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Dear Reader,
The state of the future will be affected directly by the choices we make everyday. My blog will be an opportunity for us to engage in conversation about how we can make better decisions, not only with what we chose to consume, but also with how we choose to interact with ourselves and the people with whom we coexist. The fringe will always predict the future, so join me in creating both.
See you on the threads!
Sincerely, Joshua Scott Onysko Founder & CEO Pangea Organics
Dear Friends,
I recently attended the Sustainable Brands conference. I liked it. There were lots of great people with great minds. But I realized the one thing that has always been my greatest fear about the "green" movement when it comes to consumer packaged goods...is that when the big guys start to figure it out, will all the consumers rush to buy what seems like a great, green product for less?
I think most people will, but are you "most people"? I know I'm not. Here's my point. I applaud big companies for making great strides in assuring that we start to think about the way we create, distribute and sell products, especially the ones that do it right. But here's a few reasons why you should be supporting the smaller brands.
The only reason the movement exists is because someone at some point decided that life was not "just" about profits. They decided that life is about creating a better future through commerce. Small caring brands tend to be the fringe that predicts the future. If we want to continue to create a positive future, we must support the fringe, otherwise we, as a culture, will become complacent.
Though brands are creating green products, remember it is usually less than 1% of their portfolio, meaning if we want to keep pushing them to continue to green their act, we have to show them we mean business. Trust me, there will always be enough consumers to buy what they have created. It's our job as conscious-creative consumers to be the ones that support the leading edge, not the following masses.
Creating and selling a green product is just part of the process. It's our jobs as to ask the hard questions. Ask the brands you support, are you paying a living wage? Are you paying full healthcare? How are you affecting your supply chain in a positive way? How are you supporting the workers in developing countries that produce the goods that allow you to prosper? Don't buy into the "we donate money to the blah-blah-blah" model. Ploys like this are just that ploys to make the consumer believe that the company is doing their part in the world. Ploys like this do not assure that the brand is doing all that they can to support the earth. In other words, the brand itself needs to be doing its due diligence in addition to supporting non-profits, not in lieu of.
Best,
Joshua Scott Onysko Founder & CEO Pangea Organics
In the age of innocence...
Has anyone heard that we're in a recession? I hear it all the time. It's crazy, and the conversation is always followed by everyone blaming the big, evil corporations. Well, it's true. Some of them are in fact evil by definition, but there's something we are failing to see: one of the best things about a free economy or capitalism in general is that corporations will generally produce products that we want or have asked for. In fact, corporations spend millions of dollars trying to figure out the best way to produce and design the things we will buy. Isn't that nice of them?
We said we wanted to live in houses that were too big for our wallets, so the mortgage companies created "the five year arm" and other financing products that allowed us to do just that. We said we wanted big - really big - cars that guzzled gas and polluted our planet, so the car companies created the SUV. We said we wanted cheap clothes so that our styles could change with the seasons with just a swipe of the plastic card (another issue all together), so the manufacturers started outsourcing production overseas and exploiting workers ages 8-80.
No one held a gun to our head and told us to buy these things, and no, commercials are not considered lethal weapons. So in the end, when we blame the corporations, aren't we really just blaming ourselves?
The great thing about this mess we are in is that it started with us; therefore, it can end with us. "How?" you ask. Well now is the time to raise our consumeristic conscientiousness. I'm sure many of you reading this are already on the path, but there's no time for walking it: start jogging.
Tell the corporations what you want and how you want it. Trust me; they will start doing it right. Until then, buy more Pangea. We started listening nine years ago, and we'll never stop.
Joshua Scott Onysko Founder & CEO Pangea Organics
Like water for love.
There is one thing that I learned early on in my life, simplified by something I told myself when I left school at age 16: You can't learn how to bake a cake when you're trying to learn how to ride a horse. In this I mean there are certain experiences in life that we learn certain things. There are many crossovers, but in the end our learning processes that we have developed as sentient beings determine what we learn, when and how.
