First editorial
To decorate my home, I use only stones and shells I find in nature, branches of local trees and wild flowers. I bring branches and flowers home very rarely because they are parts of living beings. In the picture above is a very small branch of a coniferous tree in an upcycled glass jar. I brought it home to celebrate a small but important (to me) unfolding.
On my academic journey, I never felt overwhelming joy when my articles were accepted in journals. I was glad as I put my heart and mind into those works, but never felt extreme happiness or pride. Perhaps this is because there are other things that matter more in life. I see myself as a human being before I identify myself as a researcher. What matters more are love, care, kindness, community (including non-humans). The stars, the sea, the sun, trees. Even though I try to weave together my being and my work, I succeed only partially. My autoethnographic article was the first work where I brought together my being and my research more authentically. Then it is my forthcoming book that weaves together my study of businesses, contemplations on sustainability and business, and autoethnography.
Recently, I wrote something that I love. It's my first editorial for the journal Environmental Values. In my editorial, I decided to talk about the state of academia and how it affects our engagement with academic work(s) and spaces outside academia, feelings and emotions, the place where I am (including the cemetery where the branch in the picture above came from), inspiration outside academia (fellow humans and non-humans, nature, children's artworks). I was anxious to send the editorial to our editor-in-chief. I didn't know what he would think and feel. But he said he loved it. I then sent this work to my partner who said that it's his favourite work of mine. I felt so much joy because I feel that with this work I'm doing something to bring about change in academia (though of course in a very small way). Change in my personal consumption has become somewhat easy to navigate after 15 or so years of practising (extreme) minimalism, zero-waste, voluntary simplicity. Though I try to dwell academia as a space differently too, I'm still on a journey.