PAUL: [00:00:00] Well, it could be just a bit of insanity, but I was looking for something when I came back from the Peace Corps. I grew up as a hockey player. And our coaches who would always say — you know, I’m a Minnesotan, so I grew up skating and playing hockey. And our coaches always say don’t go skiing because you might get hurt. And here I am separating both shoulders and ripping my face apart playing hockey and I’m saying like, “No, I think I’m going to ski now.”
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JESSE: [00:01:18] Welcome to the Smart Athlete Podcast. I’m your host, Jesse Funk. My guests today, that is plural, which doesn’t happen very often. Actually, I’m not sure if it’s ever happened, but I’m glad they’re both here. My guests today start with a Peace Corps volunteer over a number of years. This gentleman is a cross-country skier. He’s completed 40 of the American Birkey.
It’s a roughly 33-mile cross country ski race or 55 kilometers if you prefer to actually do it in the distance that they like to record it in. He’s the co-founder of Cool Planet and Cool Planet Skiers, which is an organization dedicated to bringing homegrown solutions to climate change in the town of Edina, Minnesota.
Also with us is a volunteer at Cool Planet. She is a consultant-client advocate. But also, and this is something we have in common, I talked about from time to time on the show a game creator now making a — I think card game, board game, online game kind of thing which we’re going to talk [crosstalk] about. Card game. I didn’t know based on all the components you guys had what it was. And then she also is a big fan of hiking and rollerblading, bring me back to my childhood, but I’m sure she does it to a more aggressive degree. Welcome to the show, Paul Thompson and Alix Dvorak.
ALIX: [00:02:36] Thank you.
PAUL: [00:02:38] Nice to be here.
JESSE: [00:02:40] That’s probably the biggest metaphor I’ve ever had for any intro, but when you both got a lot going on and there’s two people, I got to make sure I get through all of it. So, I hope I did you all justice by getting it all in. So, Paul, we’ll start with you. And then Alix, feel free to jump in. Obviously, I don’t know how well my double-person interviewing skills are, but I’ll try my best. Paul, can you give a little background on, I mean, how do you get started with the Birkey? I think I heard you’d heard about it, and then just jumped into doing it and got addicted. You know, how does that come to be? And I mean, why stick with it for four years, basically?
PAUL: [00:03:25] Yeah. Well, it could be just a bit of insanity, but I was looking for something when I came back from the Peace Corps. I grew up as a hockey player. And our coaches who would always say — you know, I’m a Minnesotan, so I grew up skating and playing hockey. And our coaches always say don’t go skiing because you might get hurt.
And here I am separating both shoulders and ripping my face apart playing hockey and I’m saying like, “No, I think I’m going to ski now.” So, after five years in Asia in the Peace Corps, I came home and in my first year of teaching in Wisconsin, I was listening to the radio and they said, “Over 2,000 skiers had just skied 55 kilometers through the north woods of Wisconsin.” And I said, “No way. That’s over 30 miles.” And I’m with my friend and I said, “Let’s do it next year.”
And it started in 73. I didn’t ski my first until 1979. I was 31 years old. It took me six hours and 42 minutes. There were long lines. It was really, really an amazing experience. And after that, it was like of course I’m going to do it. And they have a thing with the Birkey called Birkey Fever. And most people ski the Birkey one and they’re done. And they’re glad that they’ve done it, they can put it on their checklist. Other people keep doing it. Like, there are probably 60 people that have done more than I have. Although, I am getting up into the — There’s one man, Ernie St. Germain that has done all 47. But now with our changing climate, there’s no guarantees that the Birkey is going to happen.
So, we’re working now and changing, being adaptive to if there’s not enough snow and their dependency on making snow. So, I have become a member of the Birchlegging Board, which is Birkey skiers that have completed 20 or more Birkeys. And from the get-go, I was raising money for hunger and poverty, and micro-enterprise. And for the last 10 years, it’s been focused on keeping winter healthy, and getting people involved in political action and lifestyle changes that will address our changing climate, with the idea that we actually can do something to say winter. Which is, I think, way beyond my thinking, but that’s what we’re trying to do.
