Starting any type of project is a roller coaster. Is a challenge to your ability to adapt. There was a time in which we got a lot of momentum and support. We were able to raise a lot of money from amazing investors, and we took advantage of that to really expand and grow and grow our capabilities. More recently that has changed, right, what some people call green hashing, right?

Companies are not talking too much about their environmental actions because they fear criticism, right? So for us, it’s been a time to adapt, a time to attempt to become more efficient and more focused, right? There was a time in which we were flaring, exploring a lot of different directions of how we could help, you know, unlock this market.

And now is the time in which we’re focusing and, you know, trying to understand what is it that we can be the best in the world at? We can try to do a lot more with less, and go through, you know, a winter time, because there’s always a spring climbing the other side.

You’re listening to A Climate Change, this is Matt Matern, your host. I’ve got a great guest on the program today, Diego Zaez Gil, who is founder of Pacha Ma, which uses AI and satellite data to restore the forest and help fight climate change.

Diego was former CEO of Blue smart, and he was named on the Forbes 30 under 30 list back in 2016 so now he’s probably due for a 40 under 40 list pretty soon. You know, he still looks so young. You look so young. You know, maybe you got a few more years for that. But anyway, it’s great to have you on the program.

Thank you so much, Matt, yeah, that was a long time ago, but yeah.

Just maybe you can give us a little bit of your background and where your interest in the environment started and how it led you to where you’re at right now.

Yes, for sure. So I am originally from Argentina. I grew up in the north of Argentina and a place called Tucuman, where we have the beautiful Junga forest. It’s a tropical cloud forest that connects all the way to the Amazon rainforest. And as a kid, I would go out a lot to nature. My grandparents houses in the forest, and my two grandmothers were very connected to nature, to trees, so they foster in me and my brothers and cousins a deep love for nature.

And then life took me around the world. I was lucky to get a scholarship to do a master’s in Europe in Barcelona. So I moved from Argentina to Barcelona, and then after working in consulting a little bit in Spain, I moved to the US, initially to do an internship, and eventually I decided to start a company here in the US and become an entrepreneur.

My passion was entrepreneurship, technology, travel, and so I focused on those areas for a couple of years, and I helped build two tech startups that raise funding that, you know, launch new products and that eventually got acquired. But, you know, after going through that journey of entrepreneurship, I ended up in a moment in which, you know, almost a purpose crisis, right?

Like, you know, why I’m working so hard while the world is, you know, heading into a very dangerous trajectory, right with climate change, with the decimation of nature, and with the way that society really is building, you know, these economic and and, you know, systems that are not aligned with with nature. So decided that I could contribute from the skills that I had developed, which were entrepreneurship, building new technologies, new products.

And I thought that those skills could be useful. So it was actually after going on a trip to the Amazon rainforest, I took a mini sabbatical, you know, after my last company got acquired, and in that time, I went back to South America, and when my brothers decided to go to the Amazon, it was the first time that I go deep into the Amazon rainforest.

And it’s a very powerful experience to be in the middle of that giant jungle with these ancient trees. We were fortunate to stay with an indigenous community and got to learn from them the connection with nature they have. But also in the trip, I got to see deforestation on the way to the heart of the Amazon, and it’s really heartbreaking to see a clear cut of what used to be recently a super dense forest with millions of species now turning to, you know, bear land with some cows roaming around. So I came back from the trip, decided to do something about it.

And, you know, being a technologist now, I was aware of how satellites were. Advancing rapidly. How today we have hundreds of new satellites in orbit with cameras on it that allow us to see the Earth with a level of definition and frequency that was unthinkable before, also I was paying attention to AI. And how, with these new deep learning models and new computing capabilities now we could process giant amounts of data, and with that, make predictions, create, you know, models that allow us to to do predictions.

Today, we’re all familiar with large language models, right, like chat, GPT, style, AI, but back then, I could also see how that was going to apply to imagery, and to satellite imagery in particular. So with that is that we decided to start Bucha as a technology startup with a mission of helping protect and restore nature and address climate change.

