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Inspiration towards a life more aligned with solarpunk values (slrpnk.net)
submitted 1 year ago by to c/solarpunk@slrpnk.net
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Hi all!

Long time lurker here on slrpnk.net and just signed up to participate more. I have myself been moving on a fairly slow but steady trajectory towards a life aligned with solarpunk values (although not with zeal or even the knowledge of solarpunk for most of this time). I still have a good distance to go, but I also have some concrete ideas in mind going forward.

So I thought I'd make this post where people could share their stories to inspire each other to take bolder steps: what steps have you so far taken and what do you plan to do going forward to live more true to a real solarpunk? What turned you onto these ideals in the first place? If not all ideals speak to you, which do and why? etc. etc. Anything goes!

I'll post my story in a separate comment.

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[–] [S] 3 points 1 year ago (6 children)

I’m proud of what we’ve achieved,

You should be, good work!

Drive an electric car when I have to, but bike exclusively within a two mile radius I also drive an electric car (and I got a small one (yay!) but new one (boo...)). I moved from a place where public transport was great, and I had no desire for a car, to a place where I struggle to get by without one (at least as long as I'm a regular, salaried employee - with a more flexible work life I could potentially swap it out with a cargo bike and a membership in a local car pool service). I have recently started to contemplating getting an older, used (electric) car in the mean time.

I went to Florida once in my childhood (Naples) - honestly, it didn't seem you could get to much of anything within a two mile radius of anything, so that you were completely dependent on the car. How much are you able to get done by bike alone these days?

Visit a library once a week

Nice! I just visited my local library for the first time earlier this week! I plan to go there more often. I've had this weird obsession about owning books and displaying them in my bookshelf. Haven't bought a new book since I got an old e-book reader though. Now I just pirate everything.... :)

Grow simple plants (green onions, basil)

Sweet! I set up a cultivation station above a cupboard in my house where I try to do the same. Still some learning curve for different herbs (I planted rosemary from seed, and they are so slow!) and for getting to a sensible cycle where I always have herbs I want available (basil, cilantro, sage, oregano, thyme and rosemary for the most part).

Buy used/refurbished preferentially

I want to get much better at this. I've started this to a degree with computers - I have a refurbished mini-PC as a home server, and I recently got my mom a "new" (i.e. also refurbished) laptop to replace her aging Macbook. I installed Linux Mint on it, and she is having no issues using it.

In other areas, I am really bad at this. I think maybe the consumer laws are so strong in my country that I am afraid of losing out on the opportunity to get stuff fixed when I don't have the proof of purchase? This is definitely a focus area going forward for the things that I do need to buy.

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  • [–] 5 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    The larger streets in my neighborhood have wide sidewalks/bike paths. I can safely cycle to two local grocery stores where I also drop off any plastic bags to be recycled, the post office, our Goodwill (used store), and a strip mall with various shops and restaurants. Florida has a horrendous pedestrian/cyclist fatality rate so bike paths are the true limiting factor. Naples is especially bad. It took time to find a safer neighborhood.

    I also have an e-reader, but there's something about seeing physical books displayed and handling them that I love. Learn about all your library's onsite and digital services. Make it part if your weekly routine and get to know your librarians. Solarpunk is community. Here I love the free Consumers Reports when researching larger purchases and interlibrary loans for obscure books. As for the physical ownership, I donated over 1,250 books in 2021 that I could easily own digitally or borrow. I don't miss them. Minimalism is a healthier way to live and a tablet with a backup NAS is a much smaller footprint.

    I would love an herb garden, so good for you, but I suck at maintaining plants. So I grow what is easy in the windowsill above my sink for now.

    Consider used clothing as well. The quality of new has deteriorated to a point where used is often better. I would love strong consumer laws, but would still likely skew used for environmental reasons. I bought my eldest child a used laptop in 2020 with a chipped case for $250. One $40 new battery last year and a free swap to Linux Mint from Windows 10 and it's still going strong (glad your mom likes it too!). What do you run on your home server?

    What helps in general is to think in cost per year owned. In the case if the used laptop, I'm at under $60/year. It both encourages wise buying, repairs, and using things longer. It also helps that I block all advertising I can and never read about new electronics. As a result, I'm satisfied with what I have.

    I truly believe sustainability is key to a quality of life that maximizes health and happiness. You are taking great steps. I am a planner so I always make sure I have targets and timetables for the next phases to ensure I hit them. As a result, my life gets better every year.

