About Us
Why It Matters
This website has been designed to give you tools that will help you improve the quality of your life, that of your family, neighbors, and your local community. We see the wellbeing and prosperity of all these groups as tied together.
This website was created expressly for people who are frustrated by the way their lives are going, and often feel helpless to effect any changes. It’s for people who know something is wrong in our society and culture but typically feel too overwhelmed or busy to take any concrete steps to change course and conduct their lives differently.
It was developed with a set of values that underlie all the actions recommended on this site. These values reflect a faith in the goodness, self-reliance and common sense decency of most Americans to conduct themselves as reasonable individuals who care about the place and the people where they live, work, and raise their families.
The suggestions we offer here are all doable by any ordinary citizen. There is a perception that living your life with respect and responsibility toward your environment and your neighbors is only something that rich people can afford to do. Organic, sustainable, green and such are buzz words that have become almost meaningless as they get bandied about and abused for political and commercial purposes.
We prefer the word local. Local to us means a unique place with connections that can’t be replaced, relationships that are not interchangeable, and communication that thrives on face to face contact. Local is the opposite of virtual. Local is not anti-technology, it’s just not dominated by technology.
Local is smaller. There are very few economies of scale. In fact, local means small scale, humane, and manageable.
Local is slower. The pace is related more to nature than to that of a machine.
Local is quieter. Not just lower in volume but less crowded in frequency.
Local is focused on singular thoughts and tasks one at a time. Local doesn’t mindlessly multi-task.
Local is sustainable. It grows out of systems designed to conserve and preserve. It minimizes and eliminates waste wherever possible, knowing that our earthly and human resources are finite and have to be respected and cared for and rejuvenated to sustain us from generation to generation.
We would argue that living your life local is the most beneficial thing any person can do for themselves, their family, their community, their town, city and country.
What we are not
Living your life local is not a movement. There are no slogans, no bumper stickers, no manifestos. It’s not that easy. In fact, genuinely living your life local requires a lot of time, effort and motivation. It’s a totally custom experience—your own experience—that counts. It’s what you and your neighbors make of it.
LOCAL ACTION LIST
- Join a local credit union
- Participate in your school board, village board or PTA
- Invest in local businesses for the long term
- Buy local every day, every week
- Try to work locally by living as close to work as possible
- Retire locally by volunteering your time and expertise