We are burning ourselves out and as a result, burning the planet out.
The cure for burnout is not time off and returning to the same routine, but changing the underlying systems to give us support and regenerate our energy. This is true for us as individuals, as collective communities, and as a global planet. It’s too late for us to keep talking about sustainable design as we know our current state is not sustainable. Instead we need actions that restore us, rejuvinate us, reenergize us, regenerate us. How can we design products, tools, systems, interactions and communities that create more energy? When we compost food, it makes the soil richer and full of more nutrients. Regenerative brakes in electric cars create electricity for slowing down. As designers, as people, we need to move the conversation about how everything we do and make can regenerate ourselves, our collective, and our planet.
If we are stuck thinking that sustainability is about recycling bottles, turning lights off, mushroom packaging and designer jumpsuits made from hemp, then we are in trouble. We also can not leave the work to those in policy and regulation. We need to move the conversation on a mass scale. Get beyond the green washing, beyond the small steps, beyond even the word sustainability to think regeneratively. We need to empower people to understand that the climate crisis is deeply rooted in intersectional systems and to take action.
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Delivered to your inbox monthly-ish are articles, stories, illustrations, visuals, interviews and more on regenerating ourselves and our planet. Breaking down the academic speak behind theories and studies so that the conversation can expand. Understanding integral theory, intersectionality, transition design, systems thinking and more. Regenerative design that goes beyond just making more beautiful trash and gets to impactful solutions.
Conversation creator
Rachel Beth Egenhoefer is a Professor of Design at the University of San Francisco, editor of the Routledge Handbook of Sustainable Design, systems thinking leader, a futurist, a strategist, a mother of two daughters, and someone who’s always trying to learn new things.
