#1: Three Phases of Development

A psychologist I respect described the life of individuals and humanity as occurring in three major phases. The first, with respect to individuals, occurs in the womb and is characterized by unity with the mother and indeed all things, because there is no awareness of separation between self and other. Throughout the second, which comprises the majority of our lives, we are striving to establish our individual identities. This is a very difficult process, and we are plagued with insecurity along the way even to the point of self-destructive behaviors; but it is natural and necessary to our process of self-realization. In the third phase we come to understand that this process has actually been one of Self-realization, the realization that we are individuals in a greater whole, connected in certain ways rather than entirely separate. To an extent, this third phase is a return to the first.

This theory can be applied to humanity as a whole, and it is my hope and belief that humanity is in the third phase or entering it. The sustainability movement is evidence. For millennia, early humans were one with the earth. They understood that to hurt it was to hurt themselves. As the race developed, groups and individuals sought to make their mark, forgetting their connections and exploiting the earth and each other. Now, in large part through growing pains (climate change, inequality), many have realized that exploitation cannot continue, because it is suicide. More than averting disaster, this process of Self-realization has the potential to lead humanity to a higher plane of existence. That is my belief.

This may sound spiritual, and it can be, but Self-realization to me is actually quite logical and practical. How we live our lives on a daily basis will determine if we get there as individuals and as a species. We need to treat our bodies and minds well to be healthy. We need to run cleaner businesses. We need to have better environmental, social and governance policies. We need to focus much more on equality. We need to make sound investment decisions. In the end, we need to realize our connections as much through systems science as through spirituality or other means.

I believe that the sustainability movement, including ESG and impact investing, is symptomatic of humanity having entered or at least striving to enter its third major phase of development. Industry has long extracted from the earth in order to yield its profit. That is no longer necessary. Technology and common sense are overcoming that basic premise. And companies that are helping us move back towards a thriving planet need capital. It is practical but it is profound.

#2: Passion vs. Practicality

Since I was a child, I’ve been very sympathetic. Since college, I’ve contemplated why that is and why it persists. I’ve always felt a connection to the world and dreamed of making a difference.

Deciding to major in psychology in college was critical for me. Psychology taught me self-reflection and in turn shaped my worldview. It became the lens through which I’ve tried to understand the driving forces behind my own and other people’s actions and feelings. After college, I drove across the country with my girlfriend (now wife), a free spirit, a worldview and my lifelong sympathy, thinking I would start to make a difference on the west coast. But I was quickly confronted with what became and remains to this day the core issue in my life, the choice between passion and practicality. I didn’t know what I wanted to do, but I knew that I wanted a family someday and that my family would need to be supported. So I pursued a career in finance with the thought that I could make a few bucks for myself while contributing to the world on the side, in part through writing novels. Until recently, I have found these two objectives, helping myself and helping others, mutually exclusive.

In finance the driving force behind many people’s actions, the primary incentive, is the bottom line. Profit is often pursued at the expense of all else, even happiness. This pursuit is enabled and encouraged the rules. Historically, I lacked passion in my career, in large part because I’ve been disillusioned with the incentives in finance and because I hadn’t made a difference for many people other than myself.

That all started changing when I discovered the sustainability movement and the concepts of ESG and impact investing. I’d been developing a systems science view of the world for many years, though I never called it that or knew the term. I’ve continued to study psychology and have gravitated towards those psychologists who posit that understanding the mind requires an understanding of its connections to the body, even to the earth and to other people. I’ve read a number of popular quantum physics books and marveled at the discoveries implying that all matter is energy and that all is connected at some deep level. I know a fair bit about autism, and it makes perfect sense to me that environmental factors contribute to the problems in the systems of people with autism, as one example.

The sustainability movement is making it clear that the historical Western mechanistic worldview is limited and that we can’t consider ourselves or our businesses isolated from our surrounding environments.