Whether you're into the green movement or not, you've undoubtedly heard the word green far more than you ever thought you would. You don't have to be a card carrying member of the Green Society to want to make a change or two for the better. You don't have to believe there is anything wrong in the world to want to be less invasive on the world around you. Sometimes, without having to chase down a cause, you can do something new, something simple, simply because it makes sense.
We can agree doing good, feels good, it can impact our lives and the ones we touch in a positive manner. Too, trying to do every thing at once, to become carbon footprint free could burn you out quicker than a roadside flare. Here are simple and often free things we can do.
Much of daily lives are surrounded by technological advances that made aspects of life easier. Think about the napkin. A simple, mass produced paper product that made take-away food much, much easier. Paper towels? So very convenient. Now we realize how much wood is required to make our throw away face wiping products. At our home, we gone back to tea towels. We throw them in with laundry we would be doing anyway and we're reusing towel. As a special bonus, cloth is so much nicer on my baby fresh face!
Get back into local foods. Often you'll find these are all natural and/or organic foods. I've found some people recoil from these terms, as if I'm trying to convert them into something uncivilized. Some people think this means they'll be wearing linen tunics, leather sandals made from the carcass of animals that have died from natural causes, certified of course, banned from razors and forced to change their names to something akin to Wandering River Love, or something of the sort. There are growing studies on the benefits of all natural/organic foods for both the environment and ones own health but you don't need to switch for these environmentalists. Switch for yourself. You'll most often be supporting local businesses, that's good for your community. Too, you find food has something called, FLAVOR. Yea, this is so good, the foods are better tasting from meats, to vegetables to fruits, they taste good!
Ditch the plastic water bottles. I know, they're so flippin' convenient: They are! I still grab one on occasion when I'm out and I need water and I've forgotten mine. Remember, I said this is the easy tip article, the no guilt, the realistic. There are new studies on BPAs, bad chemical stuff emitted from certain plastics. Nalgene, you can find them at their name DOT COM, is now making BPA free bottles. You can check them out. There are metal bottles, often completely recyclable. Glass bottles are making a surge too. You can check out LoveBottleDOTnet (I'm typing these web addy's because the article companies don't like a lot of links in the articles, so, I'm trying to give you the resource and comply to guidelines). If you get a decent filtration system at home, Brita and PUR are two that are out there. You can use tap water with an added filter. There are new studies claiming tap water is often better for you than bottled water because municipal water districts aregoverned by the EPA having to test many times daily and water bottle companies are governed by the FDA only required to test once a week and are not held to as strict of standards. So, long and the short of it, tap water is better! Crazy but, okay.
Reduce the amount of packaging and or wrapping you're using. Opt to buy boxed laundry detergent instead of plastic bottled detergent. Decline to have things bagged by the grocer when you can easily carry out the good/goods. Simple, quick and easy something you can do and feel good about it.
I'm fairly certain, second to the mortgage and or rent payment for most of us, our utilities are the next largest house bill. For this reason, my personal interest, I looked into changing all my lights to the CFL style bulbs and I hooked my televisions and computers up to power strips. Long story short, by doing just these two things and actually shutting off my appliances at the power strip, I cut my electric bill in HALF! Do it, you'll love the savings.
Here's one I love, it's easy, easy! If you're a social network user, specifically Facebook and Bebo, they have an application you can use. It's free. It's called, Lil Green Patch. All you do is click it, daily, and click your friends' names in your group and send them a virtual flower. For every 10 you send, the advertisers of the site, save 1-sq foot of rain forest. They cap how many people you can send to each day, but hey, I'm at 20 people a day. So, every day, I send 20 people a virtual flower and I'm saving 2-sq feet a day of rain forest. It's quick, it's free and it's something simple you can do to help. Your friends don't have to send one back nor do they even have to click to accept your flower for their virtual garden, you simply have to send 'em.
According to the ACEEE, the greenest car in the US, for the 6th straight year is the Honda Civic.
Wanna help shoe children in other countries, check out Toms Shoes DOT com.
Check out Green Is Sexy DOT org for a bunch of commentary on green and whatnot. As a bonus, you'll learn it was founded by Rachel McAdams, an actress.
Sometimes doing good for goodness sake is rewarding. I hope the tips and ideas here are easy and worthy of your consideration.
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