Episode Summary: Today, we dive into the second part of our discussion with Josh Spodek, a leader in environmental advocacy and personal change who landed a segment in the Daily Show. 

As we are about to step into the new year, we're bringing you another special rebroadcast. 

In this segment, Josh shares deeper insights into his journey of personal transformation and environmental responsibility, challenging conventional notions about sustainable living and climate action. 

Josh believes that the key to systemic change lies in individual transformation. That is why his work also includes coaching high-profile leaders, like C-suite executives from major polluting companies or politicians to cultivate a deeper sense of environmental responsibility in these influencers because their actions can create significant ripples through their positions of power and influence.

This episode was originally aired in 2022. Follow the link to listen to the full episode

Watch Josh Spodek in the Daily Show

Want to join in the conversation?

Visit thecarbonalmanac.org/podcasts and send us a voice message on this episode or any other climate-related ideas and perspectives.

Don’t Take Our Word For It, Look It Up!

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Featuring Carbon Almanac Contributors Brian D Tormey and Olabanji Stephen

Brian is a Real Estate Title Insurance Professional and Goat Farmer in the US.

Olabanji is from Lagos Nigeria, he’s a Creative Director and visual designer that helps brands gain clarity, deliver meaningful experiences and build tribes through Design & Strategy. He founded Jorney - a community designed to help people stay productive, accountable, and do their best work. 

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The CarbonSessions Podcast is produced and edited by Leekei Tang, Steve Heatherington and Rob Slater.

Welcome to common sessions.

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Um, Lakey.

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And as we are about to step into

the new year, we are bringing

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you another special rebroadcast.

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Today we dive into the second part

of our discussion with Josh sporadic.

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A leader in environmental advocacy and

personal change, who lended a segment in

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the daily show if you want to find out

why you can listen to the previs episode.

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And this.

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Segment jealous shares, deeper

insight into his journey of

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personal transformation and

environmental responsibility.

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Challenging conventional notions about

sustainable living and climate action.

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Josh.

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Believes that the key to systemic change

lies in individual transformation.

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That is why his work also includes

coaching high profile leaders.

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Like C-suite executives.

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From major polluting companies or

politicians to cultivate a deeper

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sense of environmental responsibility.

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And this influences.

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Because the actions can create significant

ripples through the positions of

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power . Have you had experiences with

some people and, and sort of, can you

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share some of those with us of people

who may not be themselves in a place

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where they're, they're intrinsically

motivated to go try and forge a new

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trail and experiment themselves?

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Can you talk to a little bit of that?

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One comes to mind, there's like,

the people I want to lead are

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gonna be the people who can

make the biggest difference.

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So these are gonna be.

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C-suite executives at major polluting

companies, politicians, elected officials,

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also people in culture, singers,

athletes, movie stars, television stars.

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These are the people that are

the most effective role models.

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And there's one executive at this oil

company, and I can't say who it is

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and I can't say where it is because

we have a working relationship,

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but he, for the longest time, we.

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Keeping in touch, but not really

talking about energy and pollution.

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But I really wanted to work with him.

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And so I've developed something called the

Spock method, which is a, a way to work

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with someone to evoke their emotions and

feelings and values around the environment

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in a supportive, nonjudgmental way.

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And then lead them to come up with a

way for them to act on those emotions,

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on what the environment means to them.

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And this is a very different, subtle,

Critically different thing than to

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say, here's what you have to do.

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It's what do you like to do?

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And how can you do something like

that relevant to the environment?

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And by making it meaningful in that

way, because they're acting on their

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values, not what the New York Times

tells 'em they're supposed to do,

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or Greenpeace tells 'em that they're

supposed to do, then big or small

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doesn't matter because they're gonna

like it and they're gonna do it more.

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So he was resisting.

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I kept saying to him, let's do this

photo method, because I think once

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you do it, you'll really appreci.

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The way that I work and

you like doing more.

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And he was like, no, no, no, no, no.

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So we keep the conversation going

and at one point he talks about

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visiting a relative and he sees

something that he had read about that

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he hadn't seen with his own eyes.

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And that was that near this

relative, it was his grandmother

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and, and there was a force near

her where he used to play as a kid.

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And it didn't get cold

enough in the winter.

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And there's a beetle that could

continue to grow that normally

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would not grow because of the cold.

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And the beetle had just

eaten up this whole forest.

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So I haven't seen a picture of

it, but it sounds like it was just

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stumps acres and acres of stumps.

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And he was heartbroken because

it was something as a kid.

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And so even though this was in a

statement of something that mattered to

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him, and I walked him through the Spock

method without asking him, but since

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it was out there, I could work with it.

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And he decided that the way he would

act on this was that he takes a walk

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in the park near where he lives.

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What he committed to was to pick

up litter in that park to keep it

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a little cleaner, and it evolved in

the month or so that he was doing it.

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I think I forget exactly how long he

was doing this to involve his daughter

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and his daughter started when he would

go to the playground with his daughter.

