Note: This blog post is a sponsored conversation written by Lynn Smythe, the Founder and Chief Blogger for The Creative Cottage lifestyle blog. The opinions, thoughts, ideas and text are all mine.
It sounds like a trendy thing to go green these days, but it’s not a trend – it’s a must. We need a healthy, happy planet and a working ecosystem for our own survival. Going green is everywhere; fashion, politics and technology are all working to find ways to be more eco-friendly, so why not introduce this into your home?
It can be easy to be caught up in all the green chat, and it’s a good thing. If you are learning about being more green is going to improve how many single-use plastics you use or help you to turn down the thermostat, it can only be a good thing. You can even invest in solar power and run your home for free by harnessing the power of the sun.
It’s easy to get overwhelmed when you consider how you can make changes to your own personal life to embrace a greener lifestyle, and it can be helpful to understand the bigger picture going forward. Globalization makes the world smaller, which makes it much easier to see how people are living and how the ecosystem matters. It’s also easy to see that the greenhouse gas emissions in Australia can have an effect on the forests in Brazil and how the manufacturing in China makes European life a little harder.
All countries have an impact on other neighboring countries and until we all recognize this, nothing is going to change with the environment. Embracing a greener lifestyle isn’t just about saving the rainforests – though that’s a good idea. It’s about improving your home life to improve your health. It’s about improving the way you wash your clothes so that you aren’t putting chemical-filled water back into the sewer systems.
Treating the Earth a little better isn’t always easy, and it can even be expensive sometimes. But being active in your efforts to do more and be more eco-friendly is important and you could be saving your life as well as the lives of tons of animals. Don’t give up in your efforts because every single piece of effort helps the wider environment. Being an Earth warrior is not always cheap, but it’s easy, so let’s take a look at how you can help:
Refuse To Use More
Reduce, reuse, recycle – right? No. there’s one missing – REFUSE. Refuse to use more than you need. Refuse to use the plastic bags at the store and bring your own material ones. Refuse to accept plastic freebies like pens and refuse to accept flyers. Say no and skip to using the things that you have, and you’ll be able to reduce your waste over time and thus have less of a carbon footprint.
Put Away The Car
You drive to work. It’s a ten minute drive and it’s guzzling gas every day, twenty minutes a day. Instead, stretch that commute to half an hour and walk the same route you drive. Or, failing that, invest in a bike and a helmet and make it an exercise. You can up your fitness and get to work on time while also reducing your emissions and your environmental impact.
Go Back To Reusing
It’s so easy to reach for the plastic wrap when you have leftover food, but you don’t have to. Instead, get some Tupperware boxes and store leftover food properly. You can reuse these containers and wash them after you’re done. You can also start using reusable coffee mugs and water bottles to stop using single-use plastics that have no benefit to the environment whatsoever. Keep linen bags in the trunk of the car, too, so that they’re easy to grab when you’re out shopping each day. There’s no need to waste plastic bags if you have the right ones to hand.
Reduce Water Use
A bubble bath is a wonderful thing, but a bubble bath every single day is a lot of wastewater let down the drain. Instead, go for a short shower with a low-flow showerhead. A power shower may feel nice, but it’s wasting a lot of water than you don’t need. You could even swap your dishwasher and your washing machine to models that use less water, too. For the washing machine, only run a small load at a time and keep it on cold – there’s no need for a hot wash unless there are some serious stains.
Go Veggie (Even A Little Bit!)
Meat has a rather big impact on the environment, and if you swap out two of your weekly meals for options that are purely vegetarian, you’re going to make a big difference to the world around you. You don’t have to go completely vegan or vegetarian to witness the benefits on your health as well as the world, but even the smallest change can make the most significant difference.
Shop Smartly
When it comes to being eco-friendly, we go back to the basics of recycling. You can buy items second hand and make a huge difference to the world around you. There are so many things that get taken to charity shops that can be bought rather than buying entirely brand new!
Reduce Paper
A lot of parents are switching from using baby wipes to using reusable wipes like these, and this can be applied to toilet roll and kitchen towels, too. There’s no need to use disposable options aside for convenience, so be a little inconvenient and use the washable stuff instead. It makes a big difference to the planet.
Switch It Off
It’s the easiest of all the concepts to go green: if you’re not using it, switch it off. Lights, lamps, games, TV – if there is no need for it, they don’t need to be on. The amount of electricity that you consume by leaving things on standby is staggering, so don’t leave it to chance. Turn it all off and bask in the budget electricity bill you have next time.
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