Some of the homes that have been built in the last 10 years just appall me. Why do humans need huge homes? I was born poor and I didn’t know you bought clothes at anything but the Goodwill until I went to college. Some of our mentality about what it means to have a good life is, I think, not going to help us in the next 50 years. We have to think through how to choose a meaningful life where we’re helping one another in ways that really help the Earth.
Interpretation
This quote critiques materialism and emphasizes the importance of a meaningful life focused on helping others and the Earth.
Elinor Ostrom highlights the disparity between material wealth and the essence of a fulfilling life. She argues that the recent trend towards building excessively large homes symbolizes a misguided understanding of what constitutes a good life. Instead of accumulating material possessions, she suggests that true fulfillment comes from making choices that foster community support and environmental sustainability, particularly as society faces future challenges.
In practice
During a speech about sustainable living, one might quote this to emphasize the need for a shift in mindset.
What is missing from the policy analyst's tool kit -- and from the set of accepted, well-developed theories of human organization -- is an adequately specified theory of collective action whereby a group of principals can organize themselves voluntarily to retain the residuals of their own efforts.
What we have ignored is what citizens can do and the importance of real involvement of the people involved - versus just having somebody in Washington make a rule.
The power of a theory is exactly proportional to the diversity of situations it can explain.
Without the Spirit of God we can do nothing. We are as ships without wind or chariots without steeds. Like branches without sap, we are withered. Like coals without fire, we are useless. As an offering without the sacrificial flame, we are unaccepted.
What's the go of that? What's the particular go of that?
Even two of humanity's most intimate possessions - a sense of self and a body image - are fluid, highly modifiable creations of the brain's mischievous deployment of electricity and a handful of chemicals. They both can change or be changed on less than a second's notice.
Economic chasm between people is something that is of interest to me. And something that I used to write about even as a child. It's something I've revisited a few times in my writings.
An abnormal reaction to an abnormal situation is normal behavior.
They who forgive most shall be most forgiven.
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