A while back, I heard a story about an anthropologist who was living with the Hopi tribe down in the Four Corners (excuse me if my information is a bit off, I was on my third Manhattan). He spent months studying their traditions, rituals and their basic way of living. When he was getting ready to leave he said to the chief, "Your way of life is fascinating, but I find it odd that most of your songs are about rain and water." The chief thought for a moment then said, "Water is what we need to survive, without it we would perish. I find it more odd that all of your people's songs are about love. Are you without it?"
I guess you're wondering where I'm going with this. Well, I have recently been contemplating my past relationships and writing about the key things I've learned from them. It seems that the most important thing I have learned is the importance of separating wants from needs. In the end we as humans have a desire to quench our desire for both, but I find when we give them both equal attention early on, we tend to miss the mark. I for one have found that I spent too much time focusing on my wants and not the needs of a relationship. Without your needs met, there is no foundation to work on your wants. For example: try working through two days of your life without water. Technically we can live three days without it, but I can only imagine that you won't get very much done. Now don't get me wrong, I do believe for a lasting relationship we need both wants and needs met, but I also believe needs must come first, in life and love.
It's 2009. A new year. I'm guessing most people reading this letter have access to enough water to drown in. Aren't we fortunate that now all we have to focus on is drowning ourselves and others in love?
Have fun,
Joshua Scott Onysko Founder & CEO Pangea Organics
Dear You and Me,
First off, I want to thank all of you for the kind words regarding my letter to the president I chose to send out to all of you. The letter got the biggest and best response of any letter we have ever put out. That being said, I did receive seven emails from people who did not like the letter. As I expected, some people thought the letter was political, some thought I did not believe in Obama, and some people were not happy that I would utilize our list to serve my own agenda.
Here's the deal: the letter was not meant to be political in any way. I wrote it two weeks prior to the election and it was meant to be sent out regardless of the turn out; it was neither for or against any particular candidate or agenda. It was simply stating where I think we are, how I think we got here and where I think we need to go. For the two people who did not like that I would send this out to a list that was created to support a health and beauty line: well, all life, as well as our transparency, has a direct correlation to our overall health and beauty. The main difference behind Pangea and other brands we support is we actually tell you what we believe in. In the end wouldn't you rather know what your dollars are supporting? I would.
That all being said, please note that I respect all of you who took the time to tell me how the letter made you feel. There is no right and no wrong; there is only what we do and what we don't do. The future is not a letter, it's a conversation and I can't have one with out you.
Now for my December letter.....
I was recently enjoying a glass of wine after a long trip during happy hour at my favorite Boulder establishment, The Kitchen. I started up a conversation with a woman at the bar and we got around to talking about what we each did and Pangea came up. Her eyes lit up and she said, "I love Pangea! It's just a little too rich for my blood." Then she went on to tell me about her fabulous culinary vacation in Italy and her tickets to see Madonna. The woman then paid for her $14 glass of wine, grabbed her Prada bag and off she went.
I realized something that I remember journaling about back during my travels in India in 1999. Most of our issues in life can be routed back to our own definitions and the extrapolations of those definitions. What's interesting about this "recession" we are having is that most of us are "protecting" ourselves from it by down trading on our purchase decisions; purchasing less sustainable, socially irresponsible, usually made in third world countries, product. This makes us feel like we are doing the right thing, but actually it is just sharpening the spade for our next hole. If we get good enough at digging all of these holes we're going to get hired as grave diggers.
We need to start defining a plan based in the present with the future in mind. Yes times are tough and everyone is cutting back, but where we cut back is what will determine our future. Now is the time where we need to support small and local. Sure, buy less, but buy for the future as well. We need to rebuild our economy, as in "us" the consumers.
Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!
Much love,
Joshua Scott Onysko Founder & CEO Pangea Organics
A CONVERSATION WITH ONESELF
Dear Friends,
The day will come when we can surrender, not to a war or enemy but to ourselves. Until that day, however, we will continue to struggle for that which consumes us. Ironically, most of our lives are spent yearning for something we have yet to know.