JESSE: [00:05:59] You know, the funny thing is that I received an email from my coach that he sent out to all of his athletes this morning. He had no idea I was talking to you guys and he himself had said something about climate change and how it’s affecting even triathlon, which is generally a summer sport. And he mentioned about race, cancellations. And he, for a number of years, he thought maybe they were flukes, but as he’s starting to see more trends, he’s like, no, I think that’s probably an indication of what’s going on with water being too cold or rainouts, or whatever it is, that’s happening.
He sees some kind of correlation there. So, for you, the listener, it’s not just a matter of Paul’s not going to be able to ski anymore because there’s no snow, but like, it affects all the seasons. It’s not just a matter of winter’s gone, you know?
PAUL: [00:06:53] Yeah. Well, and we’re finding race organizers now, all ski races also have a Fat Tire component, they have a trail run component, they do family events. Once the Birkey had enough snow to do half the race, but the kids had to do their race running down Main Street in Hayward, Wisconsin. So, being adaptive is certainly something that they’re doing. But I think all sports and all sports organizers now are really looking at how do we go cupless?
You know, how do we cut transportation costs? People travel a long way to train for cross country skiing. They have to go to Upper Peninsula, Michigan, which gets — used to get 400 inches a year, now it gets 200. So, they still have lots of snow. But half, in the last 10 years. So, the changes are dramatic, they’re really working fast. That’s why the policy issue and the federal policies have to be moving quickly. And that’s been our big focus is to get people to connect with their legislators on a local and a federal and a state level that take action and build partnership.
JESSE: [00:08:06] Something I always struggle with and I’ve spoken to a number of climate science-type people over the duration of this show. One person I think about in particular was Madie Steer, and I can’t remember what episode she was, back in the 50s, maybe. She’s researching nano plastics in the oceans. And so I think about plastic and how it’s affecting the environment because my company uses plastic to produce bottles and stuff. And I’m always looking for, like, a better solution. Though I can’t seem to find one, at least at my scale, because I am not a mega-corporation.
And the thing I struggle with is on an individual level, sometimes I feel small, like, how can I do anything? And so I asked her, her opinion on that, she gave it. So, I’d like to ask you, Paul, like as individuals — I think you already mentioned being active in talking to your legislators. Is there anything else we can do to be active and actually make an impact in this conversation and trying to steer us in the right direction?
PAUL: [00:09:16] Well, I’ll say a couple of things. And then I want to loop in Alix because she’s got tons of ideas on this. But Katharine Hayhoe, who is one of the most famous scientists and she’s also kind of a communication psychologist. She says the most important thing that people can do is to talk about it. Keep it at a real simple level, here’s how climate change is impacting me, here’s what I’m doing about it. I’ve started a garden, I’m doing composting.
I’m riding my bike more. I’m carpooling. And all the little things are really, really important and they’re not enough. But if enough people do enough little things and share it with their friends and their family — I mean, Buckminster Fuller, who I’m finding out most people don’t know anymore, the great mathematician and thinker said that if you get 6% of any population actively involved like alarm, that will draw another 12% of people that are curious and cautious.
And then you will have a movement that will have its own momentum. And it’s kind of like reaching herd immunity. You get enough people talking and doing things, and that is now happening with climate. COVID is going to move right into climate. And people are going to see that we’ve done this before, on some levels. It takes teamwork. And if we find common ground, even amongst our differences. And that’s why we brought in Braver Angels as one of the recipients of the Birkey 40 money because they’re all about conservatives and liberals finding common ground and not trying to change each other, just saying, we have to work at this and it’s not easy. Alix, anything on that?