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They would pick up litter.

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And people around them.

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At first were like, what's

wrong with you guys?

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And then eventually they started picking

up letter two and it became something

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between him and his daughter that was fun.

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So this is not an obligation,

this is not in his mind.

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He's doing something that he

enjoys, partly in reaction to the,

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the magnitude of the feeling he

had when he saw the the forest.

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Because of this, he starts

saying, all right, let's bring

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you into the company now.

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Let, and he's, he works with

people in C-suite of one of the

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major oil companies in the world.

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And in order to bring a new

leadership coach, it has to go

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through several steps that they

have a lot of internal leadership

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coaching and a lot of inter practices.

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So we have to present how I

work for their internal review

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to make sure that it works.

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We're working on creating

this presentation.

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We're using past presentations

of things that have worked

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and the usual corporate stuff.

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And the, the, the method, by the

way, is in corporate speak, would be,

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this is a mindset shift followed by

a process of continual improvement.

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And I start with a mindset

shift with this photo method.

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And then the continual improvement

is, you know, we always overestimate.

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Not always, but we tend to overestimate

what we can do in a day, but

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underestimate what we can do in a year.

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And so lots of these little changes

add up to a lot in one person.

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If you keep doing it right, you can't

just do one thing and stop anyway.

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We get to doing this presentation

and or we're forming it.

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And in the presentation we're putting

all these numbers and how it works

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and past clients and things like that.

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And then he puts in, he says, here's

this picture, and it's a picture of his.

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At a playground and she's standing

there with a big smile on her face and

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she's holding up a piece of litter.

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He said that we are at the playground

together and she saw a piece of litter.

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She was on the monkey bars or

whatever, and she just runs

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over and picks up the litter and

she's so happy that she's got it.

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And that goes into the presentation

because what's gonna make this

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work at the company is not

the numbers, the oil company.

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They know the numbers better than anyone.

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They know what works, what

doesn't work, and so forth.

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What they don't know is that when

they do this, they, the executives are

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gonna connect with their kids more.

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They're gonna love the

experience on a human level.

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That is something that you can't fake.

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I can say to someone, You're gonna

like doing this because it's gonna

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bring you closer to your family.

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It's gonna bring you closer

to everyone in the world.

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It's gonna connect you.

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You know, most people

think, oh fuck, I can't fly.

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I'm not gonna get to go see Machu Picchu.

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I'm not gonna get to see all

these different cultures and

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I'm not gonna see my mom on the

other coast and things like that.

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But when we see that taking others

into account for everything that we do,

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because every the pollution, you pollute

the air, you pollute everyone's air.

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We're all connected this way.

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That's a beautiful.

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That's not a burden that I

have to take into account.

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Oh, every time I do something, I

have to think about every other

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person on the planet that's glorious.

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And now he could show that

from his personal experience.

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And you might say, well, picking up

litter in the park is not a big deal.

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Well, I'm gonna be talking.

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Well, we can't be for sure, but looks

like I'll be on a path toward talking

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to the C-suite of a major oil company.

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That could be some pretty big

change, and that's why I don't

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think that you can get there.

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Genuinely, authentically living

the values and enjoying them.

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Actually, if I go back to that first

time when I was avoiding packaged food

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for week, there was a part of me that

wanted to hate the experience, that

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wanted to feel miserable and realized

if the cure is worse than a disease,

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I would take the disease and just say,

well, if we go down, we go down, but

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at least I'll have fun and join the I.

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I kind of wanted that to.

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Because it would've been so much easier

just to say, I throw out my hands.

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What can I do?

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Only governments and corporations

can make a difference.

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I can't make a difference.

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But that was wrong.

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It's a much better life.

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Living humble to nature than there's

a quota came from Abraham Lincoln.

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I actually, I gotta say cuz

video uses so much power.

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I'm reading a lot more books these days

because I'm not watching videos and I've

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read two biographies at Abraham Lincoln.

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and both.

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Great.

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I can't believe I've made it

this long without learning

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more about our 16th president.

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Well, America's 16th president.

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I'm American and it's, I'm not gonna

say it word for word I, but it says The

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worst thing you can do to yourself is

to do something that you know is wrong.

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Once you do something you

know is wrong, you have to

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convince yourself why it's okay.

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You have to suppress and deny

and twist yourself up inside and.

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I mean, Lincoln knew what happened

when people did that, but we have

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a culture built on polluting.

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Knowing that we're polluting, knowing

that it's wrong and internally

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twisting ourselves up to say, why?

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Oh, our, the plane was gonna fly anyway,

or, what I do doesn't matter, or only

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governance in corporations can make a

difference on the scale that we need.

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It twists us up it that is not.

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I could only have found that

out by actually living this way

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and finding the glory in it.

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I dunno if I've gone too off, too off

topic or to a side, to any sidebar.

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I think this is beautiful and,

and we're, we're, that's what

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conversations are all about is figuring

out and finding out where they go.

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