546: Maxine Bédat, part 2: Systemic Change Begins With Personal Change

Maxine shares her experience with her commitment across the country. She moved partly to enable living by her values. People often suggest it's easier for someone living in New York not to fly since I have access to so much culture here, but access to many cultures only matters if you value it. Not everyone does. I hope you live where you can access things you value. If you don't, no amount of travel will overcome that you live where you don't like.

I mention this because Maxine could live by her values better not in New York. She sounds like she's still flying a bunch, she didn't commit to avoiding flying (yet). As we talk about in our conversation, we build up to bigger changes through smaller ones.

Note how often she describes the discomfort that changing to acting on her values liberates her from. I believe we all feel that discomfort when we know we're acting against our values. We know when we're polluting. No amount of rationalization that "everyone else is doing it", "the plane was going to fly anyway", "what I do doesn't matter", and so on can quiet our consciences.

I heard her composting commitment liberated her from feelings and behavior she didn't like. Not that she couldn't change any time, but the commitment from our conversation kick started a change. I expect she'll keep developing, maybe not monotonically, but steadily.

• Vogue: Maxine Bédat Urges the Fashion Industry to Make a Change Now, Not in 2030
• Maxine in Harper's Bazaar
• Elle: Maxine Bédat Unravels The Lies of Greenwashing The author of Unraveled on why she doesn't subscribe to the term "sustainable fashion."
• Unraveled: The Life and Death of a Garment

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