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Totems

Exploring the idea of businesses giving back to the non-humans they use or impact through totemism

Totems

Exploring the idea of businesses giving back to the non-humans they use or impact through totemism

About

Should industries create non-human personas for their collective resources, and be guided by the traditional wisdom of totemism, to deepen the relationships between humans and the world?

Totems ↗ represent non-human entities like natural objects, plants, animals, spirit beings, or the weather.

The word totem is actually an anglicisation ↗ of the Ojibwe ↗ word for clan (doodem).

How might we evolve the use of non-human personas in the design and business world by learning from the traditional and ecological wisdom of totemism and commons?

This page further explores the concept introduced in this Medium article ↗ by creating a web page for lifecentred.design’s membership to a totem collective.

Links

Our Totem Collective

Our non-human totem

Our printed books use paper which draw from Trees and Forests.

Our totem commitments

  • Reduce impact by using print-on-demand instead of pre-printing mass amounts
  • Regenerate by donating to onetreeplanted.org who plant trees on our behalf
  • Inform users of our books about how to make their book last longer and how to keep their books circular when they are finished with them

Collective members

Get the guide book

Learn more
A document called 'Non-human and non-use personas'

Get non-human persona templates

Subscribe to download

A document called 'How to nudge users to choose planet-friendlier options'

Subscribe to download

Get the guide book

Learn more
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We use eco-friendly web hosting

For every amperage this site pulls from the grid, GreenGeeks web hosting returns 3 times as much renewable energy to the grid—learn about green hosting.

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Damien Lutz, author of The Non-human Persona Guide, The Life-centred Design Guide, and Future Scouting

We replenish what we use

A percentage of profits from design guides by Damien Lutz are donated to onetreeplanted.org to replace the trees used to create the books

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Lifecentred.design aims to be low carbon, inclusive, and regenerative

This site's hosting is green

This website runs on green hosting - verified by thegreenwebfoundation.org
Energy used by the web hosting servers is offset by 3 times as much renewable energy returned to the grid

We're planting trees!
The number in the site's top bar shows how many we've planted

To regenerate trees used to make our books, we donate a percentage of printed book sales to onetreeplanted.org

Page CO2 emissions
Shown for high-traffic pages only

Sustainable web strategies are used to reduce page load emissions.
The current industry standard is 0.8g/page view—all lifecentred.design pages aim to be less than the standard.

Page accessibility rating
Shown for high-traffic pages only

Pages are designed for accessible use and rated out of 100

More about our commitments

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Lifecentred.design aims to be low carbon, inclusive, and regenerative

This site's hosting is green

This website runs on green hosting - verified by thegreenwebfoundation.org
Energy used by the web hosting servers is offset by 3 times as much renewable energy returned to the grid

We're planting trees!
The number in the site's top bar shows how many we've planted

To regenerate trees used to make our books, we donate a percentage of printed book sales to onetreeplanted.org

Page CO2 emissions
Shown for high-traffic pages only

Sustainable web strategies are used to reduce page load emissions.
The current industry standard is 0.8g/page view—all lifecentred.design pages aim to be less than the standard

Page accessibility rating
Shown for high-traffic pages only

Pages are designed for accessible use and rated out of 100

More about our commitments

This will close in 0 seconds

Lifecentred.design aims to be low carbon, inclusive, and regenerative

This site's hosting is green

This website runs on green hosting - verified by thegreenwebfoundation.org
Energy used by the web hosting servers is offset by 3 times as much renewable energy returned to the grid

We're planting trees!
The number in the site's top bar shows how many we've planted

To regenerate trees used to make our books, we donate a percentage of printed book sales to onetreeplanted.org

Page CO2 emissions
Shown for high-traffic pages only

Sustainable web strategies are used to reduce page load emissions.
The current industry standard is 0.8g/page view—all lifecentred.design pages aim to be less than the standard

Page accessibility rating
Shown for high-traffic pages only

Pages are designed for accessible use and rated out of 100

More about our commitments

This will close in 0 seconds

Lifecentred.design aims to be low carbon, inclusive, and regenerative

This site's hosting is green

This website runs on green hosting - verified by thegreenwebfoundation.org
Energy used by the web hosting servers is offset by 3 times as much renewable energy returned to the grid

We're planting trees!
The number in the site's top bar shows how many we've planted

To regenerate trees used to make our books, we donate a percentage of printed book sales to onetreeplanted.org

Page CO2 emissions
Shown for high-traffic pages only

Sustainable web strategies are used to reduce page load emissions.
The current industry standard is 0.8g/page view—all lifecentred.design pages aim to be less than the standard

Page accessibility rating
Shown for high-traffic pages only

Pages are designed for accessible use and rated out of 100

More about our commitments

This will close in 0 seconds

I am the voice of the trees who were taken to make the product I speak from.

We, the trees, gave shade, clean air, homes for countless creatures, and the gift of oxygen for you to breathe. We cooled the earth, held the soil, and stored the carbon that would have otherwise harmed you.

Now, as a user of this product, you are part of this legacy, and a custodian of the things we once were. 

I ask you to honor the role we played for your planet. Where we are taken, help new trees rise, and protect those who still stand tall. Nurture them as they nurture you, for your future is rooted in our regeneration.

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