The Permaculture Principles, sometimes called the Permaculture Design Principles, are a set of concepts or tools used to provoke thought and guide the design process of any project, organization, or endeavor.
Depending on which permaculture teacher you follow, the principles may vary in number and wording. In this series, I’ll refer to the twelve Permaculture Principles laid out by David Holmgren in his book, Permaculture: Principles & Pathways Beyond Sustainability. I’ve put in bold the principles covered in this post.
Holmgren’s Twelve Permaculture Principles
- Observe and Interact
- Catch and Store Energy
- Obtain a Yield
- Apply Self-Regulation and Accept Feedback
- Produce No Waste
- Use Renewable Resources and Services
- Design from Pattern to Detail
- Integrate Rather than Segregate
- Use Small and Slow Solutions
- Use and Value Diversity
- Use Edges and Value the Marginal
- Creatively Use and Respond to Change
Permaculture Principles in Everyday Life
Similarly to how I covered the Permaculture Ethics last month, with examples from everyday life, I’ll take each of the Permaculture Principles and explore how we might apply or recognize each in our daily lives, not just in our gardens.
In Part One of this series I’ll go over the first three Permaculture Principles: Observe and Interact, Catch and Store Energy, and Obtain a Yield.
Permaculture Principle 1 – Observe and Interact
Observe and Interact means taking the time to observe your environment and then interact with it appropriately, based on your observations.
Observe and Interact In Landscape Design
Almost every permaculture designer will advise new property owners to observe their land for at least 12 months before making any major changes to it. Waiting this long provides the opportunity to observe the property in every season. When you finally make changes, it will be with the full cycle of seasons and their impact on the land in mind. This observational knowledge will give you a better idea of how to best interact with the land.
Observe and Interact In Personal Development
One way of applying this principle that stands out to me is within the area of personal growth and development. If you’ve done any sort of personal development, you’ll understand the value of first observing yourself before attempting to change.
The first step of personal development is to observe yourself: your behaviors, thoughts, and emotions. This self-observation leads to better self-understanding.
Only when we come to understand why we do the less-than-healthy things that we do can we change those patterns. With a new awareness of self, through self-observation, it becomes possible to make appropriate positive changes.
Observe and Interact In Parenting
Another area where the principle Observe and Interact is useful is in parenting. When we take the time to observe our kids’ behavior (particularly “bad” behavior) more deeply, we gain a greater understanding of why they’re acting out. We can interact with them by asking questions about the behavior we don’t like. Observing their responses further improves our understanding of why the unwanted behavior is occurring. From this position, it is easier to interact with them constructively to resolve poor behavior.
Permaculture Principle 2 – Catch and Store Energy
This principle is related to the concept of natural capital. As a global society, we’re using massive amounts of natural capital in the form of fossil fuels, at a much faster rate than can be replenished, not considering the deficit we’re leaving for future generations.
Catch and Store Energy is about shifting away from the overexploitation of natural capital by recognizing opportunities to capture and use energy flows in our local environments. This could be using renewable energy such as solar, wind, hydro, or geothermal. It can also be applied in smaller ways in the garden or home. Nature’s prime example of Catch and Store Energy’ is a seed–a tiny grain of energy–waiting for the right conditions to emerge and come to life.
Catch and Store Energy In Landscape Design
In permaculture landscape design, we might apply this principle by, for example, orienting gardens and greenhouses to the sun, using a brick wall to store solar rays to create a microclimate that plants thrive in. Or it could be diverting stormwater runoff to irrigate a garden. Or, it could even mean growing plants that store the sun’s energy in their leaves, and harvesting and preserving the food for later consumption.
Catch and Store Energy In Urban Life
In an urban lifestyle, we can catch and store energy by growing herbs on a sunny windowsill. Or by putting a tile floor in a sunroom to absorb solar energy and passively heat the space.
Also, consider your personal energy throughout the day. Catch and Store Energy might mean arranging your day to make the most of your available physical and mental energy. For example, scheduling your most critical and energy-draining tasks for the time of day when you’re best able to focus.
Permaculture Principle 3 – Obtain a Yield
Obtain a Yield In Landscape Design
In permaculture landscaping, we’re always thinking about how to get a harvest. We grow plants that produce foods we can harvest and eat. If we keep chickens, we consider the eggs they provide. We can also consider other services chickens provide—their nitrogen-rich manure, pest control, and weed control.
Obtain a Yield at Work
Likewise, at work, we might consider yields to be creating deliverables for a client or getting paid. Several approaches can increase these sorts of work-related yields. Some of them include prioritizing critical tasks, culling out busy work, and keeping focused on the right tasks.
Obtain a Yield at Home
Another way to obtain a yield is by reusing and recycling items from one area of life into another. A waste item might be, for example, an old yogurt container. But, that container is valuable beyond its days of containing your lunch. Put to use differently, it might store leftovers, hold a potted plant, or become part of a craft project.
Likewise, junk mail and newspapers can be shredded to yield bedding material for vermicomposting. (If you’re not familiar with vermicomposting, it’s a method of composting kitchen scraps using red wiggler worms.) The shredded paper provides a carbon source to balance out the high nitrogen in food scraps.
Conclusion
I’ve listed a few of the many ways the first three Permaculture Principles; Observe and Interact, Catch and Store Energy, and Obtain a Yield; can apply to everyday life.
Some of these applications may seem like common sense, and you’re probably already applying them or something similar in your life. But with awareness of the Permaculture Principles, we can go even further in designing healthier and more fulfilling lifestyles.
In what other ways do you apply these first three Permaculture Principles to your everyday life?
Make sure to read about the next three permaculture principles in Part 2. Until then, happy “permaculturing!”
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