New year’s goals that help the environment
Photo by Gaelle Marcel on Unsplash
A quick scroll through your social media feed, or a flick through a magazine in recent weeks means you’ve probably come across some kind of promotion or advertisement for living a more sustainable lifestyle this year. Whether it's Veganuary, or a No Buy Challenge or simply ways to manage your energy bills … all kinds of improvement challenges are in our minds.
We set ourselves goals and resolutions for all kinds of areas in our life: ways we want to improve personally or professionally. These are great things to do. But perhaps we could also reflect on the ways in which we can have a positive impact on the world we live in. After all, the way we live has consequences for everyone around us.
With that in mind, here are five areas where we can all make a small, but important difference in our shared home:
Start with your garden
Gardens are perfect places to make a positive impact on the environment so why not try some of these gardening tips? Most of these will mean less work too!
Leave a patch of your lawn unmowed, or even better sow some native wildflower seeds.This can provide a home for some minibeasts and even hedgehogs. Native wildflowers have the added bonus of being very low maintenance and look amazing when in full bloom.
If you want to go a step further, take part in “No-Mow May”, where you refrain from mowing your grass for the month of May. It’s a great way to allow some of the key plants to flourish, and will attract pollinators.
Reuse and recycle
The “circular economy” is a concept where items are kept in circulation for as long as possible before going into landfill, so before throwing something out, see if you can find another use for it.
Upcycle! Maybe a lick of paint might brighten up an old coffee table, or an old wine bottle or jam jar could be used as a candle holder or vase.
Check if there is a local freecycle group where you can find someone who might use the item you no longer need. This prolongs the time the item spends out of landfill.
Before buying something, it’s always good to check freecycle or buy and sell websites to see if anyone has a secondhand one. You still may decide to buy new, but there’s no harm in checking first!
Get involved in your community
Many local areas organise cleanups every now and then; why not take part? It’s a really tangible way of helping the environment as you can have a visible and immediate impact and it’s a wonderful way to meet people in your community. Why not get the whole family involved?
Rethink your morning coffee
Buy a reusable takeaway coffee cup and keep it in your bag or your car. You can even buy a collapsable one to save space. Most coffee shops give you a small discount for bringing your own cup which is an extra bonus. Or on your next trip, keep the carry tray and bring it back to the coffee shop on further outings. If they’re sturdy enough, you should get about 10 uses out of them.
Manage your plastic use
I heard once that the inventor of plastic was so conscious of all the paper being used for bags, that he wanted to develop an alternative. It’s unfortunate that his eco-focused invention has become one of the environment’s biggest problems. Plastic is extremely useful in so many ways but there are ways we can manage our usage to delay it going to landfill.
If possible, replace Ziploc bags with paper bags (available in the supermarket) for freezing or storing, or invest in reusable ones.
When shopping, try to buy loose fruit and veg rather than those in all the plastic packaging.
Wash out and keep takeaway, sweets, and soup containers. They’re really handy for toy storage or freezing food. Porridge oat scoops are handy to throw into your rice or dry pet food to reuse as a scoop!
Unfortunately, toys are one of the worst culprits for plastic. Check the packaging and materials on toys you buy or try to buy toys that are locally and sustainably made. It’s not always possible but worth it when you can.
The novelist Elizabeth Goudge once said, "Our true home is where what is around us echoes the best that we are." Even our smallest actions can have huge ripple effects. Living out our best helps not only us but everyone.
