Green has joined the main stream. One can hardly escape from hearing about some way we can help save the planet from impending doom, whether it is heard at an event, on television, at school, in the paper…wherever. Mostly, we get a lot of “change your light bulbs to
CFL’s,” “inflate your tires,” “recycle,” “drive less,” and the like. These are all wonderful suggestions and everyone should do them, but is there more we can do? Are we just dabbling at the surface of sustainable living? And is it asking too much to do more? (If we’re talking about impeding doom…I don’t think most things would be too much to ask.)
I know that it is very hard to change habits and mindsets that we may have carried with us from generation to generation (though not too far back in some cases). We’re used to eating strawberries in the winter if we wish it (regardless of the gas used and carbon emitted to travel from some warm country to our cold state). We use vast amounts of water to grow green squares of lawn even though we’re in the dessert (high though it may be), are in a drought, and are scarce on water – a most precious resource! (Yes I have a patch of grass as well – I told you the mind is hard to change!)
The point is, these little things like recycling and such are small, and yet, many people have a hard enough time just changing out their light bulbs; so how can we ask for even more? Or more precisely, how can we ignite the change in people to do the smaller things AND the bigger ones?
So, what are you doing to reduce your ecological footprint (I want the “small” and the big)? What has worked for you in encouraging others to make more
eco-conscious choices? What can we do in our own hometowns – what services can we provide? And last, what more can we ask of ourselves?
Join the discussion and spread the word!
