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Lifestyle

Category: Lifestyle

Posts about community and values.

CategoriesLifestyle

Futureproofing: How to Actually Invest in Your Future

by Big Calm

“Community is probably the best investment you can make.” ~ Charles Eisenstein

When we hear the word “investing,” most of us think about financial wealth—savings accounts, stock portfolios, or retirement funds. While financial capital is undeniably important, it is far from the only form of wealth that ensures resilience and fulfillment in life.

True resilience—what allows us to thrive no matter what challenges arise—is built by nurturing all the forms of wealth that sustain us as individuals, families, and communities. Aside from financial capital, there are 7 other kinds of wealth:

Social Capital

This is your network of relationships—family, friends, and community—and is a profound source of comfort, support and opportunity. 

Cultural Capital

The shared values, ethics, traditions, and knowledge that strengthen communities and provide a sense of identity. In the case of permaculture (and as a permaculture-guided community, Big Calm) shared ethics include: 

  • Earth Care: preserving and nurturing the natural world, reducing consumption and minimizing human impact to maintain biodiversity
  • People Care: ensuring the well-being of individuals and communities through cooperation, fairness, and shared prosperity 
  • Fair Share: the equitable distribution of resources and surplus

Material Capital

The physical goods and resources you and/or your community own—homes, tools, and equipment—that can sustain individual/community needs or help build a self-reliance.

Intellectual Capital

Knowledge and skills are assets that cannot be taken away. Investing in education, training, and the curiosity to keep learning pays dividends in adaptability and innovation.

Living Capital

This refers to the natural systems we rely on: soil health, clean water, air quality, and biodiversity. Often undervalued in traditional economic systems, these resources are critical to survival.

Spiritual Capital

A sense of purpose and connection to something greater than oneself fosters resilience during life’s inevitable challenges and helps us navigate uncertainty.

Experiential Capital

Life is the sum of our experiences. Traveling, creating art, or spending time in nature expands our horizons and enriches our sense of what it means to live well.

Why This Matters More Than Ever

Our modern systems are designed to prioritize financial wealth above all else, but that model is failing us. Economic uncertainty, environmental degradation, and social disconnection have shown us that focusing on financial returns alone is not sustainable. Resilience comes from diversifying our portfolios with positions in all 8 kinds of capital, for example:

  • Build Connections: Volunteer in your community, host gatherings, and participate in collaborative projects to strengthen social capital.
  • Care for Nature: Plant a garden, restore native habitats, or support conservation efforts
  • Learn Continuously: Pick up new skills or hobbies that align with your values to build self-reliance and enhance well being
  • Simplify Ownership: Invest in quality tools and resources rather than accumulating unnecessary possessions
  • Create Culture: Tell stories, share your traditions and create new ones

When we expand our understanding of wealth, we free ourselves from the treadmill of accumulating money at the expense of everything else. Instead, we create lives that are rich in relationships, knowledge, and purpose—a wealth that no market crash can erode. It’s the cumulative effect of nurturing all forms of capital that leads to a resilient and fulfilling life.

CategoriesLifestyle

Living in the Gift: Rediscovering Connection and Abundance

by Big Calm

“The gift moves in a circle, and it returns transformed.” ~ Charles Eisenstein

Our economic system is based on the pursuit of endless growth, often at the expense of social and ecological health. But it hasn’t always been this way.

In traditional societies, gift economies were foundational. Food, labour, and resources were shared within communities, strengthening bonds and ensuring that no one went without. In these systems, wealth wasn’t measured by accumulation but by how much a person gave.

The idea of a gift economy, where goods and services are freely given rather than exchanged for money, is a central theme in Charles Eisenstein’s Sacred Economics. This book came highly recommended as a community-visioning resource and it did not disappoint!

Conventional monetary systems isolate people from one another by turning relationships into transactions. They enable the accumulation of wealth by a small number of individuals and thrive on a sense of scarcity (often a result of how resources are distributed, not their actual availability) and competition. In the current economic system, as Eisenstein puts it, “your loss is my gain”. 

In contrast, a gift economy emphasizes community, trust, and abundance. Resources circulate freely, without an explicit expectation of return. Gift economies rekindle a sense of connection and shared purpose while creating networks of mutual support. They shift the focus from individual gain to collective well-being, so “your gain is my gain”.

Gift economies may not be practical on a large scale, but integrating at the community level aspects of gift economies—local currencies or bartering for example—can create abundance. (It’s no surprise that the concept of gift economies is implied in the “fair share” permaculture ethic, which guides us to “take what we need, share what we don’t”). 