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  • [–] [S] 3 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    The larger streets in my neighborhood have wide sidewalks/bike paths. I can safely cycle to two local grocery stores where I also drop off any plastic bags to be recycled, the post office, our Goodwill (used store), and a strip mall with various shops and restaurants. Florida has a horrendous pedestrian/cyclist fatality rate so bike paths are the true limiting factor. Naples is especially bad. It took time to find a safer neighborhood.

    Sounds like you are able to get quite some things done in a bike trip! :)

    I also have an e-reader, but there’s something about seeing physical books displayed and handling them that I love. Learn about all your library’s onsite and digital services. Make it part if your weekly routine and get to know your librarians. Solarpunk is community. Here I love the free Consumers Reports when researching larger purchases and interlibrary loans for obscure books.

    Yeah, I agree - I definitely think I will start checking out books I want to read as well, and then perhaps maintain a digital copy I find... ahem.. somewhere.. to bring along if I am going anywhere out of my home. Getting to know the librarians is a good tip - they're some of the most solarpunk individuals out there in the mainstream world :)

    As for the physical ownership, I donated over 1,250 books in 2021 that I could easily own digitally or borrow. I don’t miss them. Minimalism is a healthier way to live and a tablet with a backup NAS is a much smaller footprint.

    Just thinking about donating my books hurts me inside, so I have something to work on here. But at least I'm not continuing acquiring more physical books at the moment, even though it hurts a little to miss the last three books in the Discworld City Watch series in my shelf...

    I would love an herb garden, so good for you, but I suck at maintaining plants. So I grow what is easy in the windowsill above my sink for now.

    That's in any case a great start. I am certainly no wizard at maintaining plants, but I try to learn and accept that I will fail at some things. But I am also pleasantly surprised at other things, and I am developing a green thumb for every second I spend tending to them. I just planted some new seeds the other day for basil, cilantro and thyme, and waiting for them to sprout now. Also looking forward to pre-cultivate tomatoes, chilis and peppers in late winter / spring so they're ready to be planted on my balcony when the weather allows it.

    Consider used clothing as well. The quality of new has deteriorated to a point where used is often better.

    I buy very few clothes, but my main painpoint is pants and shoes - they literally fall apart in no time, and it is infuriating... Previously my strategy was to buy new, but wear them until they fall apart to avoid having to buy much stuff. But when it falls apart within a single season, it is getting ridiculous.

    I bought my eldest child a used laptop in 2020 with a chipped case for $250. One $40 new battery last year and a free swap to Linux Mint from Windows 10 and it’s still going strong (glad your mom likes it too!). What do you run on your home server?

    Nice! A great favor to your child to introduce them to the world of FOSS :)

    On my server I run Nextcloud, Jellyfin, Audiobookshelf, FreshRSS, Forgejo, Kiwix (not much used yet, but I have a downloaded copy of Wikipedia early 2024 somewhere that I will put on it) and I am also playing around with some monitoring services (Grafana with Prometheus, InfluxDB and Mosquitto for some custom sensor projects I am working on). I also have a dedicated RPi4 that runs Home Assistant with Music Assistant (which allows me to use my old Sonos speakers that I bought when I was younger and more naive).

    What helps in general is to think in cost per year owned. In the case if the used laptop, I’m at under $60/year. It both encourages wise buying, repairs, and using things longer. It also helps that I block all advertising I can and never read about new electronics. As a result, I’m satisfied with what I have.

    Agreed (or in some cases cost per usage) - for me, it makes it much easier to place a proper value on it. When doing the purchases I made (that I described in my original comment), I tried to make a point out of doing proper research and permitting higher cost for higher quality products that should last for a long time or that allows me to repair the device, and avoid any kind of lock-in to some cloud subscription or similar. I most certainly have been fooled in some cases, but I think overall several of the purchases should last me a good while and should minimize that cost per year.

    I truly believe sustainability is key to a quality of life that maximizes health and happiness. You are taking great steps. I am a planner so I always make sure I have targets and timetables for the next phases to ensure I hit them. As a result, my life gets better every year.