And the specific focus on developing these technologies AI applied to satellite data to help measure, understand, report on what’s going on on forests worldwide, and in doing so, help drive funding and action to its protection and restoration, because we believe and now, six years into building a company, and I can tell you more about the journey, But we believe that this can be reversed.

We’re seeing it already areas where forests are being restored, where deforestation is being stopped and nature comes back. The resiliency of nature is amazing. So we’re just there to help a little bit by observing, informing and then driving funding and reporting on the impact of the actions.

It’s a tremendous work, and I understand that you’ve kind of partnered with a number of big tech companies like Spotify, Google, meta, Microsoft, and tell us how you partnered with them and and how that’s working out, and kind of, what are some of the the wins that you’ve been seeing by doing your work?

Yeah. So, you know, we have the insight that today, like it or not, corporations have so much power and influence. In fact, you know, the top tech companies in Silicon Valley have more economic power that all the governments of Latin America, right? So that is a force that you know can be channeled to, you know, for good can be channeled to help protect and restore nature.

And as it happens, many corporations are, in fact, committing to reducing and compensating the impact of their activities, and they have teams that are very dedicated to measuring the impact, measuring their CO two emissions, but not just carbon, also their water impacts, their you know, land impacts, and then investing in projects that can heal and compensate for that impact as they transform their operations to avoid that impact in the first place.

So with that in mind, we partner with many corporations that today are investing in reforestation and regeneration projects around the world, or in conservation projects around the world. And of course, for these corporations, you know, they want to make sure that they are investing in the right thing that they can confidently, you know, communicate what they’re doing. So there is where our data, our insights allows them to, well, first, source projects that are doing things in the right way.

Second diligence those projects deeply and thirdly, track those projects and be able to help them over time and say, advance. So yeah. I mean, as a result of those partnerships, we have helped drive 10s of millions of dollars to projects in 15 different countries that are already having amazing results on the land. And of course, this is not just about nature. These projects are empowered in local communities with jobs that are related to this bio economy of regeneration for the regions.

It’s kind of mind blowing when you think of it that the mag seven stocks have more economic clout than an entire continent and, and I was just recently in South America, and it is both an amazing place, but a ginormous continent. I mean, it’s just huge, you know, you look at Brazil, and I think, oh, it’s only about an inch, this little piece of the map. And, oh, it shouldn’t be too far away. And it’s like, 1500 miles. It’s like, you know, it’s you.

I mean, if you put Argentina over Europe, you touch Morocco and Russia.

Yeah, this is big countries, yeah. So yeah. And to think that we have companies that have the economic power of hundreds of millions of people, and these, you know, they’re not like, these are major cities. I mean, Buenos Aires, 18 million people, skyscrapers all over the place. It’s not like, it’s a backward place. It’s just mind blowing the amount of wealth that is locked up in these companies that so they’re almost like state actors.

So, but where do you see this going to next, and how? How can you kind of level this thing up? Because the rate of climate change is is kind of ratcheting up. We’re not really knocking the emissions down sufficiently to kind of Ward this off. We got to do a lot more than whatever we’re doing great work thus far. No, no, not throwing any shade on you from your tree project.

But, you know, totally, yeah, no. And of course, we also absolutely need state actors to engage. And you know, it’s a little bit baffling what we’re seeing right now, right? With some countries, you know, the US exiting the Paris Agreement, right, and other countries really lagging behind on their commitments. But, you know, I believe that in the long term, the direction is clear towards the absolute necessity to act on climate change, and along the way, we are going to see, you know, pendulums right, and waves where sometimes the old thinking wants to, you know, grab hold to, you know, what they have, but inevitably, and especially new generations coming into influence and power, new generations who have a bigger stake on the future, because we are going to get to live on that future right in the 30s and 40s and 50s, where the worst of climate change is going to be seen.

But look, I think you know there are reasons to be pessimistic for sure. When you see, you know the continuation of the burning of fossil fuel, when you see the continuation of deforestation in so many parts of the world, and when you see again governments, you know saying, drill, baby, drill. In the other hand, the reason for optimism is the advancements in technology.

