So it's finally over- 9 days of an alternative lifestyle. I think that I learned a lot over this time, mostly because of the way it now forces me to often look from another perspective. Instead of looking at foods and deciding which looks like it would be good but cheap, I now tend to take into account the real cost of me buying it (packaging, transportation, how much CORN is in it, and my health). I also am much more concience about how much recycling gets mixed with trash. After minimizing waste during the Lifestyle Project and recycling anything that does need to be thrown away, it has begun to become habit to be more waste-aware instead of habitually being scrapping the things I use. I found this especially true in respect to the amount of water I now use. I was pretty easily able to cut the amount of water I used in half, not just in the shower but my average sink time as well. I even try to reuse my plate in the Commons so there are less dishes to wash. Seeing that I can get everything accomplished comfortably in that amount of time, while my use being about half what it was before the project, I can't help but think of this whenever I turn on a water source, and now have a habit of using much less water.
What I am most happy about, however, is how the project has effected my health/life overall. Not only am I living with a little less impact on the health of the planet, but I have been eating more healthy as well. I find myself with the habit now of looking at labels for ingredients, weeding out the unhealthy from the healtheir choices, and hearing the arguement for boycotting meat in my head every time I reach for a burger. Although I am not a vegetarian, I can't help but feel like I have an understanding as to how vegetarians can choose the lifestyle they live, and even a tenacity to support them in their efforts. After all, why should we support industries with unhealthy practices that produce questionable products and pollute the environment?
A more abstract synopsis of the Lifestyle Project, however, may be Dr. Van Horn's infultration of our daily life to eventually recruit us for his environmentalist-army...
Saturday, November 28, 2009
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
My New Life
This project ended up being surprisingly easier than I expected, I had to make some adjustments in my original plan but i feel like I am now making less of an impact of the world. I started out making myself be really hardcore and almost over the top trying to do as much as I could to change my life and then by the second week I realized that I may be able to stand doing this for this project but what about after? Wasn't this suppose to be a LIFE project, so I decided to change my look on this project and actually make changes that I could apply to my everyday life. I still did the whole be super serious on the specific days but was also very environmentally aware on the other days. I have cut my shower down by two minutes on average, and my energy usage has gone way down. I have started using natural light all day everyday, and after realizing that the big light in my room used less energy than my lamp I am more willing to use it. Our room is always very hot so we would always have two fans running, obviously that was a huge waste of energy so along with using natural light I started using the cool breeze to try to lower the temp in my room. Along with me my roommate realized how much energy she was using decided to begin trying to conserve energy also, usually I would walk in the room and every single light would be on and I have told her how wasteful she was being so when I started the project she started to watch her energy intake as well. A long with using less energy in my room I have stopped taking the elevator, only taking it when I do laundry or bring up groceries. I also did the food project, my biggest change was the amount of food I wasted. At first I was doing the vegeterian thing but like I said I wanted to make this an actual change to my life something that would stick so I changed my focus to not cutting it out all the way but trying to choose more vegetables and fruits. My main focus with food was not wasting any, I didn't realize how much I was wasting till I made myself pay attention, instead of throwing it out I started either saving it for later or composting it. The last part of my project was leaving my car at home which wasn't a hard thing to do especially during the last week when my battery died, but before it did I would only drive if I really needed to and if I was carpooling, like going to the grocery store etc. Over all i enjoyed this project more than I anticapted and made some life long changes that I probably wouldn't have even known to make if it wasn't for this project and this class.
more digging in the dirt
I'm glad that everyone has had success in their projects. In retrospect, I guess I could have committed to some fasting myself along with my project. It's great to hear all the things that have been encountered when beginning a different lifestyle.
The last time that I was out at the garden, I was there longer than usual and it seemed like I got less done. Some weeds are more resilient than others I guess. But I know that in order to get the job done right, you have to spend time at it. If you don't try to get the entire plant out of the ground, you risk it growing back again. Hopefully, more work now will mean less later. I appreciate all of the others that have been helping. My project will be ongoing. I have been taking photos as the hillside has been cleaned up and I will continue until the project is finished. I live in the area and will hopefully have the opportunity to work on the hillside during the winter break. I look forward to seeing it completed and am excited to be working on a project that will benefit those on campus for a long time. Everyone should stop by next spring and see the results. Happy Thanksgiving!!!