    Cheers! Let's continue on and challenge ourselves on what is really needed for a healthy life. My goals for my next phase is at least very clear: pay down my loans ASAP, and this includes hefty cost control. I had porridge for dinner yesterday, and I felt so incredibly stupid for not realizing that it 1) tastes very good when topped with some nuts, fruits and honey, 2) is dirt cheap and 3) is as fast to prepare as instant noodles. I will be having this at least twice a week going forward.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    Books were my weakness, but I accepted I had to cull after two moves and the reality that liberty and sustainability require minimalism. Don't deprive yourself though. Finish your series. You'll pry my Calvin and Hobbes and Tintin from my cold dead hands. Whereas I didn't need a physical copy of 1Q84; there's no pictures.

    I can recommend heavier weight selvedged jeans if you want pants that last, but they come at a price. Line drying and cutting washing frequency by airing between wears extends the life. For shoes, I am either in AllBirds which hold up well (wool uppers with longer lasting treads) or leather dress shoes with goodyear welts that I have resoled every three years. I haven't bought new footwear since 2023, though grabbed some jeans in Japan for cheap a few months ago.

    I love your self-hosting softeare and one day when I have time, I want to build the same. I'm simply time-poor right now between job and kids. I miss RSS feeds.

    Eating healthy makes you feel better and saves money. Kill your high interest debt as quickly as possible and the sodium and saturated fats in instant noodles are terrible. Oatmeal, rice, and pinto beans are cheap in bulk (seal the bags well with binder clips), easy, fast (you have to soak the beans for a day but your labor time is maybe five minutes with a pressure cooker like the InstantPot), and healthier. I target <50% of the daily recommended maximums for salt, sugar, cholesterol, and saturated fats, and my blood work shows it works.

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  • [–] [S] 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    Books were my weakness, but I accepted I had to cull after two moves and the reality that liberty and sustainability require minimalism. Don’t deprive yourself though. Finish your series. You’ll pry my Calvin and Hobbes and Tintin from my cold dead hands. Whereas I didn’t need a physical copy of 1Q84; there’s no pictures.

    I still have my copy of 1Q84, and it does take a lot of space... For now I won't buy new books. I haven't bought much the past two years except for a handful of cooking books (which I do like to have physically). I think books I tend to look up stuff in are where I will draw the line in the future. We'll see about culling - for now there's not really much gain (except maybe some money if I am able to sell them), but if I could reduce it before my next move, that would be beneficial.

    I love your self-hosting softeare and one day when I have time, I want to build the same. I’m simply time-poor right now between job and kids. I miss RSS feeds.

    I've had a steady journey on this front over the past maybe 3 years - renting a small VPS or getting a SBC like the Raspberry Pi can get you started quickly if you go the route of Docker. I got into this from a privacy point of view. Really disliked being exploited by these big tech companies, and it kinda went from there. I'm my own cloud provider now, my own media streaming service, my own code repository hosting service etc.

    Eating healthy makes you feel better and saves money. Kill your high interest debt as quickly as possible and the sodium and saturated fats in instant noodles are terrible. Oatmeal, rice, and pinto beans are cheap in bulk (seal the bags well with binder clips), easy, fast (you have to soak the beans for a day but your labor time is maybe five minutes with a pressure cooker like the InstantPot), and healthier. I target <50% of the daily recommended maximums for salt, sugar, cholesterol, and saturated fats, and my blood work shows it works.

    My diet is not really that bad, but my main issue has been finding those really quick meals (like porridge has turned out to be). I would find myself too frequently rationalizing buying takeaway. Spent roughly 100€ a month on this. Turns out to be a much lower hanging fruit than I had anticipated.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago

    I miss the cover design of 1Q84 and also keep some cookbooks around. The benefit was the same benefit as minimalism: less to move, less to dust and make dust, less to search for, less to put away, more space. You live in Europe so it's hard to convey how overflowing with goods the average American house is. My choices are a reaction to this and I still feel we own double what we should, but my spouse and kids feel differently influenced by the society they know (I am the only one raised abroad).

    I own a Pi 3 and used to run a NAS, home assistant, and ad blocker but found Google Home and a Synology NAS to be easier. I also have privacy concerns, but balance it with time commitments.

    One of those is commitments is cookiing Saturday mornings to save time during the week while maximizing health. Other than making a batch of whole wheat pasta, I don't cook during the week. Many of our calories come from nuts, dried and fresh fruit, and soy milk which we keep in ample supply. Is meal prep an answer to your convenience conundrum?

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