Ecopreneur Files 28 - Eccentrics

Hello Fellow Ecopreneurs ????

It's been some time since my last newsletter. Not for nothing - December and January are months of treading water for me. I find daily to-do lists barely surmountable and reading fiction in solitude to be one of the few reprieves to the grayness.

Finally, on January 20th, my South facing windows saw a few rays of direct sunlight and I started to feel my voice bubbling in my fingertips again.

Not to worry, this newsletter isn't about my waning seasonal depression. It's about eccentricity and fitting in to the world around me.

The Eccentrics

Though I'm not a social creature in this point of the year, I do think quite a bit about the people in my life.

I think about the people whose company I enjoy, especially those that share a certain... particularity(?) in the world. I've started to think of them as "the eccentrics."

And although I'm not one to label, I feel like this label is one I get behind.

Because I think the eccentrics are people who look at the world a little different. We question social norms on a good day, and feel downright frustrated by them on an off day. We're often labeled neurodivergent, which we don't mind because why would we want to think like everyone else? Have you seen where "thinking like everyone else" has lead us?

The world is damn near on fire - literally and figuratively.

I think about the world's eccentrics, and I see people who are making differences. Who aren't afraid to look at themselves or the world around them, feel dissatisfied, and make changes.

I love meeting people who look at the cards life has dealt them and rather than playing along, decide to change the game.

Bringing Change

Whether that's on a small scale like consistently trying out new cafes rather than sticking on a beaten path - or a large one, like building a unique company dedicated to positive change on a grand scale.

I find that these folks are refreshingly open to new ideas, paradigm shifts, and logic beyond tradition. I think these are the traits of the people who have brought about the most change in the world (both good and bad).

And in the same breath, I can say they are some of the most mistreated people in history. From Van Gogh to Einstein to Martin Luther King Jr. to Greta Thunberg - we idolize these people only after we mock and abuse them for breaking our typical ideas of how people should act.

I don't understand why. My thinking is that we should accept and promote our eccentric thinkers because they question our learned behaviors. Because they have their idealistic plans and logic-based solutions. We should welcome 'what is possible' instead of just 'what is.'

Especially right now, when the world is catching fire and we are all at risk, fighting a crisis we don't know enough about and are almost powerless to stop.

But then, maybe that makes me an eccentric.

What do you think?