Again, I am a believer that technology, not always, but technology mindfully manage, can actually be a great force for good and a great force for advancing. You know, good causes such as solving climate change. And you know, we are seeing how solar today is actually cheaper than any other source of electricity, right? Batteries are becoming, you know, also more affordable and more resilient, more recyclable, more you know, powerful geothermal.

You know, wind and renewal energy is clean energy in general is becoming actually a lot more feasible than before. Nuclear, I think we see both fusion and fission are becoming safer and more available and EVs, China and of course, the US and Europe are making great progress on electric vehicles. Latin America is lagging behind electric vehicles. I would love to see a lot more EVs. A lot more EVs in Latin America, but so I think technology is advancing now.

AI can actually help us make scientific breakthroughs and technological breakthroughs, engineering breakthroughs that allow us to accelerate the technologies needed to arrive to a not a net zero economy, a zero carbon economy that is feasible within the next two decades, and in the meantime, I personally care a lot about nature, because nature is not just CO two.

Nature is life. Nature is the millions of species that have been inhabiting on this planet for this period of time that we need to protect. And we have to make sure that in these two to three decades of a transition that we can, you know, save all the nature we can, you know, we can, you know, give back ecosystems to the species that are endangered today, because everything is connected, right? Nature is we are part of nature, and if we destroy the substrate that we are part of. You know, we’re not going to be able to build a sustainable civilization.

Well, where do you see this going, as far as the satellite portion of what you do and and I know there’s a lot of other companies that are a lot of companies, other than Elon Musk Starlink, that are coming out there. Are you using star like now? Or using other services.

No. Starlink today is focused on internet, not on Earth observation. I don’t know if, in the future, they might, but today, you know, companies focus on Earth Observation are the likes of planet maxar And then, of course, NASA, the European Space Agency, the Japan space agency, they have been putting Earth observation satellites in orbit since the 70s, and a lot of the data is publicly available. That’s something that is amazing, not to be taken for granted.

So this is not easy to access, but is accessible by the public. And we’ve been using all those open source, you know, imagery and combining it with private data. For example, the International Space Station has a lidar device on it a program called July, and for the last four years, it’s been collecting basically a data set that reflects the height of the of. Land right, the height of the trees, the height of the mountains, right, because it literally is shooting a laser from the International Space Station and then back, getting the distance right.

So with that data set, we combine it with satellite data, we combine it with airborne lilac and we combine it with ground truth data, and with that, we are able to produce a machine learning model that predicts the carbon stock on the forest, and it’s actually really good at it.

And we’ve been measuring the uncertainty, the error of the prediction, because, like every prediction has an error, but our large landscape, the accuracy is actually pretty good, and that allows us to then automate the measurement of carbon for projects, the selection of land for projects.

And this is something that works for projects that are, you know, protecting nature for carbon credits, but it also works for governments that want to implement a, you know, large conservation at the jurisdictional level, and it works for agriculture if you want to transition to more Virginia agriculture. So we’re very excited about these models.

And to your initial question, there are more satellites and better sensors that are being launched by both private and public institutions that will allow us to, you know, continue understanding Earth in an incredible way.

Well, there’s a lot of questions that could come out of that. I would say. One of them is, can you, have you been able to, you know, measure what the rate of deforestation or reforestation effectively like globally?

Are we there yet, or are you really looking at a project by project basis, and then from there, can you determine, like, which projects are actually, you know, when you’re doing a carbon credits, which ones actually deserve carbon credits and which ones are not actually performing?

Yeah, so historically, we focus a lot more on projects and regions. Gradually, we’ve been expanding to have a global coverage. And for example, our canopy high map, or carbon stock map, has global coverage and allows us to measure carbon anywhere in the world. But for deforestation, there is an amazing project called the Global Forest Watch.

