My One Point Zero Challenge

My One Point Zero Challenge has three Goals:

  1. As an Activist and founder of the One Point Zero cause I am striving to connect my unique drive, passion, experience, mind and skills in the most effective way that assists Society change course. A radical and huge change from its out or control 1.7 and increasing, to a forever One Point Zero or less, one.
  2. In my Personal life, I’m committed to living a Way of Life that ensures I’m personally not a contributor to the 1.6 Overshoot or its continuous increase. In the process I’m hoping to be an inspiring ‘Walker of the Talk’ and inspiring leader for change within the ‘Wealthiest 1%’ community. (I hate this seemingly arrogant and elitist class, based statement: I am aware that this fact and my unique transformation experience since 2004 are key to my effectiveness in Goal 1, above:   ‘Walking the Talk’ and effectiveness in helping the 1% see the possibility of positive transformation and committing to exploring a One Point Zero Way of Life.)
  3. Lastly, given my (unique?!) Global, ‘Grand Adventure’ experiences, and transformation from a Capitalist to an Activist I have taken on the fascinating challenge of designing a future One Point Zero society, assuming I was President Trump! But not just US President, President Trump of The World. (Haha, scary hey!) This maybe impossible challenge is a personal interest and passion which may or may not have outcomes that are of any value in the future to Society. The plan to have fun with the challenge of the adventure! Where appropriate I will share issues, concepts, and views we those who want to discuss, and would welcome input and debate.

For Goal 2 above, the Challenge was to have a quantifiable goal: My own One Point Zero target.

One Point Zero is a nice, simple, measurable but it is a global goal: One Point Zero Earth’s is all we have for all of US.  It’s about ‘The Whole of Society’ and how all 7 plus billion fits within our Planet and its Ecological System.  The planet is a complex and ‘closed’ ecosystem that manages the ‘whole planet’, and it’s the ‘whole system’ that is 60% overloaded and becoming more overloaded each day.

In converting this into a personal One Point Zero goal I have taken the published bio capacity of this global Earth system today, and divided it by the population today, and that gives me my maximum allowable personal capacity goal.

There will be much heated moral debate on how this bio capacity should be allocated, and you like me may have your strong views?  I sense we are so much in Overshoot, and the wealthy nations, communities and individuals, are mostly the main ‘Over shooters’ (and by far) that this a potential smokescreen strategy and is precious time.

The Earth’s bio capacity is expressed in Global Hectares (The number of average planet hectare, excluding virtual inert areas, like deserts etc.) There is much data from many different organisations on line about all this stuff. The Global Footprint Network  is where I have sourced my data / information, and they have a great education and learning section for all these concepts and terminology.  (I am in no way linked or benefiting commercially from them)

Using this methodology:  For an Ecologically Sustainable world today, individually we have 1.8 Global Hectares of regenerative capacity annually. I have taken 2.5 Global Hectares as my personal goal for now.

The average citizen of the world’s developed countries needs somewhere between 4 and 7 Global Hectares today, and then within those countries, the wealthy elite high consumers could be up as much as 30 or 40 global Hectares!   From all my research, I can now see that prior to 2004 when I was entrenched in The Good Life I was probably well over 20 myself!

So the next big question was how does one find the size of one’s Ecological Footprint today? I.e. how many Global Hectares does one’s lifestyle require in one year today?

There are many Ecological Footprint Calculators on line, and as One Point Zero develops I’ll be able to point you to what I believe is the best.

With my ‘Enough is Enough’  philosophy and Living on my boat, using only solar wind power,  no car, cycling everywhere, minimising my material purchases, living the Simple Life, over the years I had thought I was a model member of the 1%, big earners, big spenders, and big accumulators, group, with regard to low impact sustainability living!   All was good with my footprint until I added the occasional flights I ‘have to do’ to get from one adventure to another, when the yacht can’t take me there.

Like all of us, I knew there was an environmental cost for flying but it turned out to be much more serious than I had previously glossed over. So this is now what I call, My Final Freedom Frontier, and I’m busy exploring its implications and how I solve it? The three month trip to the USA starting in June 2016 is the start of this exploring: Will I, or wont I reduce my flying forever to achieve My One Point Zero Target??  Follow the Adventure to learn more…..

For me, the Activist role and launch of One Point Zero is very scary, and a huge personal challenge. I have dealt with some huge ones, and my personal transformation since 2004 was the ‘hugest of the Huge’, but this is my Ultimate Challenge, because it’s challenging my very core and potentially stressing relationships with other humans.  From my days in South Africa, I thrive on change and seek transformation experiences. This is when we Humans become more human and intensely alive as we deal with the unknown and change in our self-created inner world. This Global Sustainability challenge will require the Ultimate transformation: To be part of helping Society transform itself is an opportunity I cannot turn down. Like in 2004: I have do what I have to do, and I am doing it!