I have been following media and discussion on social media about climate change and global warming and how we need to take action. I agree that it is an important and serious topic and that we all should work together to stop the change, make a change instead. I feel that at the moment the media is full of instructions on what to do and what to do not. Those instructions, or the way those are told, make me feel that people should feel bad of doing certain things that they are used to do and which maybe bring a lot of joy to them. Everything should be changed, here and now.
“Flying is bad
Eating meat is bad
Buying new stuff is bad
etc.”
Like I wrote on one of my first blog posts, I believe in baby steps. I could compare the situation above to running a marathon. If you are asked to run a marathon, but you are not a runner at all, can you manage to run 42,195 km directly? If you try to run a marathon at once without practicing, you fail. You lose your motivation quickly and probably do not see the finish line. Instead, if you start with baby steps: first walking, then running slowly, running longer paths, running a bit faster and longer. That is how you learn. You get used to running, you enjoy it more, and when it is time to run a marathon, it does not feel that hard and you reach the finish line with a smile on your face.
So what I’m saying is that you do not need to stop flying, stop eating meat, stop buying stuff etc. Just start to think about it more. Could you for example; instead of flying take part to a business meeting through Skype, add more veggies to your weekly diet by trying new recipes, prefer locally produced food, start recycling if you do not do that yet, prefer fabric shopping bags, think before buying something if you really need to buy it, do you need it and could you maybe borrow it instead of buying, etc. Change your habits little by little.
I think it would be more important to get everyone to take part and do at least something, baby steps, instead of trying to get everyone to do everything, that is not gonna work. Changing peoples habits is hard. If there is too much pressure and YOU NEED TO DO THIS stuff, most of the people will just leave it like “f*** this”. Instead of trying to change everyone’s behavior and habits largely and significantly at once, I would recommend to encourage and inspire and support each other to get started little by little. Everyone doing even a little is quite a lot in total.
I’m going to write more about fashion another time, until that you can read my previous baby steps to a more sustainable fashion post here.
And an important announcement! I have fixed a new commenting box, which enables commenting easier without logging in anywhere. Please do not hesitate to leave comments.
VIIVI