They invite us to rethink what we value and how we relate to one another. Gift economies call on us to give freely—whether it’s time, resources, or care—knowing that the act of giving enriches not just the recipient, but also the giver.

Inspired? We certainly are!

To learn more, the full text of Sacred Economics is available here.

CategoriesLifestyle

The Herd of Cats

by Big Calm

Big Calm cofounder Steve Hardy once ran a disaster and emergency management tech startup and would regularly speak at events about black swans, uncertainty, emergence, applied improv, resilience, and antifragility – all subjects that are even more pertinent today and that crossover to permaculture and tiny homesteading.

So, rummaging through the archives, here is a recording of that talk: The Herd of Cats: How Entrepreneurs, Improvisers, and Disaster Managers Approach an Uncertain World.

If you enjoyed this theme, here are a few other links – beginning with the wonderful Pablo Suarez of the International Red Cross/Crescent’s Climate Center speaking about harnessing humour.

Be sure to also check out our post outlining The Adaptive Cycle, which pairs nicely with this thoughtful reflection by Paul Chefurka on Finding the Gift in the darkness (audio here).

CategoriesDevelopment,  Lifestyle,  Tiny Homes

The Stack: Looking at Tiny Home Communities as Whole Systems

by Big Calm

In computing, a tech stack is a collection of independent components that work together to support the execution of software. For example, to develop a web application, the architect defines the stack as the target operating system, web server, database, programming language, and so on. 

In permaculture, the practice of stacking functions ensures that every element in a system has more than one function. By combining the multiple functions of various elements in the system, we are able to increase yields and increase the system’s stability, which thereby increases its resilience as a whole.

Psychologist Abraham Maslow identified another type of stack in 1943 when he published “A Theory of Human Motivation” in which he explored how human beings grow and develop according to a hierarchy of needs.

This particular stack provides an especially useful framework for the future of Big Calm and other tiny home/homestead communities. If what we’re building is an intentional community, let it be one that is intent on serving multiple functions, rather than simply being a place to park your tiny home. Let it achieve all five of these levels to meet all of our psychological and social needs, such that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

So let’s look at this opportunity as a system.

The core for everything is the house itself. Having a roof over one’s head satisfies our most essential physiological need. 

There is a surge of innovative, factory-built, modular, and efficient structures approaching the market – from cubes and containers to A-frames and domes; all shapes and sizes. These options need to be treated as a distinct housing class that is in many ways superior to traditional stick buildings and wasteful bespoke construction. This next generation of housing is designed to be “plug-and-play” – as exemplified by tiny houses on wheels.

Next is the physical edge (another important permaculture concept). All of those prefabricated houses need to be placed somewhere and plugged into hookups. Most of them would benefit by being surrounded by complementary attachments, like decks, storage, and even micro-grid energy systems. 

This edge space provides safety and security for one’s house, and offers a much-needed interface with nature, which is especially important for smaller dwellings.

Then, of course, there is the community aspect. Whether it’s suburbs, cohousing, co-ops, or ecovillages, a good home is surrounded by good neighbours – somewhere between Dunbar’s Numbers of 15 and 50, a natural scale of sociability among humans. Even better if they’re positioned in a “pocket neighborhood” configuration that, as Ross Chapin observed, balances community members’ privacy and proximity.

Not only does community provide a valuable sense of belonging, in rural areas especially, it’s a way to pool resources – like harvested food and energy – that build resilience.

Building resilience also builds esteem, which can fulfil us both practically and spiritually. This may be the most overlooked layer of the stack and is largely missing from modern, sterile real estate developments. In a world where remote work is now possible and work-life balance is sought after, the ability to cultivate and share skills, and to do so both hyper-locally in-person and bio-regionally online, creates a powerful micro-economy and valuable income.

Many people have side-hustles that they’re passionate about and would like to nurture. Natalie Brake at Tiny Home Listings Canada calls this vocational edge space “happy money” and it’s ideally close to home, not separated by a dismal commute to a separate work life.

Lastly, and most aspirationally, is the network state. Described as a reverse diaspora, or Society-as-a-Service, and even as the sequel to the nation state, this is where digital technologies like blockchain open new possibilities for membership, governance, and currency. Not yet, but it’s coming. For now, its essence is that of knowledge exchange – especially bioregionally – between champions of the resilient and regenerative villages movement.

So this is the stack! The main point here is that all of its layers need to be present and aligned to get optimal results. 

In this stack, one’s home isn’t simply a house. It is also an interface with nature, a community of neighbours, a micro-economy of skills, and a passport to a regenerative movement. 