That’s a project that is managed by WRI, the World Resource Institute, and they’ve been monitoring and reporting on deforestation worldwide, is publicly accessible, and it’s a really great source of understanding of deforestation. Now we, too are measuring historical deforestation. We use that historical deforestation of a region to establish a baseline of business as usual, of what what is expected on a certain area, and with that, be able to predict into the future what might happen, and then allow to understand what is the additional carbon sequestration, the additional nature impact of An intervention today, right?

What happens if you really protect a belt of forest? What happens if you start the reforestation here? How that changes the trend of what was happening historically, and all that is done with AI, meaning that there isn’t a subjective bias, and that allows us to rapidly determine the additionality and the merit of these projects that we help.

So in terms of the carbon credit market, there’s been a lot of kind of criticism of the carbon credit market, and you know, projects that aren’t really that viable or that effective. What are your thoughts on, Has that improved because of the work that you’re doing and how

So, yeah, there’s definitely been lots of criticisms. And I would say that some criticisms are philosophical, and, you know, I understand where they come from, and there are some people who are never going to convene be convinced that this is a valid mechanism, and that’s fine. I’m okay with with not everybody you know, fully supporting this idea. I happen to believe that it’s a value mechanism today to drive funding in this emergency where we are losing millions of hectares of forest every day, and where we are losing the opportunity of, you know, restore forest if we don’t drive funding today.

So I think, you know, from a philosophical perspective, I think it’s a, it’s a pragmatic way to drive funding from the economy to the ecology, and to do it in a way that that causes an impact today. Now some people, the philosophical criticism is, well, you are giving a permit to pollute to the others, right? Well, it happens actually, when you look at the numbers that the companies that are the most investing in carbon credits to compensate the footprint are the ones that are investing the most on clean energy and EVS and transforming their operations to reduce their carbon emissions.

And then you have. Companies that just don’t care and don’t do anything, right? So it’s not that the ones that buy carbon credits then keep polluting or increase the pollution. That’s not the case right now. The other criticisms were more tactical and more implementation focused, and those we agree and we’ve been working very hard to address those issues, and those the criticism. There were things such as well, you know, people are taking these very arbitrary baselines, you know, someone is saying like, well, this forest was going to be completely gone. We’re saving it, and we’re getting all this money.

And the Pro and the forest maybe wasn’t really in danger. Maybe the people who own that forest wasn’t going to cut it down anyways, right? That has happened, unfortunately. And here is where having this satellite based approach, looking at an entire region, what is the practice of the region?

Is this an area where there is a lot of illegal deforestation, or where there is a lot of aggressive harvesting, either legal or illegal, and is the practice that is proposed really going to change the trajectory of the of the landscape. Now we can have these more objective answers to those questions and make sure that only the projects who deserve because they’re effectively increasing carbon sequestration get carbon credits.

Other issues you know, were things such as, you know, planting the wrong trees in the wrong place, right? Or people just, you know, planting a monoculture of eucalyptus in a semi deserted area, trees that they were going to cut down for timber in the future, and getting carbon credits for that, right? These things should happen, right?

So. And I think the fundamental problem was that 10-15, years ago, when this early market emerged, we just didn’t have the technologies to ensure good scrutiny, right? So people were designing the projects. There were methodologies, but they were designing the projects, taking a lot of you know, flexibility on their approaches, and then you send an auditor to the field to check a portion of the project. And that was good enough, right? Well, today you cannot get away so easily.

You know there are satellites that allows us to look at the history of a region, that allows us to look at the accounting of a project in detail, and that allows us to track the projects over time, and in doing so, really increase the quality, the transparency and the accountability of these projects, and that’s a process that’s been happening for the last five years.

I would say with it’s not just pachama, it’s many companies and NGOs and alliances of organizations that have been working really hard to raise the standard to make sure that the mistakes or the problems of the past don’t happen again, and that we can establish infrastructure for a market that can actually drive big volumes of money to projects that deserve it, and, you know, cause a real impact, both on carbon, on biodiversity and on, you know, the ecological and social impacts that we need to see on the ground.

As with any market in its infancy, there are going to be problems, and it’s being refined and great work to you to bring some degree of accountability to this. So there, there is a sense of, hey, if I’m contributing to this project, it’s actually going to do something positive.

