Everyone wants to be happy. Growing up, that was always my goal in life. If at 90-something years old I can say I lived a long, happy life then I have succeeded in all the ways I want to succeed. Happiness means something different to everyone, but for me it means finding true love, having a family, finding moderate success in my career, generally being a good person, and living a life filled with fun and laughter. I feel like I'm a generally happy person, largely because I'm grateful for very basic things. Am I alive? Yep. Cool, I'm happy about that. That said, I'm always looking for ways to improve my happiness. I was pretty shocked recently when I came across a study by Tetra Pak that found that those that make renewable, sustainable, eco-friendly choices find happiness from those choices. After thinking about it for a few minutes I realized it wasn't all that shocking. Humans find great happiness from doing good things for others. Why wouldn't we find that same happiness doing good things for our planet?
In that spirit I wanted to share four easy ways to live a more renewable life. These tips are seriously easy to implement, will do some good for our planet, and will bring you a little happiness along the way!
1. Walk more
I am constantly in a car driving somewhere. Omaha is known as the 20-minute city. Whether it's to work, out running errands, or to catch up with friends, it will take you just 20 minutes to get anywhere, but that's when you're in a car. That said, I live downtown so I can definitely prioritize walking to the local events, restaurants, and stores by me. It's good for the environment and let's be real, it's good for my waistline.
2. Conserve water
Conserving water is one of the easiest things to do that has one of the biggest impacts on the world. Cut your shower time by a few minutes in the morning, turn off the sink while you brush your teeth, and be conscious of how much water you're using when you're doing dishes or cleaning your car. There are so many people who don't even have access to clean water. We are blessed and we have a responsibility to use the water we do have well.
3. Choose renewable packaging
This was a new one for me, but I realized that much like I use my dollar vote when buying organic, healthy products, I'm also using my dollar vote for that product's packaging. Buying products in biodegradable or renewable packaging (like cartons) helps me shrink my global footprint a little bit. Living in the country that I do, with the privilege that I have, my global footprint is pretty freaking big. I'll take any opportunity I can to shrink it even a little bit.
0 comments