Where I Lived And What I Live For Analysis

Sandra Garcia

Professor Lauren Bond

English 101

22 September 2015

Sustainability

The term “Sustainability” has many definitions. The most basic definition of sustainability is the capacity to continue or keep moving forward. A thing that is sustainable can be repeated, reused, or recycled because it still has resources to keep creating it. There are what are called the “three pillars of sustainability.” The three factors that true sustainability depends on is social equity, environmental preservation, and economic viability. (Wessier, 3). In order for there to be social sustainability, communities and people need to be treated equally for there to be a chance to eradicate global poverty and ending the environmental exploitation of poor communities

or countries. For there to be environmental preservation, our human activities need to protect our environment, which is Earth. Finally for there to be economic sustainability, our development as humans depend on the long-term production, use, and management of resources which is a part of a global economy. Sustainability has different interpretations to different people. Many of the following authors of these essays or short stories have different examples of what they think sustainability is about.
In Henry David Thoreau’s essay “Where I Lived, and What I Lived For”, contains many examples of what he believes sustainability is.

He states, “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” (Thoreau, 29). Basically, Thoreau moved to a secluded place like the woods because he wanted to start living life. He thought that he needed to get rid of everything and keep only the necessities and goes on to say he did not want to die without learning to live in other ways. Another example he writes about is “Simplify, simplify. Instead of three meals a day, if it be necessary eat but one; instead of a hundred dishes, five; and reduce other things in proportion.” (Thoreau, 30). Thoreau believes that we need to live in the simplest way and have the least of anything as possible. Thoreau says, “I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to know it by experience, and be able to give it a true account of it in my next excursion.” (Thoreau, 30).

Thoreau means that he wanted to get rid of the excess of life and not live in a life in a routine. He wanted to take risks and to reduce life to its lowest terms. If life turned out to be cruel, why should we tell other people about it or tell our experiences to others. We should let others live what life is truly about. Based on their own experiences they should make their decision.
In John Muir’s essay “The American Forests”, he states many examples of what sustainability means to him.

Muir’s emphasis is about conserving America’s Forests. In his essay, he says that Indians only cut down what they needed but the “white man” does not think of the consequences cutting down too many trees will do to the environment. “Every tree heard the bodeful sound, and pillars of smoke gave the sign in the sky.”(Muir, 39). Muir believes that people are just burning wood for the fun of it. He also states in his essay that “In the settlement and civilization of the country, bread more than timber or beauty was wanted; and in the blindness of hunger, the early settlers, claiming Heaven as their guide, regarding God’s trees as only a larger kind of pernicious weeds, extremely hard to get rid of.”(Muir, 40). He feels that the people of this country got rid of trees because they wanted wood to burn to heat food and that the earliest people looked at trees as worthless or just a waste of space that was hard to remove. Muir goes on to say that we face consequences for having gotten rid of so many trees without necessarily needing to. “Clearing has surely now gone far enough; soon timber will be scarce, and not a grove will be left to rest in or pray in.”(Muir, 41). He says that we have removed so many trees without needing to that in the approximate future timber will be hard to find and you will not be able to find a tree to sit

beneath.
In Rachel Carson’s essay, “The Obligation to Endure”, she provides various examples of her insight of sustainability. Carson uses this essay to warn the public about the long-term effects pesticides and to say that in the long run they do more harm than good. She states that, “Only within the moment of time represented by the present century has one species –man- acquired significant power to alter the nature of his world.”(Carson, 49). Carson is basically saying that we, humans, have gotten such power that we can change nature into either a way that helps us and or that hurts us. Carson also says that the chemical, “Strontium 90, released through nuclear explosions into the air, comes to earth in rain or drifts down as fallout, lodges in soil, enters into the grass or corn or wheat grown there, and in time takes up its abode in the bones of a human being, there to remain until his death.”(Carson, 50). She means that many chemicals like Strontium 90 affect us because though the explosion goes up, it comes down to get into the soil where our food is grown. When we eat that food, it stays with us until we die. Carson goes on to say that even if we want to fix this problem, it will take generation to make it better. She says, “Future generations are unlikely to condone our lack of prudent concern for the integrity of the natural world that supports all life.” (Carson, 55). Carson means that future generations will not be able to grasp how we do not care what happens in nature. If the natural world starts to suffer, we will all suffer because it affects all of life, humans, animals and every other living thing