Are You Doing Your Part for a Greener Future?

Posted by K-M. Denyse Jones on March 17th, 2020

The state of our planet should be of some concern to everyone.  

Our very existence, present and future, depends on the Earth. 

To make a better future reality, humans must choose common-sense conservation and good stewardship. 

Going greener presents the best path to ensure future prosperity.  

Why Greener Living Gives the Solution for a Greener Future

Take a moment to think about all the things we get from our planet. 

Now ask yourself, “What would I do it resources got scarce?”

Amazon can’t deliver us air, water, food, or fuel from a neighboring planet. 

Moreover, we can’t just pick up and move to the next heavenly body if conditions here become intolerable. 

We all live with a simple truth . . . many of the resources we consume daily exist in fixed quantities.

Once depleted, we won’t see them again in our lifetimes or even our children’s or grandchildren’s lifetimes. 

Moreover, plenty of our modern activities also produce pollution. 

This pollution impacts the quality of many of the precious natural resources we have at our disposal. 

By conserving what we have today, we can help to deal with both these dilemmas as we seek additional solutions to move forward to a greener future.

Start Greening Today for a Greener Future

Every journey starts with one, first step. 

On a journey to a greener future, that first step is the commitment to greater awareness and implementation of sustainable practices.

So, start with investigating what you should do to become greener at home.

You’ll get some general tips a little later in this post.

Once you feel comfortable with greening at home, you can stretch your learning to focus on environmental sustainability in the workplace.

Next, learn to set yourself up for sustainability success.

People always tend to make excuses for things they feel pose a challenge or take too much time.

Planning and staying organized can help to squash the tendency to delay your transition to green.

Go ahead and schedule time on your calendar to gather the items you may need to make the transition.

Find and designate locations in your home to keep things like bins, bulbs, filters, etc.

If you feel the need to go above and beyond, start a saving plan to purchase those higher ticket eco-friendly items.

Additionally, devise a system to track the changes you make and the money savings you’ll garner throughout the journey.

Seeing your success can serve as a great motivator to keep going.

Completing these tasks first will help to keep overwhelming feelings at bay and boost the chances of getting you to your desired sustainability end goal.

Simple Actions to a Greener Future

Now that you have made your commitment to greener living and done a little planning, the time has come to act.

You don’t have to go after the more expensive or time-consuming opportunities to begin.

Numerous opportunities exist for you to live a greener life right now without too much effort or additional spending.

Implementing simple actions and scaling to more involved activities over time will get you successfully to increased sustainability.

So, what actions should you consider:

• Recycle as much paper, plastics, cardboard, and tin as you can through your municipality’s recycling program, if it has one.

• Turning off lights, computers, monitors, televisions, and other electronic devices when not in use.  Remember, devices still consume electricity when in sleep mode.

• Set the thermostat at 72° F in the winter and 76° F in the summer.

• Repair any water leaks around your home.

• Take shorter showers.

• Turn off the water while lathering hands during washing and when brushing teeth.

• Water the lawn only once per week during the early morning or evening.

• Wash full loads of dishes in the dishwasher instead of hand washing when feasible.

• Leave grass clippings on the lawn to reduce waste.

• Filter water at home and use reusable bottles instead of buying bottled water. 

• Walk, bike, carpool, or use mass transit for transportation whenever possible.

• Reuse goods and reduce product consumption where you can.  

• Buy local and post-consumer recycled products.

Once these behaviors become second-nature, you can incorporate additional tasks like replacing existing appliances and fixtures with high-efficiency alternatives.

Looking further into the future, you could choose to install roof solar panels, to purchase an electric vehicle, and/or replace existing windows with high-efficiency ones.

Final Thoughts

Getting started toward a sustainable, greener future is one of the best gifts we can leave to those who come after us.

Even though it will signal a change for most people, it does not have to cause feelings of fear or overwhelm.

Taking the simple approaches discussed above to start will compound over time into positive impacts for our planet. 

So, what are you waiting for?