It's October 2008 and the daily conversation of global climate change has been replaced by the talk of a steep decline in the economic climate. In this past decade, it has never been more apparent that our race has spent the last 100 years focusing on the bejeweled tip of the pyramid, forgetting that there is no tip without a base. We have grown into a socially and economically unstable culture, putting wants ahead of needs, lust over love, trials over trust, and most unfortunately, persuasion over the truth we once shared with one another. Through these changes we have become a volatile culture socially, environmentally, politically and economically.
We have become a culture that knows more about the human genome and about the furthest reaches of space than we do about the people we love. We are so curious of the unknown, yet we are constantly looking externally to quell our curiosities when, in fact, it is we who harbor the most complexities. I am a big believer in the concept of the pendulum theory, and it has never swung so far in one direction. There are now two paths from which to choose: one is the path of a revolution and the other is total chaos.
So you say you want a revolution.
The first step is to de-label yourself. You are not a republican, liberal or a democrat; you are human, and being human comes with more weight than any social or political thought or agenda that has ever been created. When we label, we create walls; when we create walls, we create confusion; when we create confusion we create hate; and when we create hate we are not creating at all.
Step two, become a visionary. A visionary is not somebody that sees the future, they are just people who have a better understanding of the present. Their tools are the ability to love, listen and learn. When you use these, there is no reason for defense and the world will become your teacher.
Step three, lead by example. The world is watching, reading, blogging, twittering, networking, taping, filming and instant messaging.
Step four - it finally seems that we are a culture that has learned how to vote for what we believe in. Voting doesn't stop after November 4th, and in fact voting has no beginning and no end. The strongest vote you have is the one you have when you vote with your dollar. The only difference between our political systems and a corporation is that one files taxes and one collects them, and that's about it. If we put as much time researching the companies that we support as the politicians we vote for, the world would be a much different place. There is suffering happening in every corner of the earth, not just in the Middle East and Dafur, but also in the factories that produce the products we buy everyday from L.A. to Shanghai. People are working for wages that cannot support themselves let alone their families. They don't have healthcare; they work in toxic work environments; and they are producing waste that pollutes our earth and our bodies.
But we can stop this. It's time we start buycotting: buy only what you believe in. Corporations only follow one thing, and it's not their CEO; it's the dollar, and when they see their dollars going to greener pastures so will they. Make a change. Buycott for a better future.
Step Five, and most importantly, have fun. Nobody wants to look up to people who don't know how to laugh.
Salut!
Joshua Scott Onysko Founder & CEO Pangea Organics
Dear Friends,
I spent July 4th weekend in Wyoming in a little town in which I used to live called Jackson. Every Fourth there is a parade which inevitably is just a chain of vintage cars driving five MPH tossing candy at kids who line the road. This year one of the floats was a political inspired float. Many people decided to protest the float by turning their backs on it. This got me thinking about how we choose to show our beliefs and how that energy affects the way we live as well as the world in which we live. In Buddhism there is a word that describes the root of all conflict and aggression; this word is Shenpa. We have conditioned ourselves to have a reaction and or label/opinion about just about anything in our lives. It's easy to identify your Shenpa. The next time something happens that you don't like, really try and feel the emotions and thoughts that are running through your body and where their actual root is.
To bring it back, what I was feeling from the crowd was a dislike for everything for which this float stood. The people on the float felt alienated and anger towards the people turning their backs to them. But in the end they were just people like the ones in the crowd, people who simply had a different view of the world. We are all entitled to our own views just as we are entitled to protest, but when communications between two idealisms is limited to a "turning of the back," we have broken our communication; we have simply told these people that we don't like them. We can blame this on the Shenpa, but as a human race our job is to learn from our tendencies in order to have a better understanding of each other. Little incidences like this may or may not lead to a war we see on CNN, but it creates a war within. In my opinion, there is no difference between us and that which we create. So why not create peace?