The last time that I was out at the garden, I was there longer than usual and it seemed like I got less done. Some weeds are more resilient than others I guess. But I know that in order to get the job done right, you have to spend time at it. If you don't try to get the entire plant out of the ground, you risk it growing back again. Hopefully, more work now will mean less later. I appreciate all of the others that have been helping. My project will be ongoing. I have been taking photos as the hillside has been cleaned up and I will continue until the project is finished. I live in the area and will hopefully have the opportunity to work on the hillside during the winter break. I look forward to seeing it completed and am excited to be working on a project that will benefit those on campus for a long time. Everyone should stop by next spring and see the results. Happy Thanksgiving!!!
Overall, a Great Experience
These three changes have taught me quite a bit about how to live a bit simpler and more carefully. The easiest of my three challenges was still reducing my electricity and water. I have learned lots of little tricks to reduce water usage that will be in my life for the rest of my life. For example, I found that if I don’t get ice in my cup, all of the water a get at a meal will not be wasted. I’ve found how to reuse water; sometimes using the same water for lots of dishes, or using runoff to shave my legs. For electricity, I found I just hardly ever need lights on. In my attempt to save electricity, I found myself going outside more often to get work done, and I found that quite enjoyable. It has even made me be around people more often. To keep the lights off, I would go sit in my hall with other people at night. The food changes I’ve made will have an extremely lasting effect on me. I don’t know that for the rest of my life I will no longer be a glutton, in fact I know I will always have my gluttonous moments. However, from this point forward I know that I will always eat consciously. Each time I get up for another serving I will think first. I found this last week that even on days that I didn’t specify as no food waste days, I still would be hesitant to get a second serving. At the end of each day of only eating what I needed and not wasting any food, I was so proud. It will be nice to continue that feeling. The most fun experience of all this was the laundry day. That was a huge success. I will post pictures very soon. It was so much fun. I spent the whole day outside and found I loved drying peoples laundry for them, it was rewarding. The lines were right by the highway for all the cars on Southwestern Blvd to see. Every hour or so, there was a honk. I like to think they honked because it was a great idea (although that may be wishful thinking). You know what else I found? I thought the laundry lines were absolutely beautiful. They made me smile all day. After Sunday, I cannot imagine why neighborhood associations would ban drying laundry outside. I think they could bring something wonderful to a neighborhood. It’s a great idea; a solar powered dryer.
endings and beginings
During the final week of this sustainability project, the temperature decreased a bit, re-enforcing not planting many flowers at the end of November. However, I was able to transplant a few tropical sage flowers from my house (we have an abundance). Their red flowers liven up the shade. I also made a bird’s eye view of where to plant the flowers and I drew a picture of the flowers together. I hope to post these as soon as I figure out how.
I know I can get turkscaps at an organic nursery near Smithville, if I can’t find a local source. The other flowers I will try to find as the temperatures warm. This project is ongoing, and will hopefully eventually spread out of the garden to the dorm rooms and home with students.
This is the beginning of a continuous project, that I hope will continue to be maintained even after I graduate. I feel like having flowers in a shady area will liven it up and show people that there can be color and life everywhere. Perhaps this area will be expanded to also grow vegetables or herbs, but for now it is just native flowers to bring joy, right at the front of the garden.
