While staying at the Verite Guest House, in Auroville, we were able to practice intentional small-footprint living. That "footprint" is more than where we physically step and leave a trace, but the cumulative and extended affect of our living, from food consumption and by implication food production and distribution, to energy consumption and its similar chain of delivery from source to our hands, to the consumption or acquisition of goods, whose origin is more likely than not an Asian city. 

Many people live a small footprint, but they are forced to do so by lack of material goods and lack of economic opportunity. There are those of us who live full-current in the river of wealth which is our western economic empire; we are not forced to any privations, at least not presently. That current can sweep us along, deciding our pace and destination, and involve us in some of the greatest abuses of material capital and pollution of the planet without us being aware of it.

By making a choice for simple living, by intentionally decreasing the detrimental affect of our passage, we take up a third position, one of choice and empowerment, where we will have far less to mop up at the end of our day than if we merely kept soiling our rooms and sweeping the muck to the side…

At the Verite Community, 100% of our light was generated by wind and sun. The houses and community buildings were completely off-grid — leveraging the advantages of a warm climate, of course. We kept light use to a minimum as a matter of course; we permitted the night to be night, and used LED headlamps to light our way around if necessary. Sometimes the warmth of candles helped light a space, or a conversation.

We did not push too far into the night, nor wait too long to begin the day. With a little effort and a little communal support, some obvious best-practice for Earth Ownership was made easy, and felt like simple acts of kindness as opposed to arm-twisting inconveniences.

Now, technology — give it some food and who knows how far we can go. LED lighting is known as solid-state lighting. It can be driven digitally, turns on and off instantly, and uses a small fraction of the power of incandescent bulbs, an old technology which has not yet been swept aside. The life of an LED lamp is tens of thousands of hours, some estimates of current state-of-the-art lamps put the average life at 100,000 hours.

I just purchased an under-the cabinet led strip from our local supermarket chain. It plugs into a standard outlet, gives off reasonable amount of light… and consumes 1 watt of power. As in one watt. If it lasts even half the longest estimate, that is power-sipping light for 5 and one half years.

There are already lights ready for home use, which screw into a standard bulb socket. You can also mix and match these lights to create any color you wish, even modify the colors with time or on demand to change the mood or purpose of the light stream. At present this lighting is somewhat more expensive than standard lighting, and the number of lumens is on the low side. But all of this is set to change in the coming few years.

It's another good idea, like the electric car, like recycling, like home gardens.

Don't mistake your influence on making good ideas into good realities: the consumer drives everything in this country, or consumption does, so if you decide, if you choose a smaller footprint, if you find that soulful living has a value inestimably greater than material living… then you have added the weight of your body and the weight of your pocketbook against a door that is just begging to be opened…

Click the light's just come on.