So kudos to you and others like you are doing this work, because it is so important to have a functioning market, have a have trust in the in the process, so that I know, hey, if I said I was going to contribute x to, you know, Diego’s organization, it’s actually producing a result.

So so tell us a little bit about your you said you’re working with indigenous groups. How are you doing that? And how does that kind of fit into the puzzle of carbon credits and or just restoring nature?

Yeah, I mean indigenous communities, local communities in Latin America and around the world, you know, they are welcoming any tool that can help them, you know, protect their their environments, protect their the lands where they have lived for 1000s of years, right?

So there’s many indigenous communities that are designing either carbon projects or other types of projects that can help, you know, them, get the support, the funding, the attention to to to protect land, and we’re actually seeing it with great success in places like Brazil, in places like Colombia, in places like Costa Rica and so forth and so on.

Now I do want to mention that, you know, the tools and technologies that we build cannot help just through current credits projects. You know, there are other initiatives that are being pushed forward. Like for example, the European Union has a law to avoid deforestation on the products they buy. It’s called the EU deforestation regulation, and that means that companies that source projects from forest countries will need to monitor the supply chain to make sure that they’re not. Producing deforestation, right?

So, if you’re buying coffee in Europe, you want to make sure that that coffee is not coming from the forest in the Amazon and planting coffee, right? It’s coming from an area where there was already coffee, or where you were, you know, mixing coffee production with agroforestry and so again, satellite data and AI can help there.

Another approach is the idea of, in settings, companies that produce agricultural products in their supply chain, they can enhance the ecosystems where their products come right and again, satellite data and AI can help on that.

So I think at the end of the day, it’s about using all these frameworks and coming out with even new frameworks that allows us to incentivize and keep accountable to those who are the drivers of deforestation and those who have the power to enhance ecosystems because they have an influence on them.

Is there some kind of label that we could look at as consumers and say, Hey, this is reliable. I know you I see on products, say, free trade, or, you know, fair trade and stuff like this. And I’m like, okay, is this really reliable? To show that this company is getting sustainably sourced products?

Yeah, the Rainforest Alliance is an NGO that has been working on that for a long time. I think that they still have a long way to go, and that, you know, hopefully more products, you know, work with them. But yeah, they are one organization that is focusing on making sure that products are not destroying the rainforest. You know, for for timber, for wood, there is a FSC certification.

And again, those organizations can also benefit from these technologies. They must use them. And in fact, we are in conversations with both of them about how we can partner. Because ultimately, the only way to audit these is by observing from space in real time, what’s going on on the land, right on those supply chains.

So what excites you most about the role of technology and how it can play into our climate future.

Yeah. I mean, I think that AI one the most optimistic vision that I can come up with for AI is that AI becomes our partner on Earth, Guardian, guardianship, right? Ai, the way to think about it is, artificial intelligence is an extension of human intelligence. And human intelligence is an extension of nature, intelligence, of Earth, intelligence, right?

And if that is the case, then artificial intelligence is nature, intelligence, right? This nature intelligence now living on, on, you know, a computer substrate. And therefore the purpose of artificial intelligence is to protect the planet in which it exists and from which it comes from, right? So I imagine a future in which humans and AI work together to create civilization that is aligned with nature, that allows us to have sustainability for real, for the long term, and where we can, you know, then go on to explore the stars, right?

But once we have actually built a sustainable, regenerative civilization here, of course, that sounds, you know, optimistic science fiction, but, but we have to have these visions of how, you know, AI can be an ally and can be a tool for regeneration. I think it is possible.

I think it has to be built into the AI models that, hey, we want to have a sustainable future. Well, how do I get there? Because the only way we’re going to get to the stars, if is, if we create a world in which we are sustainable, because we’re going to blow the place up and there’s going to be no getting to the stars.

We don’t have the rights yet. We don’t have the right to explore the stars unless we have our home in order, right?