That’s the opportunity we envision at Big Calm; to knit together each of these exciting parts into an undeniable whole.

CategoriesLifestyle

The Myth of Self-Reliance: Why True Resilience Is Only Found in Community

by Big Calm

The term self-reliance brings to mind a lone homesteader living off-grid in a home built with reclaimed materials. They harvest their rainwater; capture and store energy with a solar panel and a battery; and grow and preserve their own food. They may have a wood stove to cook and heat their home with, and have probably amassed a lot of tools and equipment (a freezer, an axe, canning jars) to enable their lifestyle.

This is an admirable feat, but in reality, this brave soul will never be completely self-reliant because of their hidden dependencies: at some point a company manufactured those upcycled building materials, solar panel and battery, and all the other equipment this off-gridder relies on. Even if they were to “reset the self-reliance clock” once everything needed for this lifestyle is obtained, complete self-reliance has a shelf life. The freezer may short out, canning jars may break, appendicitis may strike. 

This individual may have a lot of knowledge, tools and skills, but they don’t have all of them. 

Does this mean we should abandon our self-reliance goals? Not at all. Instead, it’s important to understand that true self-reliance, paradoxically, is only possible through interdependence with others.

One of the 12 permaculture principles is “Integrate Rather Than Segregate,” or to foster connections between elements (including humans!) to increase synergy and efficiency. Humans are inherently social beings who thrive in collaboration. A functional, connected community shares resources, distributes labour, and collectively tackles challenges. This model mirrors nature, where ecosystems rely on diverse species working together for mutual benefit. One community member might specialize in gardening, while another provides carpentry or medicinal knowledge. Together, they create a resilient and sustainable network that no individual could achieve alone.

By building relationships, sharing resources, and fostering cooperation, we can create resilient communities that allow everyone to flourish. True self-reliance isn’t about isolation; it’s about embracing the power of connection.

A green plan emerges from the black ashes of a wildfire
CategoriesLifestyle

Resilience: The Adaptive Cycle

by Big Calm

This infinity loop is called the Adaptive Cycle. It was first developed to explain the life cycle of forests, and is the most powerfully simple way to describe resilience.

More than just bouncing back from adversity, resilience is a loop – constant and in multitudes. Once you see it this way you’ll see it everywhere – in life, relationships, career, industry, projects, and nature.

There are four phases (sometimes referred to as: r, K, Ω, and α) to the Adaptive Cycle.

Let’s start with perhaps the most pleasant one. This is a young forest, a true love, a growing scale-up, a newly elected government, the beginning of a new job. It’s the phase where we’ve found something special and want to run with it.

We then progress up the front loop. It’s on the front loop that we’re strongest, happiest, and most constructive. Life is beautiful on the front loop.

The next phase is success, maximized and extended by standardization and optimization. There’s comfort with the status quo, but also some signs of complacency and decay. This is an industry’s best quarter, an athlete’s top performance, a lifetime achievement award, a mature forest.

We like this phase so much that we often do everything we can to avoid moving beyond it. We lose adaptive capacity and fall into the Rigidity Trap. It’s here that we see big corporate bail-outs, Blockbuster ignoring Netflix, in-it-for-the-kids marriages, climate change denial.

All good things eventually come to an end – one way or another. There comes a moment of disruption, often not of our choosing. Injury, death, break-up, divorce, disaster, downturn, revolution, even good things like invention, retirement, or winning the lotto. A before and after.

Next comes the release phase, when everything just falls apart (unless you’re the disruptor). There’s a period of denial and mourning, of coping and confusion. What was isn’t and what will hasn’t. Uncertainty abounds.

Then, following some acceptance of a new reality, we try to make sense of our place in it. This can move surprisingly fast or painfully slow, but regardless – beware – the beast is in the back loop. This climb can be very difficult, lonely, and hopeless.

The fourth phase is where we begin to regain hope. Exciting possibilities emerge – often many of them! Vegetation pushes through the burnt forest floor. Individuals date, create, and try new things. Startups start up. Let a thousand flowers bloom.

The most promising of those possibilities go on to where we started, where winners get the nourishment they need to thrive. But if they don’t, those ideas risk falling into the Poverty Trap. Startups need capital, relationships need time, books need editing, forests need water.

Adaptive Cycles can be micro and personal, like writing a new song or grieving the loss of a pet. Or they can be macro and global, like the birth of cryptocurrency or the extinction of species. They can move slowly like human rights movements, or quickly like an improv scene.

