Dr. Jernej Sever
It’s time for people to create new values and a new lifestyle
A few tens of thousands of years ago a human was still an inconspicuous animal living somewhere in Africa. Homo sapiens shared the space with other human species. Together with other living creatures, we lived in a natural environment and tried to survive in it to the best of our ability. Although Homo sapiens’ brains allowed complex abstract thinking, major changes only began with a cognitive revolution that began about 10,000 years ago. This revolution was not a sudden leap at the level of enhancement of the cognitive abilities of our brains. The main change was that we started to believe in stories, rules, ideals and ideologies. Stories, myths and laws allowed unlimited number of people to be organised. Our lives were no longer guided only by the biological and emotional mechanisms that we had developed through evolution, but above all by the stories we believed in. The stories shaped religions, philosophies, economic systems, countries and empires. In these stories we fulfilled our wishes, we ware happy or unhappy, successful or unsuccessful. With the help of stories we constructed and shapeed our lifestyle.
Negative human impact on the environment has increased with population growth, better organizations and new technologies. With the Industrial Revolution, the development of a modern capitalist and economic system and an ideology of the need for constant economical growth, humanity has become the driving force of the fastest climate change in the entire history of the Earth. In return for a more favourable life and the accumulation of many unnecessary goods, we began to lose the quality and diversity of our environment. Climate change and environmental pollution are no longer only destroying our planet, but are also putting our lives at an increasing risk.
This is not because we all want and perhaps deserve a comfortable and safe life, but mainly because we live and believe in stories and values that are not appropriate and sustainable to create a socially just and environmentally friendly world. Change is possible and can be timely, but only if we are willing to forge a new story and lifestyle.
The lifestyle is never really created by politics or religion. The lifestyle is always created by an individual who believes in it and lives it. So why don’t we create a new lifestyle together? The Environment – friendly program is a model that helps us identify and change our habits in a playful and relaxed way. Join us. Participate. Suggest new activities.
Let’s start the warm-up together so that we can run the marathon in the end. Every single one and all of us.