Yeah. You know, somebody posited on the show the other day with that, yeah, any civilization that would be capable of going and traveling to the stars has completely sustainable, no carbon footprint, you know, because that you’ve got to work that out because, and I think that that’s got to be the model is like, hey. And the problem is, it seems like some of the AI models are kind of agnostic to values or anything like that. How do you, how do you deal with that?

Look, everything is moving so fast on AI, and, you know, I think that, you know, every week you see new progress made, both on the capabilities of these models, but also on the, you know, alignment of these models. And yeah. I mean, we are in this moment of extreme uncertainty, right? Of course, you know, I paint and utopian scenario, there are dystopian scenarios right, in which AI destroys civilization, right?

And then there are intermediary bad scenarios where, you know, we we go through a transition period. Other where, where you know 10s of, you know, billions of people you know loses their jobs, and where society is really crumbling until we figure out a new stable state. But I think at the same time, you know, there has been cases in the past in which this deep transformation have worked out in a way that brought more prosperity and more, you know, progress for for society.

So we have to hope for the best. And again, this time, we have like this, this multiple crisis happening at the same time, right? Planetary boundaries being crossed, AI advancing full speed. And now the geopolitical order being, you know, dismantle, right?

So these three things are going to unfold during the next decade, and it’s going to be a period of high uncertainty, but at the same time, sometimes that’s the compost for what’s new for, you know, a new level of values and a new civilization that we know is needed.

Well, certainly, at the end of the day, we all have to live together, and we either destroy the planet kind of together, or we save it together. There’s a two option. It’s kind of binary, you know, it’s not like China saves it and we destroy it like it’s it’s gone.

So now more than ever, we are one system, deeply interconnected. And as you said, you know there’s, there’s no way around that, a collective unfolding. And as I said, I think that from a spiritual perspective, sometimes I like to think in terms of cycles, right?

You know, indigenous ancient wisdoms, and you know oriental ancient wisdoms, always thinking in terms of cycles, right, rather than linear timelines, and we are in a turning of a cycle right, both at, you know, real level and at the spiritual level. And we have to hope that the new cycle that is being born, you know, happens smoothly and in the right direction.

Well, tell us what are some of the most unexpected changes you faced in your work with pachama,

I mean, definitely starting a venture, starting any type of project is, is a roller coaster, is a challenge to your ability to adapt and and, you know, in our case, in particular, you know, there was a time In which we got a lot of momentum and support. We were able to raise a lot of money from amazing investors, and we took advantage of that to really expand and grow and grow our capabilities.

And it was a time also in which there was a lot of momentum around, you know, corporations acting on climate right now, more recently, that has changed right and now you know, there is more economic uncertainty, and there is also an incentive for companies to actually stay quiet about what they’re doing related to climate and sustainability, what some people call green hashing, right?

Companies are not talking too much about their environmental actions because they fear criticism right from either side of the political spectrum, crazy enough, and definitely also investments into environmental or climate tech companies has gone down in in the last two years. So for us, it’s been a time to adapt, a time to attempt to become more efficient and more focused.

Right? There was a time in which we were flaring exploring a lot of different directions of how we could help, you know, unlock this market. And now it’s a time in which we’re focusing and, you know, trying to understand, what is it that we can be the best in the world at? How can we double down on that and then go and try to help as much as we can with that core competency?

And that also might mean that the team is going to stay, you know, as small as possible, right for now, but we can try to do a lot more with less, and go through, you know, a winter time, because there’s always a spring time in the other side. And I think startups are like that. You need to you need to adapt. You need to be very attuned to your environment. You need to focus, and you need to have a North Star, right?

That for us has been so valuable to have a clear purpose, a clear mission, and clear values as well from day one, that allows us to, you know, keep going in the face of any type of obstacles.

In a way you’ve talked about being in the area of missionaries, not tourists and climate. What do you mean by that?

Well, you know, like everything, sometimes things get, you know, into fashion. And there was a time in which climate tech became fashionable in Silicon Valley. And you know what that meant is that a lot of people who weren’t truly, you know, committed to this came and either, you know, said, Yeah, we’re going to invest in climate tech startups, or we’re going to start climate tech startups, or we’re going to join climate tech startups, right?