ALIX: [00:11:06] Yeah, I’ve got a couple of thoughts about it. I’ve definitely struggled with this as well. I think this is extremely common. Learning about climate psychology, we feel really isolated and this feels really big. And so it’s very easy to say, there’s nothing I can do. And then there’s a really big debate about oh, it’s individual change or its system change. And the conclusion that I came to is, we all have a role to play. And so I think about this in a couple of ways.
Individual change works best as a communication and enrollment piece. So, if you can make changes to yourself, and then talk about it, that welcomes other people to do so, and then we’re all working together. So, there’s that piece of it. I think individual change just makes us feel a little bit better to and in alignment with our own values. I’m doing the best I can to help make these changes. And so that’s important to me to act on an individual level.
And then I also think it’s important to note we are not only individuals, but we are also other things, other roles. So, you talking, Jesse, about I’m a business owner and I can affect this through my business and thinking about how it touches in my business. Or in the case of saving snow and folks in winter sports, there are organizations that are wanting to work together to, for instance, there’s an organization, Protect Our Winters, and people joining together. Hey, we’re all skiers, we’re all winter sportspeople and we care about this.
I think about this as well with I live in a condo and I’m a homeowner with my other fellow condominium dwellers. I’m thinking about what can we do at our sort of like building level? What can you do as an organization, if you work in a large corporation, for instance, or even if you work in a small corporation? What can you do with your faith community, your church building, for instance, and banding together? So, I think we can think about this in concentric circles of I am an individual, and there are certain individual things I can do with me and my family. I am also a member of multiple communities, and I affect things, and together, this can kind of echo out. And so that’s how I think a lot about this.
And I also just want to say, I think there’s a really important piece of self-forgiveness in this. And I want to bring that out because sometimes it is difficult to find those solutions. You talked about it with your business and the plastic use, and you can’t really find right now those solutions. And we’re living caught in between this 21st-century knowledge that we have that we’ve got to make these changes, but we don’t have some of those yet available. They’re coming, they are coming and that’s the really exciting thing. But we’re caught right now and that can be really difficult. So, just realizing that and doing the best you can is, I think, an important piece of just keeping ourselves mentally and spiritually helpful while we’re going through this.
JESSE: [00:14:39] You know, I have a couple thoughts. The first is that talking about like small changes and doing what you can do. So, like I’m working on — I mentioned to you guys before we started recording — a new sports drink. And so I’ve thought a lot about the packaging for it, and is there anything I can do? I don’t know exactly what we’ll end up with, whether it’ll be a tub or a bag, or whatever. But one of the things that I’m committed to do with this new product, and by the time you’re listening to this, it’s still going to be months before this product comes out.
I haven’t even received R&D samples yet. So, be patient, it’s coming. But one of the things I decided to do was get rid of the little plastic scoop, it’s completely unnecessary. And so I’m going to be giving away really nice, like, teaspoon tablespoon sets, to go with first purchases, because most people probably already have them, but I don’t — Like, I want to make sure it’s included so people have it. And it’s like, it’s a simple thing. Like, we don’t need to be throwing away millions of these plastic little scoops every time you get a new powder. Like it’s completely unnecessary.
So, it’s like my very tiny contribution of reduce, reuse, recycle. Reduce the amount of plastic that’s been being produced in the first place. But more to your point, Alix, thinking about doing what each of we can, it reminds me of — and I don’t say this in the religious sense, though I did grew up in the Christian tradition — people talking about having a different cross to bear. That’s the thing that came to my mind, when it’s like we each kind of have different capacities, where it’s like, well, me, as a small business owner, I can make that decision to say, okay, we’re not doing any scoops.
And that’s a small decision. And maybe somebody who’s just a consumer, they don’t have any influence in their job, maybe their decision is, okay, well, I’m only going to buy things that don’t have scoops or I’m going to go to like a soap refill place instead of continuing to buy containers. I’m going to walk places or bike places instead of, you know, we each have different capacities.