Wrapping it up
Week of November 16-20
It’s amazing how quickly these past few weeks have flown by! Of the three catagories that I selected for my lifestyle project, I’d have to say that garbage elimination was the hardest. A person truly doesn’t realize how much throw away in 1 day, until it is forbidden. I was not aware that most of what I eat is disposable. So many times I went to pop a bag of popcorn or toast a pop tart without realizing that, alas, I could not. Having completed this project, I am ashamed to say that I am going to continue throwing things away. However, now I will think twice before I dispose of something that could be reusable or check to see if it is recyclable. My second biggest challenge for this project was initiating some changes, ie recycling bins and the elimination of Styrofoam cups, in my workplace (Innerspace Cavern) . Recycling bins were badly needed next to all of the registers because of all the receipts and aluminum cans that get tossed out every day, and everyone knows that Styrofoam is just plain bad. I thought that, perhaps, there would be some extra bins in the warehouse that I could use for my project so that I would not have to go out and use up more resources, but unfortunately, there was not. I went out and bought 6 recycling bins: one for the gift shop, one for the ticket booth, two for the snack bar, and two for the office spaces behind closed doors. Then, I painted the bins green and labeled them “Paper Recycling” and one “Aluminum Recycling” so that everyone would know what they are. Every Sunday, when I work, I am going to take the recycling to a bin close by my house. I plan to continue this process as long as I work at Innerspace. It needs to be done, and no one else is going to do it. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get anything accomplished with the elimination of Styrofoam cups . The last phase of my project was water and electricity conservation. This was probably the least challenging because I already use very little electricity and water. However, I did notice that when I shower in the mornings and I am half awake, I probably use more water than I initially thought. I asked a friend to time me once, and it turns out that my showers are a little under 8 minutes rather than the 5 that I had expected. So, I apologize to all those people that I bragged to about taking 5 minute showers. I still protest that showers can be short, regardless of how long your hair is!!! Also, I noted the amount of time that I spent washing dishes, and I kept my loads of laundry to a minimum. With the electricity challenge, I simply kept on one incandescent light in my room when I needed to do homework, and that was enough. Most of the rest of the time I could get by with just opening the blinds in my room. Natural light is a beautiful thing! My roommate challenged me often, however, keeping on more lights than we really need. I also made sure to turn off lights when no one was in the room and limit my leisure time on the computer. I don’t know how the technology fast people could survive without a computer for 4 days. My computer is a very important element in my school work. Wrapping things up. This lifestyle project helped me to think about what I throw away, reduce waste in the workplace, and continue to conserve water and electricity. It’s been fun! Peace out!
It’s amazing how quickly these past few weeks have flown by! Of the three catagories that I selected for my lifestyle project, I’d have to say that garbage elimination was the hardest. A person truly doesn’t realize how much throw away in 1 day, until it is forbidden. I was not aware that most of what I eat is disposable. So many times I went to pop a bag of popcorn or toast a pop tart without realizing that, alas, I could not. Having completed this project, I am ashamed to say that I am going to continue throwing things away. However, now I will think twice before I dispose of something that could be reusable or check to see if it is recyclable. My second biggest challenge for this project was initiating some changes, ie recycling bins and the elimination of Styrofoam cups, in my workplace (Innerspace Cavern) . Recycling bins were badly needed next to all of the registers because of all the receipts and aluminum cans that get tossed out every day, and everyone knows that Styrofoam is just plain bad. I thought that, perhaps, there would be some extra bins in the warehouse that I could use for my project so that I would not have to go out and use up more resources, but unfortunately, there was not. I went out and bought 6 recycling bins: one for the gift shop, one for the ticket booth, two for the snack bar, and two for the office spaces behind closed doors. Then, I painted the bins green and labeled them “Paper Recycling” and one “Aluminum Recycling” so that everyone would know what they are. Every Sunday, when I work, I am going to take the recycling to a bin close by my house. I plan to continue this process as long as I work at Innerspace. It needs to be done, and no one else is going to do it. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get anything accomplished with the elimination of Styrofoam cups . The last phase of my project was water and electricity conservation. This was probably the least challenging because I already use very little electricity and water. However, I did notice that when I shower in the mornings and I am half awake, I probably use more water than I initially thought. I asked a friend to time me once, and it turns out that my showers are a little under 8 minutes rather than the 5 that I had expected. So, I apologize to all those people that I bragged to about taking 5 minute showers. I still protest that showers can be short, regardless of how long your hair is!!! Also, I noted the amount of time that I spent washing dishes, and I kept my loads of laundry to a minimum. With the electricity challenge, I simply kept on one incandescent light in my room when I needed to do homework, and that was enough. Most of the rest of the time I could get by with just opening the blinds in my room. Natural light is a beautiful thing! My roommate challenged me often, however, keeping on more lights than we really need. I also made sure to turn off lights when no one was in the room and limit my leisure time on the computer. I don’t know how the technology fast people could survive without a computer for 4 days. My computer is a very important element in my school work. Wrapping things up. This lifestyle project helped me to think about what I throw away, reduce waste in the workplace, and continue to conserve water and electricity. It’s been fun! Peace out!
