🌎 THE BETTER WORLD WEEKLY #183 💌

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Hey y'all,

Happy Monday!

And, for those of us in the U.S., Happy Juneteenth!

It's hot as all heckkkk in San Antonio right now.

If this is what LATE spring looks like, I'm a little nervous about what summer will look like here. 🥵

For Father's Day we got out to a nearby state park and enjoyed some time in the river.

Anyways, *big* announcement today!

Thanks for reading,

-Cory

P.S. - You can connect with me on LinkedIn.

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👋 Bye, Bye Better World Weekly!

Welp, it's time to put the Better World Weekly to rest for the sake of starting something new.

I sent my first newsletter back in October of 2019.

I don't remember how many folks got that first email exactly, but it couldn't have been more than 100.

Today, this email will be sent to over 7,500 of you!

About 3.5 years of writing this newsletter that feels like something to be proud of.

So, thank you for hanging around! And thanks for the replies, thoughtful reading, and support.

I know this newsletter has changed its shape and substance quite a bit over time.

So, what's next?

Well, I started the Better World Weekly as means to share what I was learning in the space of sustainable business.

And while sustainable business is still in large part a core focus of mine (I am writing a book on the topic), I can't help but see overlaps elsewhere.

And perhaps that makes sense.

If we seek to dig up the principles of what makes for building a business sustainably and ethically, we should hope that those principles apply elsewhere, right?

Business can't always be an exception to the rules of everything else. Perhaps that's what has gotten us into so much trouble in the past (and present 🫤).

And so, for me anyways it's not just about business.

It's about everything, really.

It's about how we live, how we spend our time, and of course, how we work.

For me, it's about sustainability. And maybe not in the way we all might think when we first hear that word.

It's much more to me than just reducing our carbon footprint.

Or, biking to work vs. driving.

Or, bringing totes to the grocery store vs. using plastic bags.

Or, quitting it with those god damn Keurig cups.

Sure, those things are all important. And yes, they do add up.

But to me, and if you've been reading along for a while, you'll have already heard me say, sustainability is more than just about changing the things we do, it's about changing the things we value.

It's about changing what we believe. It's about changing the way in which we think the world can and should operate.

It's about questioning long-held beliefs and being open to some things, some ways of life, that do or don't make sense anymore.

It's about considering that living and working sustainably, really just might be the art of living well.

We have to break down and rebuild what we think is success.

We have to break down and rebuild what we think is progress.

We have to break down and rebuild what we think it means to live a good life.

And no, that doesn't necessarily mean sacrifice, but it does mean we might have to imagine and test the bounds of something new.

We have to test our imagination. We have to test the limits of our creativity.

If you flipped a switch and all of a sudden the global economy was a zero carbon economy, would that fix everything in the world?

No.

It would sure as shit change a lot, but not everything.

I don't think it's the carbon emissions that are leaving more and more people unfilled in their work.

I don't think it's the carbon emissions that have people feel like they work too much, spend too little time in nature, or feel like they aren't as connected as they'd like to be to their friends, family, and community.

I don't think it's the carbon emissions that has the U.S. Surgeon General issuing warnings to American parents about the mental health effects of social media for adolescents.

In a green economy, we might still have migrant children working on dairy farms associated with our most socially progressive companies (COMMAND + F "Ben & Jerry's").

In a green economy, we might still feel like we're encouraged, educated, and advocated for to the extent that we contribute to the GDP vs. our communities.

Again, don't get me wrong, a zero carbon economy would change a lot.

But it wouldn't change everything.

It might change a bit how things look. It will certainly change how we do the things we do on a daily basis.

But it might not change we what we do or what we value.

And so to me, I'm not sure living sustainably is strictly about going green.

To me, it requires a much more careful eye and attention.

It requires more than a change in a company mission statement.

And while business is one way through which we think about and look at these things, it's not the only way.

And so what's next? Both a narrowing and broadening of our scope here at the same time.

A gift and a curse of mine is my aptness towards a generalist's approach to life versus a specialist's (my wife shares the same affliction ❤️).

The reasons why I'm interested in something for some time end up more interesting to me than the thing itself.

So what's next?

An ensemble of things, really. But, now the goal is to make it an art.

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As always, thanks for reading!

To buy a little time for transition, we'll be taking the next couple of weeks off.

I'll be back with something NEW on July 10th.

-Cory

CORY AMES - @AmesCory​

Founder & CEO, Grow Ensemble

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🌍 - Better World Weekly (#183) - 🌍