And there’s other people, say like, the CEO of PepsiCo. And maybe they say, okay, we’re going to invest in the technology to actually make biodegradable plastic a real thing, and not just a pipe dream. Which it kind of is right now, although there’s kind of been some breakthrough stuff on that recently. So, I think about it that way. And like you said, both of you said that the more we as a global community talk about it, the more prevalent and important the issue becomes to allow us as people that maybe don’t have as much direct impact, to push that idea forward so that people do have the ability to to make that actual policy change, or private corporation decision, whatever it is, they have that on the forefront of their minds as well.
PAUL: [00:17:46] Yeah. There’s a power in numbers. And I’m finding since the pandemic, my neighborhood knows each other so much better. Every Tuesday night, we went out with a beverage just to toast everyone for a year. And once the winter came, some people said, “Let’s keep doing it.” And now we’ve got this network and we’re doing surveys, you know, what concerns you?
Our city of Edina is doing a Climate Action Plan. And so now I have all these new people to say fill out this survey. Mindy, my wife and I are going to be on the Climate Action Plan. We’re actually going to take your ideas, and bring them to a larger group of people that include business leaders and young people and people in the city staff. But you know, I’m pissed off that they’re cutting down these big trees to put up big homes. We need a bigger tree ordinance.
And, of course, everyone’s a publisher now with social media. So, you have a good idea, you put it out on Facebook, or Twitter, or Instagram. That’s why we’re here because Caitlin, our Returned Peace Corps Volunteer, her 16-year-old sister got her into Instagram, and now she’s doing Instagram for the Peace Corps and getting all kinds of results. So, it’s like, keep doing what works, keep trying new things and you reduce, reuse re– We have to rethink.
You know, we have to start with being open to — maybe I am thinking in an old-school way, which is easy for me. I’m 72, so I love working with 20-year-olds and 30. And they got the ideas that we need to be listening to. So, putting the youth upfront is a big part of the work that we’re doing. And I’m seeing as soon as they can run for office, I’m voting for you, you know?
JESSE: [00:19:44] That’s the thing I think, among my peers, probably struggle with the most is that, you know, want to be active, want to make a change. But then it’s like, the baton hasn’t been handed off quite yet. It’s like almost there, you can kind of see it coming, but it’s just not in your hand yet. And I feel a lot of frustration from people about that. I think sometimes it’s hard to, because it is such an immediate need, I think it’s hard to think in such long timescales.
Because even saying the average lifespan is something like low 80s here in the US, depending on where you live. I’m now 32. I’m not even halfway through at that point. But even if I was, it’s still tough to fathom that whole other 40 and sit here in this very moment. And so, I guess for my compatriots, the people that are my age and younger, if you’re listening, it’s a game of persistence and patience. But I would call it impatient patience, where you want to get it done as soon as possible. But you’re also patient enough to know like time is coming.
PAUL: [00:21:04] Yeah. It does take time to build. I mean, everything revolves around relationships. And if you’re rushing around trying to get things done and you don’t take the time to say, tell me more about that. You know, do you have kids? You know, I lost my son to suicide. I mean, that was a huge thing in my life. And now, everyone I talk to, I want to know how they’re doing. You know, that’s a big question. And if we take the time to build, then the trust comes.
So, if we can get Democrats and Republicans to actually have those times when they’re not talking about policy, they’re talking about their families and getting connected — That’s why I like what Braver Angels is doing because it’s really who are you and your why are we here together to make a difference or not? So, it’s like, there was a good, some type of — it’s an urgency, but it’s an urgency with the time to really let it settle in. I can’t remember what it was, but when I heard it, I thought, “Oh, that’s perfect.” You know, something about relaxed urgency.
JESSE: [00:22:20] Yeah. Yeah. So, Alix, how exactly did you get roped in? Did Paul meet you somewhere? Like, how did you get roped into helping? I mean, relationships is, I’m guessing, how this happened, given that Paul said that’s the crux of what’s going on.
