Green skills and mindset on agenda of EU 2023 Green Week

During this year’s EU Green Week, the European Commission organised a panel discussion exploring the human dimension of policy making: how to cultivate the skills and mindset to accelerate the green and just transition. And what can we learn from nature? Inner Green Deal co-founder Jeroen Janss joined the panel and offered his perspective.

What are the root causes of the environmental crisis?

As argued so eloquently by Carlos Alvarez Pereira just now [Club of Rome], I agree that one of the root causes for the environmental crisis is our sense of separation from nature.

It was David Attenborough who said recently, "No one will protect what they don’t care about; and no one will care about what they have never experienced".

So caring for nature starts with experiencing nature and it’s very encouraging that more and more people do go out and spend time in nature – in particular since the Pandemic.

With the Inner Green Deal, we have been organising programs in nature for a while now and the interesting thing about being out with people in nature is that they behave so differently.

In the beginning many still arrive with a busy mind – apologising that they are late, finishing a call and all that?- but then as the day proceeds, people slow down and unwind and somehow become more in tune with themselves, with the other participants and with the nature around them.

And often very meaningful conversations start. About our relationship with nature – and more broadly – our ways of thinking and relating to the world.

Nature and spending time in nature lays bare many of our disconnected and unrealistic beliefs and mindsets: the idea for example that we are rational beings and separate from nature.

Clearly the Pandemic has shattered that myth – but I think we still have some processing to do ?- to fully integrate what it means to be interdependent. And how to make decisions that take into account the web of life that we are part of.

And another myth that nature proves wrong is, while we may compete in certain areas, collaboration is the dominant theme in nature – as it is in our society, if we look a bit more carefully.

If you are sceptical about that view, I would recommend you read Humankind from Rutger Bregman which examines the science and gives many examples of how people collaborate in times of disaster while the media picks on relatively minor incidents around looting which reinforces that myth of competition.

So nature invites us to examine our mind and our views and this is a task for all of us. And that requires us to slowdown from time to time.

To step away from our electronic devices and ask ourselves – am I on the right path? What are my values? Are my actions aligned with my values?

This slowing down is something many of us struggle with. But think of it this way, all the technology and policies will be worthless if we hurried in the wrong direction.

And all of our hopes and dreams will remain hopes and dreams if we don’t take care of ourselves and experience a burn-out.

So in summary, I would say that one of the root causes of our current crisis is our mindset, in particular, how we have seen ourselves as separate from nature.

I believe that mindsets are slowly changing but feel there is work to do to fully integrate these more realistic and sustainable views in actual policy making and decision making – which is something we can explore further in a moment.

Q2: What can we do to restore our relationship with nature and how can we together accelerate the transition to a green and just society? Where do we start?

Our experience is based on the environmental and climate leadership programs that we offer to policy makers and decision makers at the United Nations, the European Institutions and also to community leaders from around the world.

These programmes are mostly online and range in length from an one hour introduction session to a journey of 6 modules of 2,5 hrs. But we also increasingly offer one day programs in the forest which people feel are very transformative.

And throughout these programs I would like to say that there is ONE thing we do that enables all this transformation to happen but that wouldn’t do justice to the complexity of the challenge.?

Based on our experience we find that we need to become better at a NUMBER of specific abilities that TOGETHER could be seen as FOUNDATIONAL to accelerate the green and just transformation.

In our work we use the model of our partner the Inner Development Goals .

As you can see, there are five categories of qualities that we work on: Being, Thinking, Relating, Collaborating and Acting.

The model has been developed by the same people who worked on the definition of the Sustainable Development Goals – the SDGs. This Inner Development Goals model has gained a lot of traction around the world and out of all models we feel this conveys most clearly the necessary journey.

As you can see, it starts with Being, our relationship with self, this includes creating presence and self-awareness – the basis for any meaningful relationship. It also includes one’s values that can serve as a compass – for when the business case for action is less clear.

Being qualities also opens a space for better Thinking, learning to think more long-term, making sense of complexity and understanding different perspectives.

Perspective taking also improves Relating to others and Relating is further enhanced through cultivating appreciation, empathy and compassion.

These relational qualities are at the heart of transformation and are essential to overcome polarisation. These three qualities, Appreciation, Empathy and Compassion are like a bridge towards others and towards stronger relationships and stronger Collaboration.

And then, building on stronger relationships and understanding of our place in the world, we move into ACTION, together, standing up for what we believe in, even in the face of difficulties.

We work together with Professor Christine Wamsler from Lund University Centre for Sustainability Studies (LUCSUS) who evaluates our programmes and one of her key conclusions is that the outlined process cultivates a sense of agency: the feeling that what I do matters.

The basis for that transformation is activating these human capacities that we all have but somehow have neglected.

And to do this together. One of the surprising outcomes of the Inner Development Goals model is how it has inspired people from around the world to form communities of change.

There are now more than 250 of such community hubs around the world that use this model – either in their organisation, in their community or in their government. In fact Costa Rica was the first country to adopt the model at the national level.

And that points to another essential ingredient: the power of bottom-up change and collaboration.?

With the IDG team we say that just because things are serious, they don’t have to be boring and that humanness, that sense of connection and that joy is something we need more of, now more than ever given that regulations are facing increasing resistance.

Building on that sense of joy and appreciation, it becomes clear that we need to change the way we talk and we complement the negative narrative of reducing our carbon footprint - which remains necessary of course - ?with the positive narrative of handprint: focusing people’s attention on how they can contribute – given their unique skills, interests and experience.

Tapping into this positive and intrinsic motivation of people to contribute and connect is something that can help us accelerate at time when that is most needed.

So inner, human development to support and accelerate outer development in the world.

Because we not only need our best minds to come up with new technology, but we also need these best minds to collaborate and act with care, justice and compassion.

So yes, we live in challenging times but it is also a time of true meaning and a time of personal growth and of coming together.

Notes: special thanks to the vision and initiative of?Monica Pisani ?of DG Environment of the European Commission who organised the event and the inspiring conversations with co-panelists?Carlos Alvarez Pereira ?of the Club of Rome,?Kenneth Barrientos ?of UNESCO and artist?Penelope Cain .