So investors or entrepreneurs or or employees. And as the winds change in the last two years, we saw a lot of that people leaving, you know, unfortunately, and that’s fine, you know, because at the end of the day. Okay, there is a core of missionaries, of people who truly have decided to dedicate the life to this mission. And we’re here, and we’re going to be here for the decades to come, working in different ways into unlocking this mission.

But I think it’s the nature of, you know, the nature of humans, and it’s going to happen in the future again, there’s going to be another moment in which climate tech becomes sexy in Silicon Valley again, and we’re gonna see tourists coming again and then going again. But, but, you know, that’s that’s good. We take that, by the way, when, when they come, investors and people who want to work on these companies, we will accept you always.

Yeah, it’s always hard to know who’s going to be the missionary or who’s gonna feed the tourists.

It might happen in every in every industry, in every sector, right, right?

Yeah, people come in on an interview and say, God, I believe in this all the way, and then they’re gone in six months. So, like, you just kind of don’t know how it’s gonna play out in real time.

I do hope that there is going to be a moment in which working with a purpose, and you know, it’s basically a given right, where people don’t want, don’t want to work on anything that doesn’t have a purpose. And I think you’re you see it with young people.

You see with millennials and X generation, they don’t want to work for companies that are damaging the planet. They don’t want to work for companies don’t have a good purpose, right? So I think at some point that’ll be, you’ll be great that that becomes, you know, table stakes, right?

And I think it requires, kind of us, creating opportunities for them, because sometimes they go just, they, they have to put food on the table. So they go with XYZ company.

So, you know, having more opportunities for them to be able to contribute their time and talents into something meaningful is super important. But what’s your message to environmentalists who care deeply about climate but feel overwhelmed or powerless?

Yeah, I mean, I feel overwhelmed and powerless sometimes as well, right? So I mean that is part of being human and being in the arena of working on this super difficult missions. My message is, take care of yourself, right? What I do sometimes is I would do a mini retreat for myself with support of my wife. You know, I would go and rent an Airbnb and do kind of like a meditation retreat by myself. Sometimes I would do a meditation retreat in a in some monastery or some, you know, meditation center.

But sometimes it’s just, you know, going and taking a weekend away from your phone, away from the news, and just to go deep inside yourself, meditate, be in nature. Do whatever you know, brings you back to your soul, brings you back to your place of inner peace. And then, on a daily basis, you know, to me, is meditation.

For other people, might be yoga, might be running, might be something else, but, but taking care of your body, taking care of your mind, taking care of your soul. I think, are fundamental for those who are working on the world. And then finally, and this also, from, you know, kind of like a spiritual perspective, not getting attached to the result of the work, like the Bhagavad Gita says, right?

You are entitled to your effort, and that’s what it’s about, to doing your duty. And that’s that’s enough, right? And then what happens will happen, and you cannot get too attached to the results and the outcomes.

Well, brilliant wisdom, along with great science. Thank you so much for being on the program, Diego. You know, I relate to a lot of what you said. I studied the Tao Te Ching a bit. And that’s kind of a similar line from them is, hey, you just do the work and let go of the results align with the doll. Yeah. So with that, we will break and do do what we can.

And that’s, I think, called the call to action. What you had said before is like, do something that best way to kind of shift one’s mood is to get into action too, to a take some some even minor step, and that’ll lead to the next step.

And sometimes have to remind myself of that simple truth repeatedly so and then another one is fine community, right? Again, the Sangha, right? Fine community of people who care, of people who you can talk about this will, of people who you can collaborate with.

I think that you know it’s important. And you know, in general, intensive crisis, building communities of trust and love is super important. So don’t, don’t isolate and find, find your community.

Excellent advice. Well, thank you again for being on the show, founder of patch, everybody check out Diego’s website at Pacha MA and contribute to it. Get involved, and let’s keep moving forward. So have a great day, everybody.

Thank you, Matt, for your great podcast.

Thank you.

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