ALIX: [00:22:38] Yeah. I reached out to Paul to find out about Citizen’s Climate Lobby, an organization he’s alluded to, that we both volunteer for, and are deeply involved in that is advocating for a price on pollution, a price on carbon pollution, which would be a market-based way to have the real price of carbon put in the market, so that businesses and consumers and organizations can choose.
And part of what this organization advocates for is also to return that tax to individual households and families as a dividend so that they can weather the kind of changes in price as we make this transition. And so he and I met through that. But then, I don’t even know. I think, Paul, what is amazing about Paul and what I’ve learned a lot about from him is to invite and enroll people. So, he had this idea, you know, I’m going to for my 40th Birkey, the way that I’m going to celebrate this momentous mark of 40 years, is that I’m going to raise $40,000. And he had the vision.
And then he just started inviting people. Hey, will you help me? Can you help me do this? And it was really beautiful to see that. And to know, I think sometimes I’ve thought about like, oh, I have this idea and maybe I have to go it alone. But like, inviting and providing a chance for people to work on something is so — it’s such a beautiful experience.
And I’m really grateful for Paul to have invited me to do that. And so we just had the initial conversation and then just started working on what needs to be done. And one of the things that he also had the vision for is to use the climate change solutions game that I had just kicked started last year as the gift for donations. Because it wasn’t just about raising money, it was also about getting solutions into people’s hands. And so that just felt like a really beautiful partnership as well for us. are two organizations to support each other and this Birkey 40 project.
[crosstalk]
PAUL: [00:25:27] And then up to 300 donors, over a hundred of them have requested the greenhouse game, either online, print, and play or the box set. And I’m going back to the ones who didn’t order it and say, “Hey, you missed an opportunity. If you want to get it, we’ll still send them out because the real mission is deeper engagement.” And so now doing these play sessions online are just great. I mean, this is something. You’ll love the game. You’re a game guy. This is a game. And it’s a card and token game. So, you get to play with money, carbon, hope, and hopelessness. And you start off in a hole where the sky is mostly negative, and you have to flip tokens to get the clear skies back. And so it’s really, it’s a fun thing. So, come and play next Friday. [inaudible 00:26:05]
JESSE: [00:26:07] Next Fri– We’ll see. I’ve got my COVID shot on Tuesday. I’m probably not going to feel good on Wednesday, which would mean, going to be like driving a ton to get up there by Friday.
PAUL: [00:26:18] No, on your computer.
JESSE: [00:26:20] Okay. I thought you were telling me to come up. I’m like, oh, it’s like nine hours.
ALIX: [00:26:25] It’s all online right now. [crosstalk] Yeah.
PAUL: [00:26:27] Send you the invitation.
JESSE: [00:26:30] Okay. We can probably do that next Friday. I’ve only got one recording next Friday. So, we could probably fit that in. Now, I’ve lost my train of thought. Oh. Thinking about games, some listeners will know, if you’ve listened to all the episodes, I also design games for another business. And I like to — I’ve done educational games, largely. I like making educational games. There are good games first and then like sneak in the education what it kind of sounds like. Just because I find, generally speaking, people just want to have fun. And then if they can get something good out of it on the back end, then that’s a plus. It’s like sneaking in vegetables. You cooked them in butter but you also gave them some vegetables to eat. So, they got something good and delicious at the same time.
PAUL: [00:27:24] Yeah.
ALIX: [00:27:25] Totally agree. That is how we developed the game actually. So, my co-creator of the game, he brought the design, the game design experience. So, he held that vision of it must be a game that people want to play, it must be a good game. And then I held the vision of what do I want this game to feel like? And what kind of messages do I want to portray through the game? But not even about learning, really, but just like, what are the messages?
So, this is why hope is in the game because I see a lot of people getting really hopeless right now. And that’s just a self-fulfilling prophecy. If we are hopeless that we can do nothing, we will in fact, just do nothing. And so there are elements in the game that are about like, what kind of feeling do we want? Or what are we playing with here as the elements of the game? And then there are some learning things that can happen outside the game.