Humankind is here, at the convergence of multiple disruptive events caused by late-stage capitalism, major political/cultural shifts, and climate change. There was a before and there will be an after this macro moment in time.

We are immersed in uncertainty and we should know to expect some difficult times ahead before seeing the hopeful light of new order at the end of the tunnel. As they say, the only way out is through.

What makes the Adaptive Cycle such a powerful visual is that the front loop crosses the back loop. It’s the intersection of the strong and capable with the weak and vulnerable – positions everyone is in at various times – that makes community an x-factor for resilience.

Resilience isn’t just bouncing back to normal. It’s ensemble sense-making. It’s an assortment of emerging adaptive cycles – from hopeless to hopeful, creative to confused, weakness to strength, helper to helped. Resilience is a knowing embrace of the emerging uncertain.

Adapted from a Twitter thread originally published on April 19, 2020.

Pictured: New growth emerging from ground charred the previous summer by the 5992 hectare Trozzo Creek wildfire in 2021.

Black cat in the forest
CategoriesLifestyle

Life Lessons from a Forest Cat

by Big Calm

Sadly, Big Calm lost an important member of the community recently. Our beloved Norwegian Forest Cat, Buddy, passed away peacefully on the very last day of summer. Not only was Buddy a truly special and loving old soul, he was both inspiration and validation for our moving from the city to build a life in the Kootenays.

Buddy had the full cocktail of kitty ailments, and we almost lost him in Winter 2019. But upon moving to the Slocan Valley several months later, he burst to life. This Thanksgiving, we’re grateful for every one of the 2457 days we had with Buddy and for these nine simple profundities – life lessons – that he reminded us of during our time together…

Two humans and a tuxedo cat in the woods

Balance – One of our goals with moving closer to nature was to recalibrate our relationship with screens. As remote workers, we spend a lot of time on our computers and phones. Buddy found this boring and would remind us that, even on those dreary and chilly days, it’s good to get out, move around, and breathe some fresh air.

A black cat at a desk peeking over a laptop screen

Seize the day – Once Buddy discovered the great outdoors, he couldn’t get enough of it. The forest was in his nature and, like a dog, he’d beg us at every opportunity to go explore it. We’re convinced that Buddy lived months, if not years, longer than expected because of his pure enthusiasm for each new day.

Be curious – Big Calm is a large 30+ acre property and having an on-leash feline as a tour guide turned out to be an amazing way to explore it. Our off-path adventures helped us to learn the topography, encounter hidden mushrooms, and come across plants and berries that we wouldn’t otherwise have seen.

A black cat on leash explores the foggy forest

Observe / notice – Whether it was birds, squirrels, garter snakes, grasshoppers, or chipmunks (especially chipmunks!), Buddy would happily sit and observe their various activities for hours. Observation and active listening are superpower skills – both practically for permaculture and spiritually for presence and gratitude.

Black house cat on a window sill looking out at nature

Stop and smell the flowers – It’s cliche but it’s true.

A black house cat smelling a bright yellow flower

Make friends with trees – Often on our walkabouts Buddy would approach individual trees and stare up at them in acknowledgement. It wasn’t to climb or hunt. It was something else; a sort of kinship with these stoic elders. In a way, it felt like he was paying tribute to each of them.

A black and white cat outdoors looking up at a tree

Hug the ones you love – The stereotype of cats being aloof and uncaring most certainly did not apply to Buddy. From bonks and cuddles to squeaks and unbelievably genuine hugs, he loved to love. If he saw you approaching during a walk, he’d stride briskly toward you. When you’re happy to see someone special, make them feel special.

A cat lovingly hugs a man

Sleep like nobody’s watching – One of the first things we noticed upon moving to the Valley was how deeply we slept. Many Pocket Getaway guests have mentioned the same thing. Ask any cat: good sleep is very important.

Black house cat taking a nap on an outdoor screened deck

Find your sunbeam – Buddy would hide out in dark nooks to sleep but whenever the opportunity presented itself, he’d happily trade those spots for a ray of sunshine or the warmth of the wood stove. There is lots of wonder in this world and, even though it seldom lasts for as long as we’d like, it is ours to cherish for the moments when it finds us.

We buried Buddy in a beautiful spot in the forest where his chipmunk friends play and a warm afternoon sunbeam regularly peeks through the trees.

Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there, I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow;
I am the diamond glints on the snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain;
I am the gentle autumn’s rain.
When you awaken in the morning’s hush,
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft star that shines at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry.
I am not there; I did not die.
––Clare Harner