December: The month of generosity

Summary

That's it. A year of challenges attempted. Some acheived, some failed, some tasks floating midway along that continuum! We have learned a great deal about our own resilience, about how our motivation levels fluctuate with tiredness, about what is reasonable and feasible in the Western society and how far the system must shift for us to live within the bounds of Earth. There is no better time for reflecting than right now so... below are our take homes, to dos, top tips, and extra thoughts on a year of trying to live green.

THANK YOU FOR READING AND JOINING OUR JOURNEY!

Take homes

The way I see it, we live in a collection of systems:

our social system tends to dictate what is acceptible to friends and neighbours,
our infrastructural system enables certain options,
our economic system tracks the flow of wealth across social systems and infrastructures,
our agricultural system provisions for us differently depending on social and infrastructural set ups, and so on ...
but all of us, and all these systems, have to fit, ultimately, within the Earth's ecological system.

We have decoupled our actions from the latter. Now, our infrastructure restricts most of us from fitting into the ecological system of the planet. Our social systems have lost connection with ecology enabling, and worse - encouraging, us to live expensively without any social or economic cost. We make financial return the greatest target and this encourages corners to be cut.

There are ways to realign. Cooperatives exist that set out to protect people and environment and encourage equity. How we switch the majority of us to these systems is an enormous challenge.

There is also a huge amount of misinformation around and it is hard to pick through these resources to try to determine where truth and justice rest. In an age of anecdotes and single sentence take homes... the depth of knowledge and action required to shift our human societies to lifestyles that entitle environmental harmony is sadly missing from governments and decisions makers.

Yet, there are many people around with great intentions and inspiring ideas. We can constantly learn from these groups and adopt all sorts of good habits that can shift us ever closer to equity and environmental care.

To dos

Get ourselves educated:

Understand the cost of living as we do.
Support the increasing social movements for change.
Inspire others to reduce consumption, reuse everything, and recycle more.
Take responsibility. We all belong to Earth, we have to protect her.
Be humble - instead of figuring out what we can get from any situation, witness how a system moves in our absence, then try and fit in the best we can in the most harmonious way.

Hold ourselves to account:

If legislation is not enforcing us to act in the best interests of ecological systems, then we can at least hold ourselves to a standard. Take responsibility for our actions and make every effort to minimise our personal footprints.
Inspire others to reduce consumption, reuse everything, and recycle more.

Keep fighting for change.

Don't lose hope, it is hard sometimes to stay optimistic about our future when everything feels out of our control... but without us lot trying, there really is no hope... so hold on and remember that there are millions of people on Earth trying to reach the same end game, holding similar ethics to me as I write this and you as you read... so stay together in hope!

Get the easier stuff done - shift any capital away from any bank or business that invests in fossil fuels.

Top tips

Don't be too harsh on anyone - it is bloody hard to stay green when so many other demands are resting on our shoulders. Remember that every little helps and that most of us have good intentions.

Pick the route that brings more people along for the journey. It seems to me that when we aim for equity, we also achieve harmonious solutions for the planet. Everything is connected, so the more of us with environmental care at the heart of our actions the better.

Look at what others are doing and you will quickly realise that there are millions of people teaming up for this next decade, fighting for our planet to regain health.

Be inspired to do more, and go gentle on yourselves

Out of our hands

A horribly large amount of the change that I have come to realise is needed for planet Earth to be healthy is out of our hands. This is a demoralising feeling. Advocacy and collective efforts are our great hopes ... good luck everyone and please keep letting me know of things we can do and I can add them to the links tab!

January: The month without chocolate

Summary

Oof! For everyone who managed a month without chocolate - congratulations! We accrued 2 fines, one because of rogue chocolate in a shop-bought muffin. The second offence was due to cocao powder that my partner used in a yummy banana cake we enjoyed before remembering that this counts as chocolate..! $100 AUD to Rainforest 4 Foundation.

Below we summarise what we learned this month - see you in Feb!

January: The month without chocolate

Summary

Below we summarise what we learned this month - see you in Feb!

January: The month without chocolate

Summary

Below we summarise what we learned this month - see you in Feb!

December - The Month of Generosity

So much evidence is building to indicate that we all benefit from doing kind things. December is our month of charitable deeds. This is a chance to be generous! None of the actions need to be noteworthy, just aim to, everyday, do something kind. Some ideas include litter picking, complements, cook a meal or cake for the family or friends, leave a happy message, write a friend a letter, clean up for your loved ones, give someone a cuddle, feed the birds some seeds, say hello to people you pass, thank someone who has helped you, teach, tell a silly joke, pick up a worm from the pavement and pop it back into some soil. There is no limit, but it leaves the world a better energy so... no reason not to join this month!