So, all of the action cards are real-life climate solutions that people are working on right now. And there are things that are, for me personally, set my imagination on fire. And there are things that people don’t typically know about or typically think of. And so we have QR codes on all of the cards, and people are welcome to scan the QR codes or just go to our website, GreenhouseGame.com/solutions and just look at the solution.
So, if they want it as an exercise — if they want to later, outside of gameplay, do some learning and exploring on their own, that’s absolutely great. But we wanted to center the play of the game. People have to cooperate against the board to cancel the climate apocalypse. And so like that’s the experience we wanted to give people.
JESSE: [00:29:26] So, I know we’re a little short on time, and it feels so fast because there’s two of you and so I’m getting lots of answers.
ALIX: [00:29:32] No worries.
JESSE: [00:29:33] But I don’t want to run you out of time. I want to give you both a chance to answer this and it depends on how long each of you answer this. So, each season of the show I come up with a question I asked every single guest. So, since there’s two of you, I want to give you both the chance to answer in your own way. This is — Paul maybe you’ll have more experience with this having been older which by the way, I’m not calling you old. You are younger than my father. So, I would say feel good about that. But — [crosstalk]
PAUL: [00:30:03] It’s okay. I’m embracing my senior-ness.
JESSE: [00:30:07] Yeah, he’s fin– and he just turned 78 yesterday. So, he finally is kind of there. He’s fought against it for a little while. But then he’s kind of just relaxed a little bit, which has been nice. Anyway, so the question I’m asking everybody this year, in the general sense is, how do you stay motivated after you fail to reach a goal?
PAUL: [00:30:37] It doesn’t really happen to me. I mean, I’m motivated. I’m just motivated. If I am upset about something, I write about it and I share it with someone. Motivation comes from inside. I think I was just born to make a difference. When I was younger, I would read books about Gandhi, and spiritual paths and Ram Dass, and all that stuff. And I said, okay, yeah, I got it. That’s it.
I’m just going to go and do what I do. And now, as an older person, is inspiring other people to never give up. That’s what the Dalai Lama said. He’s not here anymore. But I moved — In my second-grade classroom, it was like, it was okay to be upset, it was okay to — but it was never okay to give up. And you just go into your corner or do what you have to do.
I mean, coping mechanisms are important to have so you can recover who you are. But motivation is not a problem for me. It’s a gift to be able to be alive at this time because we are the only ones that are going to make a difference. And it has to be done in the next 10 years. And so stay healthy and be as happy as you can, but find places to recover, if you need that. And I spend a lot of time with people close to me, no names, that I will have to support them in being well and taking care of themselves.
And I have a lot of older people in my life now that are not doing well. And so again, it’s that thing of honoring people where they are in their life change and their phase. And right now, it’s coming in strong right now with people in my life, so I need to be there for them. So, thinking of others helps a lot, you know. Alix?
ALIX: [00:32:47] For me, I have a question that I like to situate failure in a moment in time and it’s not a permanent thing. So, when is failure? That is the question that I asked myself. So, you might have failed at something. We failed at — For the Birkey 40, we failed raising our full $40,000. We didn’t quite reach that. But does that mean that we were not successful?
No, probably not. But there was some element of disappointment, right? We put out goals so that we can kind of like stretch ourselves and try to make that. And sometimes we don’t make it. And then it’s a matter of like looking at, okay, what did we do? What happened? And what might we do next time? So, the learning piece for me is always what drives me. And anchoring myself into my values and beliefs and what’s important also drives me. And so it’s those particular pieces that keep me — like keep me going after a failure.
And I guess lastly, what I would say is just, I also let myself lean into the failure for a little bit. So, you know, hey, this is the day where I’m going to pout about the fact that like, this didn’t happen. And that’s a real bummer. But then like, it’s like, okay, what can we do out of this? What can we make up? And I think this is actually really key. I want to bring this back around to climate change. Because where we’re at with climate change, we have failed to prevent some amount of climate change.
