For better or worse, many parts of the world have been recently occupied – and in some places, like Vancouver, these occupations may be coming to an end. Many elements of the Occupy Movement have issued demands. Personally, I see many problems with demands, as they imply binary-negotiating and/or unchangeable beliefs. With that said, there appears to be more value and possibility in ideas and collaborative brainstorming – though this is a much harder process for certain.

Below is the first part of a four-part series that is meant to get our community thinking about how our brilliant, passionate, inspiring, adaptive, funny, delicious, healthy, and innovative humanity can make the world a better place.

How can we leverage our humanity to solve the world’s problems?

1. Read and teach more history so that we understand where we’ve come from and that we’re going into a dark and scary place if we keep up this path of taking, making and wasting nature, people, and the environment.
2. Count back your ancestors to the early decades of the Industrial Revolution (mid-18th century). Think about how far we have come in so few generations. Think about the costs. Try to imagine the world and your decedents in two centuries (six to eight generations) time.
3. Make people laugh or wear funny/awesome superhero costumes on days that aren’t Halloween.
4. Play sports, particularly soccer, as it is the most accessible and global-reaching sport that we have going at the moment.
5. Throw and attend dinner parties.
6. Embrace used corduroy things, for they are artifacts of a noble and honourable fabric.
7. Create art and artists, support artists and their art.
8. Stop for a moment and refocus on your mission, you’ve probably strayed a little from your core goal and a little refocusing will help you do the good you originally planned. *unless you’re @cobracommander, then please feel free to be distracted.
9. Learn to play an instrument from another culture. Bongos/congas/the ukulele count if you’re North American.
10. Plant stuff, all over the place.
11. Get a bike, get on that bike, and ride through your communities. You’ll discover where you live is way more interesting than you ever thought it was from your car, and you’ll be doing your part to help alleviate the obesity crisis as well.
12. Do something really nice for someone completely out of the blue. Make sure it’s not in response to something nice they did for you.
13. Hug a stranger.
14. Befriend a farmer. A lot of them are nice people and they have a lot to teach us. Plus they make it possible to buy good, local and healthy food in bulk, dropping the price point down from the farmers markets or yuppie focused organic butcher shops.
15. Spend time writing. The internet makes consuming culture very easy and I imagine many of us are reading, watching and listening to a wide range of content every day. Creating is a very different process and it helps focus the mind and forces you to really think through your opinions. If you need an outlet, I imagine The Potentiality is still accepting applications.
16. Read Thomas Paine’s The Rights of Man. Think about our government. Imagine ways to change it, improve it, and fix it. Don’t give up on representative democracy. It is still a radical ideal that we need to strive towards; not something we need to replace.
17. Try to learn something new every day. Continual passion for learning can only lead to growth and development – a crucial foundation to soling the world’s problems
18. When you disagree with someone, try to understand the situation from their perspective. And be open to changing your stance. Defensiveness has not gotten anyone anywhere.
19. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that owning more things will make you more happy. It will not.
20. Travel.
21. Read item #16. In addition to striving for representative democracy, strive for deliberative democracy.
22. Master a craft and share it.  None of us are good at everything but we’re all good at something.  Figure out what that something is and pursue it.  Look for mentors as you learn the craft and once you’ve mastered it become a mentor.
23. Embrace the spirit of the Infinite Tomato Project to make your home more food secure.  Learn how to save seeds, grow your own food, cook what you’ve grown, preserve the harvest, and become attuned with the seasons.
24. Ferment things in your home, whether bread, pickles, beer or wine.  Yeast are micro-organisms that humanity has been cooking with for at least 4,000 years.  In today’s fast-food culture they can teach us patience as they take hours, weeks or years to do their work.
25. Do something new every month to reduce your environmental footprint.  Completely changing lifestyles that we are accustomed to is hard.  Gradually introducing new behaviours and focusing on one thing at a time makes it easier.

Part 2 (ideas 26-50) will be on the blog next Monday, November 28.

Photo Credit: zilverbat. via Compfight cc