Wasteless Planet is one year old today! Hooray! It doesn’t feel like a whole year has passed already, but the calendar firmly states that the first ever post on this website was on August 2018. If there’s anything that a year of Wasteless Planet has shown, is that an eco-friendly lifestyle is a journey. You keep taking steps, making changes, adjusting routines and learning new ways to be more sustainable. And every bit helps. Let me tell you how founding Wasteless Planet has changed my life for the greener.
In giving you tips and advice about how to live an eco-friendly life, I noticed it helped me too. Even though I’ve had many sustainable routines in my life already, for years even, writing these blogs taught me how to go greener still. That’s why I always say an eco-friendly lifestyle is a journey. You won’t be zero waste overnight, you won’t have your ecological footprint cut in half in a few weeks, it takes time. And learning. And adapting. I’m nowhere near zero waste yet. My journey isn’t done and I keep making small changes every month to live an even more eco-friendly life.
You made me more conscious
Doing research for Wasteless Planet, finding tips and inspiration around the world and writing blog posts to share the eco-friendly lifestyle with you, has made me more conscious of my own life. As a result, me and my husband started examining our own automatic daily choices and routines again.
And boy, could we do a lot better still. So we implement small changes every time we get the opportunity. Like when we need new laundry detergent. We already used non-toxic, all natural, organic cleaning products. But now we buy in bulk: less packaging, less transport movements.
Wasteless Planet is my baby. My one year old baby, yay!
But anyway. Wasteless Planet and living an eco-friendly life is my thing. Always has been. And I tried hard not to push my love to join me. Of course, I make suggestions or ask why the lights need to be on in rooms he no longer sits. But in 30 years I tried to let him live his own lifestyle, not mine. And yet, he kept changing too. He became more and more conscious about the consequences of our way of life, of our choices. And he started making sustainable choices too. Oh happy me.
My husband made a list
It was my husband who told me how we changed our routines since I started Wasteless Planet. And how we are still adjusting, simply because of this website, this blog. He grabbed a piece of paper and wrote down the first things that came to mind. Here are the things my husband noticed that have changed over the past twelve months:
- he’s stepping out into the garden every day to throw kitchen scraps onto the compost pile
- he noticed the new cotton swaps had wooden sticks instead of plastic ones
- he found himself startled by the amount of plastic everywhere once he started noticing it
- his shopping changed as he stopped buying groceries packed in lots of plastic
- he hears himself discussing the crazy amount of plastic wraps for individually packed candy
- he started rethinking his work processes to rid them of toxic materials
- he helps me soak and wash my reusable period pads on time
- he buys less dairy products
- he makes more sustainable choices when he needs to replace something
When he put it like that, I thought: wow, it adds up. So I traced back my steps and found that I needed new sponges to clean the kitchen and bought compostable ones this time. That I needed new laundry pins, because after 25 years my plastic ones were breaking into small pieces, and replaced them with wooden ones. That I bought new cleaning cloths that promise I don’t need cleaning products to get rid of dirt (haven’t gotten around to use them yet, but will let you know if they perform well). That I started using a shampoo bar, to reduce my waste.
That I have a compost bin in my garden now and hope to have home made fertilizer next spring. That I’m still finishing up piles of the old products that I bought in bulk, but that I’m already thinking about more sustainable replacement when the time comes. That I’m sharing things and tips on social media about things I’ve done for years, but never thought to teach others. That I’m trying new things and products so that I can make reviews and tell you about my experiences. That I replaced my recycled toilet paper with bamboo toilet paper.
Tell me about your journey
Helping you make sustainable choices, put us back on track too. It reminded us that an eco-friendly lifestyle is a journey for sure and we need to keep paying attention and improving. We don’t pretend to be perfect. Heck, we don’t even want to be. That would be exhausting. We just want thousands of us to imperfectly work on greening up our lives. Because, all actions matter. Not plans, not ideas, but actions. However small they may be. Because, it adds up.
What changes have you made in your life to fit your eco-friendly lifestyle? Leave me a comment below and tell me about the steps you’re taking. I’m proud of you already for choosing an eco-friendly lifestyle. Welcome to the community!
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