We’ve just failed as a species. We are in climate change. We’ve warmed the planet one degree. And so it’s like, we failed. And now we’ve got to look for the next stopping point. Science is telling us 1.5 degrees. We have the solutions. And so like, let’s like go for that next goal then. And that keeps me motivated. There’s always something we can save. There’s always something we can learn. And we need to do that. And that’s what keeps me excited and what keeps me in this work.
PAUL: [00:35:07] And it is a marketing problem right now I see. How do we reach the people that aren’t engaged? And your podcast is a great example of helping people to take that next step. You know, like, when we work with congressmen, we rate them A, B, C, D. We’re trying to move them from obstinance all the way up to champion. There’s all these different levels where you want to get people to just take one next step. But how do we reach the people that don’t have access to computers, that are living in other countries? I mean, it’s a big deal. And we have to really come up with new solutions. And I think the technology has been given to us as a way to make that available.
Because racial equity is a key element here of being able to get the brown and black and yellow and all the cultures engaged. Not like we have the answers, but I kind of think they have the answers, which I learned in the Peace Corps. I wasn’t there to help them, they helped me understand how important it is to receive from others. So, it’s a grand game, talk about a game this one is big stakes. And we do know what to do. And if you look at Drawdown, the book by Paul Hawken, the hundred most important things that people can do. Everybody can find a solution that fits them. And in Alix’s game, she’s got a whole list of solutions for the next edition, because we keep hearing, how come you don’t have this? What about that? And you know, it’s a work in progress.
JESSE: [00:36:56] Well, I appreciate you both giving very thorough answers there. I don’t want to run out of time, so I will not make any comments on your answers as I’m prone to do. Paul, Alix, where can people see what you’re doing, keep up with you, see all the organizations? We’ll try to keep, down to the description, wherever you are, whether you’re on YouTube, SoundCloud, iTunes, hopefully, there should be some links to the various organizations that Paul and Alix had mentioned. But directly if people want to see what you guys are doing, where can they find you?
PAUL: [00:37:28] I think that — Alix, go ahead.
ALIX: [00:37:31] I was just going to say mine’s really easy. Green House Game, basically everywhere. So, GreenHouseGame.com, @Green House Game on Instagram, and Facebook. We’re slow to get our Twitter set up. But that is going to happen. So, Green House Game. And if you want to email me a greenhousegame@gmail.com.
PAUL: [00:37:54] And I think for most people, I gave you the four links of the groups that we funded through Berkey 40. But the Citizens, with an S, CitizensClimateLobby.org has 500 chapters in almost — in every state, many multiple states. And they will train people in how to become good citizens, writing letters, meeting with your members of Congress, developing these relationships between left and right. So, that’s the one if people are really interested in getting more involved in creating a livable world. And then I think BraverAngels.org, is just getting going now. They’re a new organization. But if finding common ground and depolarizing our country is important, then go to BraverAngels.org and see. You may have to start something in your neighborhood. They’re not as widely — The Citizen Climate Lobby promotes Braver Angels all the time.
And then for those Peace Corps Volunteers out there, RPCV4, numeral four, EA, EnvironmentalAction.org. We have monthly meetings and we’re doing some great stuff around climate, around regenerative agriculture, around refrigerants. And it’s exciting because we have a very particular story about all of us have had this two to three-year experience living in a developing country. So, telling our stories is a big thing. But everybody has a story, right? Telling your story is, ultimately, that’s why we’re here is sharing stories. Because that’s what’s left after we’re gone is the story of our lives.
JESSE: [00:39:44] Right. Well, thank you guys for sharing your story. That’s, I mean, in part, what this show is about is giving people like you an opportunity to share your story and the things that you find important. So, thank you both and hopefully, we’ll talk again later about the game and some other stuff that I’d like to talk about off air. So, take care, guys.
ALIX: [00:40:07] Absolutely. Please reach out — [crosstalk] Thanks so much. This has been great. Thank you.