# Why are we exceeding the Earth’s carrying capacity?
This is a quickly-sketched model created from a breakout group conversation during the MUN School of Graduate Studies’ “Earth’s Carrying Capacity” dialogue.
Tag: Systems Sketching
-
Leadership is
# Leadership is…
Lessons learned from Memorial Student Leadership Conference (MSLC) 2017. These thoughts were spurred by Director of Student Life Dr. Jennie Massey’s opening remarks for the conference, and were reinforced by the keynote speaker, Mr. Seamus O’Regan, MP.Â
Jennie and Seamus both talked about the oft-haphazard decision making that led to their achievements. The truth about this reinforcing loop is that no matter where you are in the process, you can do something to make it to the next step. No, not every moment will be virtuous – the cycle is not _that_virtuous. It is a cycle nonetheless, and that’s the thing about cycles: they do not stop.
-
Limits to (personal) growth
I’m my own worst enemy when it comes to reading articles. I have 211 in a to-do list as I write this, and the larger that grows the more untenable getting through it seems.
In this case the limiter actually escalates, as in order to avoid doing the readings I know I should do, I go off and collect more. 😑
-
This is why I’m here.
Why sketch systems? Partially as a way to productively vent my sarcasm, and partially as a way to practice systems thinking.
Also, maybe my handwriting will improve?
-
The snowfall looks so nice!
# Last night: “the snowfall looks so nice!”; this morning: “grumble.”
Shovelling as a “fix that fails”: it enables us to keep living here, when here means moving solidified rain from one side of the driveway to the other a dozen times each Winter.
We should just become snowbirds.
-
New year, new you
Could New Year’s resolutions be doomed to fail? Driven by New Year’s culture, we commit to actions, call them resolutions, and set off to become better people. This phenomena of setting New Year’s resolutions is reinforcing (R1).
Yet, as we get further away from the culture of resolutions, our commitment – linked at heart to New Year’s culture – fades. This, coupled with how slow progress can be, leads to the gradual extinction of our promise to ourselves. (B1)
Perhaps, then, resolutions made outside of and separate from the cultural phenomena are more likely to result in real changes, as their founding is based in intrinsic motivation as opposed to the extrinsic incentives of New Year’s culture.
(The time since New Year’s sets a limit to growth on the new habit.)