I think I can safely say Bruce and I have formed a friendship, both professional and from similar interests, even though he's retired and I'm not a psychologist. I learn psychology to help lead. We're both intrigued by addiction. We both want to improve our environmental situation, not just give in.

He likes the idea of the Spodek Method. He hopes it works beyond just one person. He's not sure it can. In this episode we start practicing it.

Working with him was one of the more challenging times doing the Spodek Method. I expect that as more people learn it, these conversations with Bruce will make effective lessons in challenging cases. He wasn't trying to challenge me. So far, it just works with some personalities more smoothly than with others. Finding examples of different types lets me learn how to apply it with different people and personality types.

Some types I haven't figured out. Let's see how things go with Bruce. If you're learning the Spodek Method, I think you can learn a lot from this conversation. I'd say it's advanced. On further thought, it might be me. Maybe other people would have an easy time. If so, let me know what I might be missing.

• Bruce's home page

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I rarely get to talk to people who expect living more sustainably to be joyful and rewarding from personal experience, not just hoping for the best. I enjoyed sharing that perspective with Erica last time, I invited her back with no specific agenda.

This episode presents conversation between two people who have left mainstream culture and are living more how many people agree we should, but hold themselves back. So they speak in speculation and generalities. They still think more sustainability means lower quality of life because they can't speak from experience otherwise.

Erica and I can, so we do. We don't lament missing out on things we don't do any more because we don't miss them. Moreover, we realize they weren't helping us in the first place. Soon we'll all talk about how much we prefer living more locally with less stuff. Today, for listeners who suspect it's possible but haven't witnessed it, enjoy listening.

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I loved where this conversation led.

We began by talking about recent news: Greta Thunberg taking a political stand and acting publicly on it on an issue unrelated to the environment. Guy described how he saw this action distracting and undermining her credibility in sustainability. We got to talking about overwhelming tribalism today.

In the process, Guy shared views he once held that he overcame, specifically about Apartheid. We talked about ones views changing.

In the end we got to Guy sharing what I read as something he's had to settle on: that while he generally prefers limited government, low tax policies, with our environmental problems, he's concluded otherwise. Like with national defense, where you need aircraft carriers and such, with the environment he's concluded we need big government solutions.

I shared some of my views on big action but to limit government's ability to permit pollution. I read that the views were new to him and attractive. They led him to read my book. Sorry you have to wait until fall to read it, but what I share in this episode hints at why he's written a wonderful endorsement for the book.

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