Monday, November 23, 2009
What it all boils down to
Sorry about the tardiness of this post- my laptop was acting goofy and the link was saved on here...blah blah blah I'm sure you guys like my excuses.
Well, this week was an experience- four days! I feel like I'd be repeating myself too much if I summarized how each day/project went like I have the last two weeks, so I'm just going to list off the obstacles of this week.
TECHNOLOGY FAST: papers, tests and homework were plentiful, the internet would've been welcomed with open arms; plans for going home this week would have been much more extensive had I had my cell phone; I could have gotten more online Christmas shopping done with the internet as well; the rain limited my outdoor time, so much time was spent..thinking..? (pro or con?)
ELECTRICITY: the rain limited the sunlight that I had been using to light my room-lights were on much more often; one lightbulb in my bathroom is flickering, so instead of turning on that one light in the middle of the bathroom, my suitemates tend to turn on two other lights to compensate; with all the extra studying, I was for an unfortunate amount of time=lights on much more often in the early mornings
WASTE: I recieved a couple packages in the mail, one contained packing peanuts, one was in a large box, and the other was in a thick padded (not recyclable) envelope; with all the running around of this week, my roommate ate a lot of fast food, quickly filling our trashcan.
By these cons, it must look like I had a difficult week, but honestly, it was comparable to the other two. I take this as a great sign because doubling the amount of days I do the projects should double the effort. I really loved this project. As cliche as this totally is, it made me just stop and think and not worry and slow down. All of those are actions not usually taken by me, all very unusual feelings for me. A couple of times when on a normal day I'd be drowning in anxiety, I felt like I was breathing the lightest, freshest air I had ever encountered. I completely plan on continuing to every once in a while do a technology fast. And as the waste and electricity reduction were not that difficult, I 100% plan to contine with those. Through the weeks, I pretty much did those every day, it was hard to not feel guilty when I threw something away.. haha
Well, this week was an experience- four days! I feel like I'd be repeating myself too much if I summarized how each day/project went like I have the last two weeks, so I'm just going to list off the obstacles of this week.
TECHNOLOGY FAST: papers, tests and homework were plentiful, the internet would've been welcomed with open arms; plans for going home this week would have been much more extensive had I had my cell phone; I could have gotten more online Christmas shopping done with the internet as well; the rain limited my outdoor time, so much time was spent..thinking..? (pro or con?)
ELECTRICITY: the rain limited the sunlight that I had been using to light my room-lights were on much more often; one lightbulb in my bathroom is flickering, so instead of turning on that one light in the middle of the bathroom, my suitemates tend to turn on two other lights to compensate; with all the extra studying, I was for an unfortunate amount of time=lights on much more often in the early mornings
WASTE: I recieved a couple packages in the mail, one contained packing peanuts, one was in a large box, and the other was in a thick padded (not recyclable) envelope; with all the running around of this week, my roommate ate a lot of fast food, quickly filling our trashcan.
By these cons, it must look like I had a difficult week, but honestly, it was comparable to the other two. I take this as a great sign because doubling the amount of days I do the projects should double the effort. I really loved this project. As cliche as this totally is, it made me just stop and think and not worry and slow down. All of those are actions not usually taken by me, all very unusual feelings for me. A couple of times when on a normal day I'd be drowning in anxiety, I felt like I was breathing the lightest, freshest air I had ever encountered. I completely plan on continuing to every once in a while do a technology fast. And as the waste and electricity reduction were not that difficult, I 100% plan to contine with those. Through the weeks, I pretty much did those every day, it was hard to not feel guilty when I threw something away.. haha
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