I have a series of radio stations I listen to during the day depending on my mood. Today I listened to my favourite French station which is a little crazy and different. The station is great, except that they talk quite a bit, about random nonsense generally, but just now she mentioned a new website that sounded intriguing so I checked it out.

It is called ‘suis je normal’, ‘am I normal’ and is all in French (sorry). Basically the idea is that people write up something that they do or think and other visitors to the site can vote as to whether they think that is normal, kind of normal, not sure, kind of not normal or definitely not normal. For example one person said “I need a minimum dose of music every day. Without it my day becomes sad” 86% said this was normal. Another writes “ I’m a fan of Celine Dion. Am I normal?” 93% said that this was not normal.

I did a quick search to see if anyone had written “I see sustainability opportunities everyday, all the time in everything I hear, read, see, do etc.” I suspect I would get quite a few definitely not normals if/when I put it up. But who wants to be normal. Isn’t it better to be a little different? The companies, products, schools, entrepreneurs, CEOs that you remember, that you admire, that you respect, that are leading the way in sustainability, would you vote them normal?

At the same time, people like normal, they identify with normal, so you need to be different, but in a way that is close enough to normal to be accepted and to be understood. I love using Interface as an example. They make carpets, which is very normal, but what they do with carpets is definitely not normal.

Well, if you see my statement on the site, please do vote ‘normal’.