P.S. Don't forget to vote.
Joshua Scott Onysko Founder & CEO Pangea Organics
Dear Friends,
Way back, about 24 years ago or so, I was in the first grade. I enjoyed kindergarten, but once they put away the finger paints the problems began. One day in class, my friend got sick and threw up. He was very ill, yet our teacher began yelling at him and forced him to clean it up. I told her that I didn't think it was nice to yell at him for being sick which, in turn, caused more yelling. I then retorted, "I know you think you're yelling at me, but really I think you're yelling at yourself." I'm sure you can guess how the rest of my short-lived scholastic career turned out.
Twenty-four years later, I feel the same way about people who have not learned to curb their anger. Recently, I was in a meeting and watched a person's anger breed itself from the moment he walked in the door right up until the meeting ended. I think the worst thing about anger is that it tends to spread; people can absorb anger from their surroundings which, in effect, can change the way people act and speak. I watched it happen at the meeting. The man got angry at me, I got angry at him, and ultimately everyone ended up angry. Nothing was accomplished.
In the end, the moral of the story is to try and catch yourself when you feel yourself becoming angry - you will find that nine out of 10 times the anger is rooted in yourself. You, and only you, have the ability to cure yourself of this anger before you affect the people around you. Who knows - being conscious of the cause of your anger and nipping it in the bud may even stop a war from happening some day.
Anger spreads far and fast, but remember that peace spreads just as fast, too.
Strength, wisdom & devotion,
Joshua Scott Onysko Founder & CEO Pangea Organics
Dear Friends,
Recently I attended an Alchemy workshop at Bastyr University outside of Seattle, Washington. During the class we learned some Latin phrases, and there was one that stuck with me - "ora et labora", which means "to pray and work". I think it appealed to me because it reminded me how much of my day is spent in meditation - a balance between who we are and what we do, and how it in itself affects the world around us.
I have been a practitioner of the Tonglen meditation practice for many years. Tonglen is based on the understanding that we must have compassion for ourselves before we can have compassion for others. In Tonglen you take on suffering of others in order to breathe in your intention for them and exhale the intention to them.
Through this practice I believe we have created a company that takes in forms of suffering, and ultimately creates things that help end suffering. I try to bring this practice into every moment of my day. In the end we are all human, and suffering is part of our existence - what we do with that suffering is up to us.
I recommend the Tonglen meditation practice because it helps us face our own fears, while helping alleviate the pain of others. After all, nothing creates compassion like a little empathy.
Strength, wisdom and devotion,
Joshua Scott Onysko Founder & CEO Pangea Organics
Dear Friends,
In Buddhism and more specifically meditation there is something called "the monkey mind". It is a reference meant to give a label to the process of our mind jumping from one thought to the next without ever fully absorbing or understanding the present moment. This label reminds me so much of the current, ever-growing "green" and/or "sustainable" economy that we are riding the wave of.
I have been following this industry for close to a decade now, and I have seen it all. What a lot of economists and corporations both large and small don't understand is that this industry was built on intention. People started off doing things differently simply because they believed in creating things that made our lives and the earth's healthier.
Intention is not something usually found on a profit and loss statement so often times people and companies who are trying to get on the "green boat" simply miss it all together. You see the intention of this industry often times rides on the coat tails of the level of consciousness on the fringe of our culture. The fringe predicts the future; therefore, if you want to be the future, you must be and understand the fringe. The "fringe" and its intensions are constantly changing. When the founders of this industry began selling their wares, being organic was the fringe. Then came fair trade, then living wages and healthcare, then reducing the environmental impact of packaging...and so and so on.
So to all of you who are wishing to ride this ride, I welcome you to the fringe. All I ask is that you take the time to understand the path before you pick the roses.
Strength and wisdom,
Joshua Scott Onysko Founder & CEO Pangea Organics
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