We Are Multitudes

“Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself, (I am large, I contain multitudes.)” – Walt Whitman, Song of Myself

In this poem, Walt Whitman was famously referring to the diversity and complexity of his own identity. However, his words also resonate with the multitude of challenges we face in modern healthcare.

On the back of a napkin, I scribbled just a few of these challenges. The order ultimately doesn’t matter, for all these will be amplified under the looming crisis of climate change. 

With the recent launch of this blog, I’ve been thrilled and energized by the interest shown by readers. Thank you to colleagues in Nashville, across the US, and internationally for your helpful feedback. Some of you have even offered to write guest pieces for this blog, which I greatly appreciate and welcome!

We Are Contradictions

The purpose of The Green Leap is to convene folks in healthcare who are striving to make our field more sustainable. We can share ideas, experiences, and practices to generate action. Let’s create dialogues that spark collaboration. Working together, we have so much potential for positive change.

Walt Whitman understood how cubism visually represents many perspectives at once. Image created by Reed Omary using Dall-E-2 with prompt, “the poet Walt Whitman in the cubist style of Braque and Picasso”.

The Green Leap recognizes the complexities we face, or in Whitman-speak, the contradictions. To address climate change will require all hands on deck. This means blending bottom up ideas with necessary resources from the top, and including everybody in between. 

Healthcare as Societal Bellwether

We in healthcare see all of society’s ills in the effects on our patients.

We see the effects of poverty, lack of education, addiction, violence, and climate change. It’s our patients who suffer from the impacts of extreme weather events, infectious diseases, eco-anxiety, asthma, droughts, and wildfires.

Healthcare also contributes to climate change and reduces the ability of our patients to withstand these very ills. In climate jargon, this is called resilience. Think how environmental waste pollutes our nearby communities, whether disposed in landfills or spewing forth from incinerators. Have you ever noticed that landfills and incinerators are never located in wealthy zip codes?

We also generate an immense amount of greenhouse gases: 8.5% of overall US emissions and 4.4% worldwide. If healthcare were a nation, it would be the fifth largest contributor to carbon emissions.

This blog will explore the opportunities for the health sector to reduce its carbon footprint and become more sustainable. We can help speed the transition to renewable energy, shift to low-carbon modes of transport, reduce unnecessary medical consumption and waste, and promote more plant-based diets.

Solutions will not be easy to implement, nor will they be enough to address the magnitude and urgency of our challenge. We require a change of mindset and behavior, both at individual and collective levels. We require, in short, multitudes.

What Can Whitman Teach Us?

This is where Whitman’s words come back to me. While he celebrated the diversity and complexity of human nature, his words also apply to the challenge and opportunity of addressing climate change. Whitman was an environmentalist before the term existed. He understood that looking inwardly could help us connect outwardly, with each other and with nature.

Walt Whitman, the original environmentalist. Image created by Reed Omary using Dall-E-2 with prompt “the poet Walt Whitman as a futuristic environmental hero who will save the world from climate change”

Let’s embrace the contradictions that come with climate action, and recognize that we are all part of a larger whole. A multitude of voices and actions can make a difference.

As we approach Thanksgiving, I would like to express my gratitude to you for your support and participation in this blog. I hope that you will continue to join me on this journey, and that we can share our multitudes with each other.

A fan of multitudes, Whitman also knew we have only one planet.

Have a safe and enjoyable Thanksgiving. Thank you for reading.

Walt Whitman, superhero. Can we be more like Whitman? Image created by Reed Omary using Dall-E-2 with prompt, “the poet Walt Whitman as an action hero in Japanese anime style”.